How to Create a Living Mulch | With Kath Irvine

What if the best mulch isn't something you buy or wheel around the garden—but something that's already growing?

In this conversation with Kath Irvine, author of The Edible Backyard, we explore the science and practical application of living mulch. Instead of constantly importing straw, compost, or woodchips, Kath explains how diverse, living plants can protect the soil, feed soil biology, reduce weeds, build resilience, and ultimately create a healthier garden with less work.

We discuss why diversity matters, how plant roots feed soil microbes, why chopping plants can be better than pulling them out, and how to introduce living mulch into both vegetable gardens and orchards. We also tackle some of the difficult realities of gardening—including invasive weeds, compost overuse, and when there may not be a perfect solution.

If you're aiming for a low-input, high-output garden that works more like nature, this episode will challenge many of the gardening "rules" we've been taught.

🌱 What You'll Discover

•  What living mulch is and how it differs from traditional mulch 
•  Why plant diversity creates healthier, more resilient soil 
•  How living roots feed soil biology through photosynthesis 
•  Practical ways to introduce living mulch into vegetable gardens 
•  Creating productive orchards with perennial companion plants 
•  Why "chop and drop" often beats pulling weeds 
•  The surprising downside of using too much compost 
•  Choosing and saving seeds for diverse living mulch mixes 
•  Managing difficult weeds without becoming overwhelmed 
•  Why observation may be the most important gardening skill of all 

📚 References & Resources Mentioned

• The Edible Backyard — Kath Irvine 
• Homegrown Fruit — Kath Irvine 

Kath Irvine's website

Referenced

•  Dr Christine Jones' work on soil biology and plant diversity
  
  
•  The Jena Experiment (Germany) — biodiversity and ecosystem resilience

🎧 Previous White Strawberries Episodes You Might Enjoy

Mulch and Ground Covers | Mastering the Garden
 

Companion Planting: Figs, Grapes, Olives & Companions | Mastering the Garden
 

About Sam – Learn more about the host of White Strawberries.

Support the Podcast – Buy Sam a Cuppa to help keep new episodes coming.

Join Grounded – Be first to hear when the course opens.

Ask a Question – Submit a gardening question for a future episode.

Transcript

[00:00:00] 

We know mulching our gardens is important and creating nutrient-dense soil is important, but what about if we're doing this the hard way? Maybe we're moving wheelbarrows of hay from one area to another, or we're shopping for fertilizers, albeit organic and natural.

 If you've listened to this podcast before, you'll know I'm all for low input, high output gardens and letting nature do its thing. If you haven't, then hi, I'm Sam. My family and I eat over 80% of the fruit and produce from our land, and this happens in and around podcasting, work, school, adventure, family, and play.

I'm super excited to bring you this conversation with Kath Irvine, author of The Edible Backyard, passionate permaculture teacher who has designed, taught, and managed food gardens for more than 20 years, successfully feeding her own family of six. That is a big deal, I'm just saying. We talk about how to create a living mulch. Check her out 

Mulch comes two ways. The overall of mulch is a covering on the soil, and nature mostly does this using plants what we would call a living [00:01:00] mulch.

But inert mulch, that was the big, new thing to do, as I've journeyed along, we're learning now more and more about the value of living mulch, and it makes complete sense because that's how nature does it.

I-N-E-R-T? 

I just called it an urch because that's made up of like, you know, straws and wood chips and that kind of thing. So things that are no longer connected to roots and living. 

Mm. We've got living mulch in terms of we might chop it and drop it, but it was alive growing in that space- 

Yes ... 

Yes. As opposed to part of what nature's offering us but has come maybe further abroad, maybe it's a big tree that's been chopped into tiny little bits. Maybe it's leaves that we've collected up the road- Yep ... that type of thing we've brought onto our site. 

What kind of- Yep ... turned you then to living mulch?

It was actually Dr. Christine Jones many years ago. She did a tour of New Zealand. It was really listening to her that , switched it on. But I was really primed for that moment because [00:02:00] I'd been observing it in my own garden anyway. When my kids were young, I had this massive time deficit, and I wasn't able to keep up with all that mulching that I had decided was the way to go.

And it was during that time of watching what happened in my garden when I let it go and was no longer able to mulch, and I actually started to think, "Oh, gosh, this is actually looking a lot healthier." What was happening in my veggie garden at the time were things were self-seeding and growing and filling the space that the mulch that I would've normally been applying and keeping on applying.

And I definitely started to notice an increase in performance and health. So when I listened to Christine Jones, who I advocate every single person who is interested in gardening hooks up with and listens to, and the work that she had done and the advantages of this living ground cover. Yeah.

And not only in the veggie garden, so this applies to beneath our fruit trees, [00:03:00] to paddocks and pasture, to, whether you're planting a shelterbelt, doesn't matter what, you want to have a mixture. And it's the diversity of plants that really is the core of her work and the gift that she brings to us.

