Cindi ...

I primarily use shredded oak leaves for my mulch both in fall and spring in my home garden. I always put down shredded leaves in fall and the rain and snow contribute to the decomposition. They are gone by spring.

I think you might want to do some research about how much water a mature oak tree uses in your area each day. My research of the California white and black oaks in our area showed that the trees use 70gals of water a day. They are incredible competitors for both nutrients and water and will also send roots up into raised beds.

I did the research because I cannot have a vegetable garden on my own property, but have had one on a friends. Most of her property is an oak forest with a few open spaces. My yield was quite poor until I did the research on the trees and made some adjustments. I still don't get sufficient yield to satisfy me for the amount of time and work involved in maintaining that garden. I am thinking of abandoning that gardening effort.

Smiles,
Lyn

I did leave last year's shredded leaves on the beds over the winter but then that's buried under new fall leaves as it's too far into cold weather to shred the new leaves and reapply for winter. Leaves don't stop falling until around Thanksgiving and we generally get our first frost (if not snow) by Halloween. I grow mostly non-fussy perennial ornamentals under the oaks at the moment but hoping to find something edible to interplant - maybe fruiting shrubs of some type. I grow elderberries in part shade but they don't get enough sun (or moisture?) to flower. I grow all of my greens, carrots and radishes in pots - they like it better than my garden soil.

Oh, I do agree with you. I don't think it gets quite as cold in my climate, but it's my version of cold. Our first snow is usually around Thanksgiving.

I gather leaves in fall where I have my vegetable garden and haul them home simply because I don't have enough trees on my home property. Yes, I shred them and re-mulch the garden so that the material will decompose and feed the soil. The spring mulching, which also feeds the soil, is primarily to hold moisture in the soil through my high summer temps. Those high temps will decompose those leaves almost completely before our first frost date, which is around the end of October.

I cannot grow vegetables in my home garden because of the high heat zone, the higher elevation which impacts the quality of the light and because of the aspect of my garden which traps heat and the lack of fertility of my soil. They grow food crops in Arizona and even the central valley of California which certainly has high temps, so heat is only one of the factors that impairs my ability to grow a lot vegetables in my home garden.

I agree with Hazelnut that our food chain has been horribly contaminated and producing our food is important. I just wish I had more land.

Smiles,
Lyn

In retrospect, I wish I would have tried more shade vegetable gardening waaay back when I first bought this property. Back then it was - no sun, no vegetable garden. So I worked at developing a shade garden with ornamentals. We have had to take out a few oaks along the way and I could conceivably rip out some of my shade plants and put in some edibles in part shade/part sun but I've grown rather attached to some of them. Others I can remove and free up some space but I'll be faced with dry part shade.
It sounds as if you do have a difficult site to work with. Can you do any edibles in pots?

Hi Cindi ...

I have a few containers with vegetables and fruit and truly hate container gardening up here. Even with the right potting soil and large containers, I often have to water a couple of times a day. I am not fond of drip irrigation for container gardening.

Smiles,
Lyn

I wish I could siphon some Alabama sunshine to y'all!

That is dedication to water pots a couple of times a day. Even more dedication to drive somewhere else to garden. Similar to community gardens. I feel lucky to have adaptable space at home.
Thanks, Hazelnut, for the thought. I have sunshine but very clear blue skies indicative of the high pressure from the north which translates to cold. We were barely above freezing with sunny skies yesterday. Supposed to get warmer weather this week with rain instead of snow.

Temperature around 40 here today, Thunderstorms predicted over the first of the week. I just edited a report with photographs of historic buildings in the snow. The survey was in SW Tennessee completed a few weeks ago. So snow is not far away. The thing about permaculture is that where there is a will there is almost always a way to grow plants. But, it is very difficult to grow plants without sun.