Everyone in the neighbourhood expects me to mow the tall grass that grew there for years, and I don't wanna, don't have a tool to do it, and think wildflowers are great for all the bugs sticking around. Apparently there's snakes too!
But I will have to clear some of the area in order to plant something. I comfort myself in the knowledge there will still be plenty of tall grass left over, I won't completely destroy the bug ecosystem.
Inspired by my 'use the ground covered by a pile of wood to plant' scenario, I thought of a plan. What if instead of cutting grass, I use all those rotten boards to flatten and cover it. That way the bugs can just relocate where they like it best, it's not a violent action. The soil will receive some moisture from it, the grass will eventually die and become food to different types of bugs, turn to compost, and as the end result, I will have a perfect gardening space for my fall garden.
Inspired by this, I braved to finish unraveling the big pile of beams and boards, it was easier now because some of it was just getting dragged to the grass! Here's how much grass I covered:
I did step on a nail once, but since every board had like 7 nails sticking out and beams had 30 each, this went well. It didn't pierce deep into me and I'm vaccinated against tetanus so I feel fine.
Here's all the wooden beams I stored into the shed:
If you wonder why I put them together in this specific way, I learned to do it as a child but now I can explain why.
Putting a row of sticks inbetween rows of beams ensures that every beam has access to air, that means it's less likely to start rotting or spreading moisture in the structure. The second reason is weight distribution; every beam is putting weight on the sticks, holding them firmly in place and making sure the next row has a flat structure to lie on. As a result, this is stable and won't topple over, nothing can fall down on me, I can climb it safely and store other stuff on top. This is also a good way to store wooden boards you want to protect from rotting.
I did find a few wooden boards that aren't rotted yet, and could be used as shelving or maybe an outdoor table. I'm excited thinking about that! I don't have to use a hammer, I could just arrange bricks to hold them up. That way they're easily re-used too.
There's a lot more rubble to clean; looking at it from afar I assumed it was all bricks, but they looked yellow and dirty. I figured I'd just clean them. Once I climbed on top of the rubble, I grabbed a yellow brick and it simply fell apart in my hands.
It was not bricks. This ex barn was built using unbaked raw clay! Clay was mixed with wheat husks and shaped into bricks. I immediately got so excited, because I didn't know people used to do that, and how awesome is that. This means two things: one, I have a nearly unlimited supply of clay directly in my front yard, most of it brick shaped. Two, if I don't clear it before the rain, it's going to melt into the ground.
I'd rather not convert most of my soil into a clay area; even though it's better at retaining water than siga, it's still not the best for gardening, and it would take many years for wild plants to want to grow in it. It takes sturdy and deep roots to push through clay, most garden plants wouldn't manage it. It is good as an underlayer beneath the fertile soil, but imagine trying to remove all soil to install an underlayer? You can do it in a raised garden but it would disturb the ecosystem if done on a wider level.
I do want raised beds too but I have to take a year to figure out where plants like growing the best!