It starts with photosynthesis, right? So sun shines down on the foliage, and through that absolutely incredibly miraculous happening of photosynthesis inside the foliage, carbohydrates are created. And, the plant uses a portion of those for growth, and another, quite considerable portion, goes out the roots as exudates, and those exudates are feeding the biology in the soil.

So that's how important they are. The plant gives up all of those carbohydrates it's generated to keep them fed. they are the bridge between the nutrition and the soil. That's how the plant takes up nutrients. They are nutrient conversion. [00:04:00] They are information. There is the information highway connecting all the other plants, particularly through the fungi, through the mycorrhizal network.

they are pest and disease resistance. It's incredibly mind-blowing what the functions that they are doing. Like the symbiotic relationship with the plant, where the plant is actually fostering particular relationships depending on what mineral it's requiring. I mean, it's outstanding. And the intelligence in nature, you know, it's inspiring.

It inspires us to step back and trust nature more. The more I learn about how wise and how on it nature is- Mm ... the less I wanna actually stick my, stick my oar in. So, that's going on, that's feeding in, in the root system beneath the plant, which is called the rhizosphere.

. just trillions of different microscopic, biologies that work in there. And each plant, whether it's perennial or annual, but particularly within different families, syncs with different biological actions, right?

[00:05:00] And so as a very simplistic way to approach our garden, we need as much diversity of biology as possible, ergo, we need as much diversity of plants. 

There's a German, long-running trial using green cropping, where they were trialing two plant families, three plant families, four, six, all the way up to I think maybe 18.

And measuring cropping and abundance and health and all that kind of jam. The greatest measure came when a massive flood came through and what do you know? The fields with four families and up rebounded really quickly. what an observation and what a learning. So six seems to be, Christine Jones's measure.

It's not science that I myself have ever done. I'm leaning on her information and all her field work. and I certainly am seeing the evidence in many different ways in the garden. And one of the ones I love the most is slugs and snails, interestingly, in these diverse living mulches.

Slugs and [00:06:00] snails are still there, but the damage is nothing like in my mulched rows. It's very interesting to me what's going on there. 

. This will be really new to people, especially those that enjoy a weed-free, garden bed with lines of certain vegetables. 

Mm. 

What would a veggie patch look like in thinking about diversity in terms of six?

Then also what would an orchard look like or a food forest or whatever we wanna call that with fruit trees? Mm. 

Yeah. 

this is awesome because... So we'll sort of have some virtual, gardening conversations because you can still absolutely have rows, you know? So we're not, there's no dogma here, 

there's just, creating a space that rather than try and follow someone else's pattern, that we create the garden that we love. That's really important, there's definitely space for rows, and there's also a lot of space for transitioning into this very new paradigm.

I've [00:07:00] been playing with living mulches, intensely for 10 years- But when I first started, you know, I had been over-composting and I'd just like to spend a little moment on there before I dive into the virtual garden. I had been over-composting, and man, this is one of the most common things I come across and this is the pattern, right?

"My garden was thriving. It was growing well. I was having amazing crops. I'm making my own compost, and now everything's just stunted, and I'm getting disease, and things aren't flying so well." and a common thing that happens is a mineral lockup from too much compost. There is a definite limit to the amount of compost we need 

How do we know that? We look out in nature and we see that happen. compost is definitely required, depending on your individual soil, as to how much you need or not. Compost is definitely required, but a heap less than what we're generally gotten used to using in our modern world.

Our soils are [00:08:00] generally desperately overfed. Because, you know, we can go into a garden center and there's bags and bags of wondrous miracle cures, and most of them, lots of them now are organic and they are natural, and we're just pouring them on more, and more, and more. And of course, we have our little garden giggle and call that the moron effect.

But, instead, the thing about the living mulch, you know, that process we were talking about, the sun, the plant, creating the carbohydrates and exuding them out the roots and the biology converting those minerals, that is the fertility we want to lean on most heavily, because there are a lot less deleterious side effects to it.

an important thing to think about, too, is the fact that, even natural fertilizers and composts are disrupting the aquifers and flowing into our groundwater and our waterways and things like that, too. So it's good to stretch our minds out beyond just our cropping and how well our crops are doing.

It's important that we're also looking at the bigger picture of our wider environment and our contribution to the waterways. 

So let's think now [00:09:00] about, what the living mulch in a veggie garden is actually gonna look like. So I'm gonna start with some ideas of rows, because they're, A, we love rows, you know, but also, B, rows are entirely practical.

There are lots of moments where a row is practical. so you put up a frame for your peas. Your peas need a frame. You're gonna have to have a row, because they're on that frame. crops like carrots, and leeks, and garlic, and onions, things which don't take up a lot of ground space, they're not the big, bulgy plants, they also work well in at, through the very least, groups or rows or clumps together.

corn is another one. Because of the pollination up top, we wanna always have that in a block, in a block together. So you are going to have these. It's not completely, you know, wildflower meadow type style, you know. But what you do is you just start to get creative and think, "How can I bring diversity to this row?"

So there's an opportunity, next door, behind the row and beside the [00:10:00] row. There's also an opportunity for diversity before the row even comes into being. 

let's pretend we're starting a new veggie bed, right? my favorite way to do that is to build a compost pile on it. Once that's broken down, spread that out, chuck in a, mixed Six Families plus green crop on the soil. And then once that green crop's up, sort of pre-flowering-ish, but you can make that work for you, you can plant crops amongst that green crop.

So if you can visualize that, you've got , a mixed green crop, like a lovely, lush, green, diverse carpet of plants, and little pockets in between that, of your crop. if it's small stuff like carrots, you might just chop a row of that, completely down to then sow your, carrots in a row.

Lettings You'll smash that green crop right down more likely [00:11:00] and, plant your half a dozen or so saladings in that little wee space. bigger crops like zucchinis, pumpkins, corn, all the brassica, they fly beautifully in the pockets amongst the green crop.

And your management in this scenario becomes chop and drop. Ideally, but without being dogmatic or too precious about it, we're chopping our plants. We're not pulling them out. But let's not be afraid of pulling plants out. You're gonna pull the carrot, you're gonna pull the radish. some things, you know, you're gonna pull the buttercup because it's so, dominating.

So my favorite tool, in the garden since I've become a living mulcher is a flax cutter. It's like a little sickle, and it's got a serrated edge and a wooden handle, and you just whip around with that baby and you knock the tops off whatever isn't working in that space.

And it's either not working because quite simply you don't like it. It's your garden, that's, you know, [00:12:00] it's gardener's choice, right? Or it's not working because it's encroaching too much on your chosen crop. whatever reason, either one of those, you just sort of dip and dive between the plants you're keeping and the plants you wanna whip out, and, and there you're creating your ideal canvas in your garden using that chop and drop.

 Chop and drop is super fertile because what's happening below the soil, when a plant grows tall, its roots are correspondingly growing wider and further. Okay? When you chop it, the roots slough off, and there's a biological explosion in the soil of all that feeding.

it's a massive frenzy. 

Our soil needs those deep roots. It's absolutely, essential for soil structure and soil health. 

 Chopping and dropping- is new to people, I think, my mum will come over, and she will help me sometimes, and she just wants to get that root up, and it doesn't ma- ma- matter if it's a mizuna, which could just be chopped,

She's just got this idea that, , if there's roots in that soil, that it's not gonna be [00:13:00] happy. But what you're saying is that when we chop them, we're allowing those roots then to continue to do the thing. They're gonna feed the soil, Yeah ... they're holding onto a lot of nutrients you know, as they biodegrade, they're gonna create little paths for worms, and all that sort of thing.

we don't have to touch the ecosystem under the soil, for some people this will be completely new. 

Could you tell me what you would plant? so you said a brand-new garden bed, you would put a green crop in it.

what would you put in your green crop, 

so a green, green crop is a seasonally dependent moment. So there are green crops that you would use in warm weather and green crops that you use in cooler weather. 

Yep. 

and the options are diverse, and they're definitely, environment specific. So, for me, broad beans are amazing. That's the legume family. there could be oats, and there could be, mustard, Brassica family. There could be, oats are Poaceae, if I'm saying that correctly.

mustard's a Brassica, I will always, always get a taproot in, no matter [00:14:00] where I am. Taproots are super important, and I love using, daikon for that. Or sometimes it's called tillage radish. That's also a Brassica. 

it doesn't, they don't have to necessarily be so-called green crops. it's great to get some flowers in there as well. So, you know, calendula and borage at this time of year, are brilliant companions in that way. So borage is such a humble garden plant, but man alive, does it do beautiful things for soil, for bees above ground.

Ton of biomass. You know, a lot of people now are gardening in small gardens, and they're like, "Oh, but it's so bushy." I'm like, "We love the bushy plants because that's lots and lots of biomass," and this is our access to making our own compost. So homemade compost, is at its best when it's made with plants, and so we need to be growing our own.

And if we're leaning on a living mulch, we don't need half as much compost as we thought we always did. Parsley is also a brilliant in that scenario with [00:15:00] its wonderful taproot. coriander. Gosh, you can 

just- 

Mm ... you could just go and go with varieties. 

So these are 

also- But let's say, let's say that's where we've- ... edible. 

Yeah ... are, are, Yeah ... worthwhile in the garden regardless of the chop or drop. You know, regardless if we're using them as a liv- living mulch or- Yeah, and- ... if we're harvesting them for ourselves 

You can include leafy greens in your chop and drop and just be picking them, as if you were it's literally like foraging in your garden it becomes then.

And that works really well when you're picking leafy greens, to put in your soup or to put in your saute or your stir-fry or for a salad mixture just to be getting dill and parsley and, kale all from your green crop 

You'll be playing with this till you die, basically. . There's no end to the combinations of plants. Yeah. it is really fun, like you said. And so, I recommend, having, if you're interested in playing with the idea of living mulches, you need to have seed in your store cupboard, and that's the thing that you spend your money on is, [00:16:00] is green crop seed.

basically just seed, so as that you can make your own DIY, green crop mixes, which you are using in the same way you would use mulch. So you're still planting your central cropping plants at the same spacings that you would use as normal.

People worry that, that there's gonna be competition. This is probably the most common question I get about living mulch, "Oh, but don't they compete for nutrients and water." And this is a big lie that we've been told. nature is cooperative. And then, you know, you can look out at a forest and a prairie, at a jungle, and you can just, suddenly realize how egotistical and human-centric we are in that moment thinking, "God, how ever did nature survive before humans came along?"

Plants only need due space and lots of feeding where there is poor biological activity. Where there is rich biological activity, they need very little. [00:17:00] So, you know, it's something, it's something like d- depending on who you read, and because I'm not doing the science myself, you understand, because I'm listening to scientists who are doing the work, I don't have a figure for this next, statement.

But depending on who you listen to, there's a, it's, it's somewhere between 3 to 10% of a plant's requirements are met by organic matter added to the soil. The rest is met by biology. So that's a big, that's a huge paradigm- Absolutely ... you know, that basically wipes out all the garden products for sale.

So for me, the kit is this. it's a diverse mixture of seed in your cupboard. It's your homemade compost. Totally doable, 'cause you don't need as much now. and vermicastings are the other thing, because you have to recycle your food somewhere, right?

You may as well get a really simple homemade worm farm set up and get vermicastings, which have some kind of magic. They're like breast milk for babies, I suppose. they're just absolute magic. So that's my kit. That's my health kit. My [00:18:00] living mulch. 

 The vermicasting- the tea that you're getting from the bottom, are you using that to water seedlings and things that are ready to go out and be put into this living mulch?

 Any liquid that comes off the worm farm is really just a leachate.

It's very variable at best. There will be sure some biology in it. the most potent way to make a liquid feed is more likely to get a handful of vermicastings, drop them in your watering can and swill them round and round and round, and then water that on. 

Mm-hmm. 

you really shouldn't have much liquid coming off of that worm. But vermicastings, you know, in seed raising mixes, vermicastings just a tiny little bit with each seedling, planted, they are incredible biological inoculants, but there's a whole lot of other stuff.

And that biology stays with that plant for its entire journey, even into its next amount of seed that it creates. Incredible. So strengthening, the force of the plant. And it makes sense, doesn't it? Because there are the worms [00:19:00] operating in all the raw material on the top in nature all the time, and that's where the seeds are- 

Yeah

 That's where they're landing, and that's where they're germinating. So it's a, it's a age-old relationship. 

So you, you buy, you know, your green crop seeds. Do you have a s- like, are you trying to get heirloom? Are you trying to get local seeds?

Do you kind of have some seeds that you try and save yourself because they're so easy? I'm assuming there's green crops that you just let self-seed and, and but maybe don't plant them out.

Mm-hmm. Like, I'm thinking mizunas. I will never plant another mizuna in my life.

to start off you're gonna need to buy them in, right? And, I will always choose, open-pollinated seed. it's gonna be hard to get, heritage seed in this regard, though a lot of the green crops are as they are. they're pretty straight up.

they haven't hit the hybridization mill in the same way that our crops have. 

Mm-hmm. 

but open-pollinated, preferably organic. But I would never buy treated seed [00:20:00] because of the fungicide. Don't want to introduce those fungicides into my soil.

Fungi being the most important element. The architect of all our ecosystems. but I wouldn't necessarily break my heart trying to get organic because nature is a bioremediator. those particularly if you're gonna be saving them, year on year, nature will be evolving them, improving them, uplifting them, and infusing them with, biology and all that as part of your wonderfully organic diverse system.

buy them in and definitely I don't buy mixes 'cause I wanna make my own. You know? And you kind of feel like an alchemist. you've got all your little jars of all your different crops and, if you're a total geek like me, when I was learning the families, and I've still got some to learn, but every time I sow a crop now I mentally note the family, so I'm just infu-- 'cause I never knew them before.

but I have my jars labeled with the family under them just to keep reinforcing it. And then you can pick a mix. You can go, "Right, I've got a taproot. I wanna make sure I've got a taproot. I've got, I've [00:21:00] got something a bit, a bit tall, and I've got something scrambling."

So you're just trying to get as much diversity, in there as possible, as well as having diverse families too. I've got something flowering, at least one thing flowering and so y- you can have a lot of fun making your own brews. , I think the pre-mixed ones are quite limiting. also they won't always, they won't always suit you.

But some of the warmer - places, there's a lot of oats in a lot of the autumn mixes. Mm. In some of the warmer places, oats just don't work because they're never winter killed. Mm. So you end up with this mess of clumps of roots in your veggie patch. Mm. Brilliant in your orchard, but quite a pain in your veggie patch, you know, you're having to dig out these huge chunks of roots- 

in order to free the space for your carrots or whatever's coming next. 

Mm. so yeah, so that's fun. So get your seeds and absolutely then, a lot of things I just let go to seed. like you said with the mizuna, basically leafy greens and herbs, I just let them go, and flowers, salads.

And then you never have to buy another six cell [00:22:00] plastic container with those seedlings in as well. And also every year, the seeds that you save or let go to seed are adapting every year, becoming stronger and more resilient and more one with your place. Which is not only your soil, it's also, the biology in your soil, the minerals in your soil, it's , the predatory insects.

It's the whole thing. everything is connected, the birds even. And so they're all knitting into this whānau of your garden, making it even more stronger and ever more resilient. And with climate change, and God knows one day people are gonna wake up and stop spraying everything everywhere, but in the meantime, while they are, our gardens have to handle that environment.

They have to handle the water with all the toxins in it. They have to handle the air with all the toxins in it, and those self-seeders our best way, to do that. 

As far as saving seed is concerned, it is [00:23:00] a specialty niche, saving seed, but as long as you just read up about it.

It's great to find out stuff. seed saving, go on workshops, see which ones you can save. I've saved loads of seed experimentally and had lots of different, results, some brilliant, some not. but you can, you know, always having to buy in green crop seed is a little bit of a weakness in a way because you can't get the seed in.

You're a bit shtoom. So alluding to those local networks is very, very potent. Making sure you've got, seed swaps going or getting involved in seed swaps, that's an excellent way, and just saving as much as you can. And You know, the best seed bank is a living seed bank.

I mean, it's great to have a store, but seeds are viable only for a certain length of time. as long as you are, using your seeds fresh the next year all the time, you don't have to be too pedantic. They do have to be dry and stored well. 

the lesson that took me the longest time to learn was labeling my bags, which [00:24:00] is quite surprising- Yep ... 'cause I'm quite geeky and OCD about that. I think autumn is just busy and if you, you know. But labeled bags in a good, in a good storage place where they're not gonna get moldy and go to pieces, and then use them next season.

Yeah. And your own saved green crop seed is kinda like next level awesome. that you know, it starts to feel like, oh, sheesh, this is really a resilient system, you know. Yeah. 

Mm. I mean, the plants that are happiest- and are biggest and are going to seed, are then gonna make more babies, and those babies are gonna grow, and they're gonna be happy in that environment- like their mom and dad. I also think that they're co-evolving with me because I'm letting the ones that I wanna go to seed.

they're used to my watering habits. They're surviving my neglect or pampering you know, or that, the sort of part of me is in an art form. and yeah, it's a very, very cool way of looking at it, even to the point of, you know, I'm, I'm selecting the seeds that I wanna sow for the following year, 

you know, there's some certain cultivars of things that I will- 

Mm ... 

hold [00:25:00] onto because I just think they're really pretty, or I think they're really yummy, or the kids love them. And so you end up having this garden that just reflects the gardeners, which is, is so much fun. 

Kath, I wanna move the conversation now to- Mulching in regards to fruit trees

And, I just wanna say, , I adore your book. I would say it's one of the best books I've read for a long time, and I genuinely mean that. Not only do you have a lot of images, um, of real spaces, um, not AI rubbish. Don't get me started.

Um, but also beautiful illustrations. and so I'm just looking here now at page 108. And you have lists, of different,plants, and you've categorized them, like a dynamic accumulator. Borage is gonna be p- potassium and silica. It's gonna be bringing that up to the top of the soil. Obviously, we've got comfrey, which is huge . clover, nitrogen and potassium. There's things that, the plants are accumulating for the gardener, [00:26:00] for the space, for the plants around it.

You've got lists of, pollinator attractors, ground covers, nitrogen fixers, plants that help, repel pests. So if someone's listening now and thinks, "I really like this, idea. It's gonna save me time. It's gonna bring more biodiversity into my space. It's gonna help me, sort of take a step back, and my plants are gonna be happier and healthier and more - nutrient full," I couldn't recommend your book enough.

It's called, The Edible Backyard: A Practical Guide to Growing Organic Fruit and Vegetables All Year Round, , but moving along now, how do you think of living mulch in terms of underneath trees, fruit trees, nut trees, that sort of thing?

Yeah, cool. So same jam, you know, same theory, but we're, we're just in a more perennial, space and, we can almost lose our, you know, the hard work weeds. most of them are really sweet beneath fruit trees, you know? You compare a fruit tree to a carrot, we're not going to need to [00:27:00] protect and hold the space quite so much. So, the space beneath our fruit trees is an evolving space. let's just honor that first because when we first plant a fruit tree, it's tiny, it's hardly got any shadow.

but eventually, obviously it's gonna grow into this overshadowing thing, you know?

I- Said to my daughter, I was like, "You know, this tree used to grow figs, but now it's growing pumpkins.

Isn't that crazy?" And the look on her face- ... of trying to figure out what was going on. Because they'll grow the trees and the pumpkins will drip off the tree, right? 

We could be so wild with our pumpkins, it's great. Ideally we're going to use the space beneath our fruit trees for a high concentration of perennial companions, down there. once again, we're getting diversity in families, and we're also getting diversity in growing style. So 100% get a good amount of taproots in there.

nature may be highly likely providing many of them for you in the form of dandelion, chicory, those kinds of things. fennel and dill and, comfrey and borage and parsley. There's no end to the taproots, right? Get taproots going [00:28:00] in there. Perennials take a lot longer to establish, obviously, than annuals, and so it's a really beautiful tag team to get them both in there at the same time.

One is, green crop the area in preparation for your, fruit trees, and then plant your fruit trees and your perennial plants in amongst the green crops so you've got that living mulch going on already. let the living mulch go to seed and then you'll get some coming up, but obviously the perennials are gonna gradually thicken out with time and- There'll be that evolution from the more heavily annual to the more heavily perennial.

and it can be so much fun, that space beneath your fruit trees, to create that whole meadow kind of vibe. 

And once again, all you need to be doing mainly is chop and drop. Even if you have a tricky weed like kikuyu, chop and drop. modern gardening has really gotten into this funny vibe of, like, getting every root out and every bulb out and [00:29:00] ev- you know, like, these horrible, horrible gardening jobs which are completely unnecessary.

if you're enjoying them, knock yourself out. but if you're in that whole war space or which of the language of gardening has become, like I'm at war with the weeds and all that stuff, then damn, have a go with chop and drop instead, you know? Nature is constantly evolving.

Like, we relate to it as if it's this completely static thing and I'm always gonna have that onion weed. I'm always gonna have that kikuyu. it's not nature's plan. We hold those weeds in stagnation with the way that we garden by constantly pulling them out and not rep- not replacing them with anything else.

So really those weeds are guardians of the soil, covering bare soil, fulfilling whatever mineral requirement is missing from the soil, and so if we can get this natural diversity going, and yes, it's a manufactured diversity 'cause it's our chosen diversity. It's not necessarily what nature would put in there.

Like in New Zealand, nature's never gonna throw a dahlia beneath a fruit tree. [00:30:00] So beneath your fruit trees, I guess where I'm heading with this as well is don't be so afraid of the weeds.

Like, let's honor the weeds. Let's observe them and think, "Wow, this is a really dominating weed. I'm going to just continue to chop and drop it, and I'm going to continue to build my diversity to overshadow it." And you can ask yourself if you have a really dominating, vigorous weed, you need to match the strength of the growth of that weed with the plants you choose to plant beneath your fruit trees.

I'd be choosing borage, tansy or comfrey or fennel or dahlias, you know, like rambunctious things- to jostle alongside with it. And we don't mind, little bits and pieces of weeds coming through. let's go for that, whole meadow vibe 

 Diversity and living mulches benefit everyone The more space we have in terms of the number of fruit trees, the number of annual garden beds, the number of perennial garden, when you start getting to a place where actually you're wanting as little input for as maximum [00:31:00] output, these things start making a lot more sense. Yes. And especially if you're wanting to show up in your garden

in a spiritually positive way.

bindweed, the convolvulus, is something that is on my mind as I say this, and this is one- 

that's tricky ... 

there's one plant that I'm thinking- Yeah ... "How can I love you? You wanna be here. You're coming up through the ala." Mm. "You're on my bund through some soil we got from somewhere maybe we shouldn't have."

Like, how can I love you? Because the, what I don't wanna be doing is every time walking into my garden going, "It's you and me. You're going down. I'm gonna pull up every bit of root I can," and spend my Saturdays doing that for the rest of my life. So last year I tried to start weaving with it. Right. I thought maybe I could fix some things with it.

I was like, "What are you really good at, and what can I love? How can I love you?" Now, that is not to say at times I also don't get in there and pull it, 'cause I do. but now I might just grab the mature seed heads off and put them in my pocket and chuck them somewhere, you know. but yeah, this just- 

showing up in a way that is

peaceful. So good ... but there is space for and I love that you brought convolvulus to the table, 'cause it's all very well to be [00:32:00] generous about weeds and say, "Just chop and drop them," and all that.

The vining weeds are, super tricky because, below ground we've also got that vine, and there are other weeds in that category as well. . Everywhere I have lived and gardened, there has been convolvulus. And if you have just a tiny little bit that comes in from a neighbor, that's cool.

You can set your chicken run up over there. You could even have a mowing strip there or some way of keeping it back. You can create a perennial barrier that will really slow their growth down from coming in. But with vining weeds, of course, they will just clamber over the top.

Mm-hmm. 

and in our temperate climate with our amazing rainfall and our moderate temperatures, not too high, not too low kind of thing, weeds like that just absolutely flourish. 

I use, cut and paste for convolvulus. It's a glyphosate. hands up, that's what I do. Because otherwise I do spend every single Saturday. And, I've tried lots of things. I almost had to go to counseling before I used that cut and [00:33:00] paste on the convolvulus. 

I'm at my wit's end. you won't. It just advances and advances and advances." and ivy is the same, jasmine is the same.

even though there are strategies for small sections, are different to large. If you've got it on scale, that's what I'm talking about. but I know for sure I would never spray a glyphosate, not in a million years. Never. the roll-on has no spray drift. and it's kinda like the best of what I got.

it's like using that glyphosate in that emergency situation. and yes, glyphosate is a crap nasty thing, but it's the way we're using it. You know, we're using it on our food crops, for God sakes. Oh, yeah. We're spraying it everywhere, you know?

So, I would ideally like not to, but I've got nothing else- for those weeds. 

If it makes you feel better

I also use the cut and paste on probably there's about five things that I will use it on and it, it is what it is Mm. Yeah And I also think that there's some ethics around letting those things go rampant through our properties and heading to the next property.[00:34:00] 

So it is a ... We can't be dogmatic about these things, and if we've observed and tried and asked, Mm ... other wise brains, and, and that's where we land. I think that's where we land and, and yeah, exactly like you said, we're not we're not spraying it on food we're about to eat. I mean, that's just at one end of the spectrum.

It's crazy town. 

Aside from there are other strategies, like I have had success, There was convolvulus in the area where I ended up making my veggie garden, and I did. I black plasticed that area- and left that, and the following, autumn, pulled the plastic off, and what convolvulus does is the roots all come up to the top.

Yes. And then it was a massive mission just raking and pulling- them all out and getting them gone, and then straightaway planting the area. And the area immediately, adjacent to the edges of the veggie garden where the convolvulus, that was where I put my chicken runs. so it was the convolvulus beyond that.

Yeah. And I knew that if I got rid of the absolute majority of the convolvulus- that way, and then was able [00:35:00] to keep it out with the chickens, I could keep on top of those little bits that came through- the garden. And eventually after about three years, no more bits came through. Yeah. So, you know, there's that- it was because we had a lot of land and a big area, and yeah, we got that out. So that was a bit of a weedy segue, but I love that we talked about that 'cause that's keeping it real. You know, it's really easy to idealized, and that will be really useful, you know, for people, so.

I think 

so too. 

Yeah. 

You know, there are- a lot of weeds that we can, leave Weeds, quote-unquote, you know? Like the dock and things. Leave it. 

Yeah. Most. It's doing something. Most. right? 

. I actually, used to use an awashi a lot to chop and drop. Now I actually use a pair of hedge trimmers, and I'll set my kids on hedge trimmers because they chop and drop- I pay them, and they'll chop and drop my comfrey in particular. Yeah. Because we just do that a few times a year. 

Yeah. 

so it kinda kept it. So the hedge trimmers are another- Mm ... another really- Mm ... easy way of doing it. Any other ways you can think of, of that chopping and dropping method? 

Totally. 

Oh, there's so many. I know people that just use secateurs. Yep. People that use weed eaters.

It's just [00:36:00] the size, it depends on scale, and I love that we've brought this into it, 'cause all of it is gardener's choice, right? Yep. 

And really my whole interest and my whole passion is to connect people to, the confidence to observe first and then choose what works. And listen to that c- 'cause we are so connected to the land and the garden, but that voice has been diminished with lack of practice over the last, you know, 100 years.

And, we are nature, and we are completely connected into our ecosystems. We are so deeply connected to your plants. wow, the science is absolutely clear, but I know it for myself.

you have to listen to that voice and act on it for it to get stronger and stronger and stronger. And then at some point, you stop doubting, and you are just acting on it. You're no longer second-guessing yourself in the garden. That is the biggest jam, because really you and I can have all the ideas about the things that work for us and they're great starting points because, you know, I've been doing this for a very long time now, so, I know I've got a little system that works really well for me, for [00:37:00] my personality, and for the ecosystem and environment that I am in.

But everybody needs to find that for themselves. So I, I'm really happy to be, a landing pad or a starting point for people, to bounce off, and then to observe their system. You observe the nature of your weed. don't get bought into any dogma or I should be doing this, I shouldn't be doing that.

You know, 20 years ago, I never would've confessed to using a roll-on glyphosate 'cause I would've thought, "Oh God, that's gonna freak people out." but just to that. Listen, listen to that voice and observe.

That's my biggest passion for What I can give gardeners, you observe. When you're observing, and this sounds so simple you think why am I even saying this, but this is the core of it, and this is what people are missing.

You're observing without analyzing and working out what you're going to do. You are simply observing. That's observation. And that is rich. That is life-changing because our mind automatically jumps to this, we go into this panicked e- because we don't know what our [00:38:00] solution is. 

So it's, it's simply observing. It's just observing and, and trusting, trusting our voice. And then you react, and then you observe. Yeah. And it's like a dance. And then you see what happens. Yeah. Yes. 

That's so serene and, peaceful and lack of striving and perfectionism and doing it for maybe what other people think of us, 

Mm

I know for me, on my journey to become a gardener, I didn't know any gardeners when I gardened, you know? I didn't care what anyone else thought 'cause no one else was gardening in my life. And then as you make these connections and you have this rapport with people, and then you think, "Well, they're doing it that way.

Should I do it this way?" And I know for me, for a long time, people would come over and I'd feel like I had to justify the quote-unquote mess of my garden. And now as someone walks through my garden, I say, "Everything's here for a reason. What can you see?" And I'm happy to explain why I've left it there.

I remember a friend's husband said to me once, he was like, That really big thistle, are you [00:39:00] gonna do something with that?" I was like, "My chickens are coming in here in a couple of weeks- ... and they'll do something with that. Why would I do something with that prematurely- and just make work for myself?"

I think I had had a big party and there was just this very big obvious thistle, so the non-gardeners of the group could be like, "I'm pretty sure that's not a plant." and it is, it is, it is a lot of letting go. I- ... I just wanna say I love your book. I really love it, and I think it's one of those books where I could come back to it and reflect.

it's not really a read once, one and done. It's more of a reference book for me, I think. And you've just tapped on so many important aspects. I was nodding my head through a lot of it. is there something that you wish I'd asked that I hadn't, or is there something that you think, actually, you know, when you get off this conversation you'll be bummed that you didn't say something?

 I feel that we've had a very robust, conversation and I'm probably, been in this game for too long to ever feel bummed at the end of anything.

But I would like to just say that, on the [00:40:00] topic of dogma, 'cause I am really hot about not being dogmatic about stuff, there is never a, "Don't do this," or, "Do do this," moment. there's space for most things. I'd be dogmatic about spraying, chemicals. but apart from that, as far as inert mulch and living mulch, there's space for that inert mulch absolutely in the garden, and that's a good example of that dogma.

But we talked about that really well, at the end there, and doing what works and just giving yourself the grace, you know? If you're feeling tight and pressured and gotta do this and gotta do that, you know, just to give yourself the grace to have the breath to reconnect, and most things don't matter, especially in a garden.

No. 

Weeds are a living mulch. The weeds are nature's living mulch, and the only reason, we're at war with them or we look at them... it's just like, that's just our conditioning, you know?

it's absolute conditioning. It is not real, this vision that we hold of gardens. Like I'll never forget a [00:41:00] lady coming into a workshop at my, old garden- and saying, "Where's all the food?" 'Cause she was expecting rows and rows and rows of market garden like food. And yet there was a family of six eating entirely out of the garden with no bought veggies there, but to her it was just like, "Where's the food?"

Mm ... 

Just enjoy it, everybody. That's what I'd like to say. 

Thank you so much. 

Yeah, 

yeah. 

And if people wanna find you, if they wanna follow you, if they wanna get your book, where can people find you? 

Well, my website's ediblebackyard.co.nz.

I am selling my latest book direct, Homegrown Fruit: A Practical Guide, and my other little pruning handbook are in bookshops. But yeah, it's all on my website there, all the info. 

Thank you for taking the time to speak to me. I really enjoyed this. 

Cool. 

Yeah. 

Hmm. 

Thanks, Kath.

. Before we wrap up, I wanna talk about , plant families, because Kath brought this up, and this idea of having at least six different families in a garden, and this creates a , environment that's resilient.

Kath kept coming back to one word: diversity. Not just diversity above the ground, but diversity [00:42:00] below the ground, too. Every plant feeds a slightly different community of microbes through its roots, helping build healthier, more resilient soil. Nature is incredible. 

There are two easy ways to recognize plant families. First, look at the Latin name on the seed packet or Google it. , for example, cabbage is Brassica oleracea, or anything beginning with Brassica belongs to that family. So it's the second to last word of a Latin name is the family.

And second, simply, observe them. Plants in the same family often have similar flowers or leaves or roots or growth habitats. The more time you spend gardening, the easier those family resemblances become to spot I wanna also put in the show notes the Jena experiment from Germany, which is the one that Kath refers to in this interview.

And if you'd like to know more about companion planting, I've linked an earlier White Strawberries episode there too.

 That's me. See you next time, and until then, may your gardens be abundant and your strawberries white.