Your not using proper wood chips. Should have the fresh green leaves mulched with limbs when making proper wood chips. Leaves give soil health and create microbes in the soil. Saw dust or pine shavings are not the same as wood chips and won't give same soil results that Paul Gouche explains in his Back to Eden Garden Method.

When ever I'm mentoring someone on gardening I ALWAYS tell them "the only rule in gardening that matters is..... there are NO rules. Do what works for YOU." Till/no till, mulch/no mulch, what ever the opinion it's about what works for you. The best thing about gardening is that you never stop learning. Even after decades of extensive gardening I learn new things from fellow gardeners every year and adapt my system almost every year.

I worked at a soil testing facility and let me tell you, nobody knew what they were doing inside the lab. The argonomist used his math intellect to fudge the results. They lied about doing double blind standards to stay NAPT and ALP certified. I was "trained" to run a LECO nitrogen/carbon analyzer and that machine was NEVER calibrated properly. Not once in 3 years. And I doubt that lab is the only one that runs like that. Just beware that there's liars and cheats. So if your results don't add up, it's probably the lab.

The biggest mistake people make with wood chip gardening is watching the Back to Eden garden documentary but not actually seeing what’s in front of their face and making up what they think they are seeing as “the method” and implementing their made up method and then failing and blame the original documentary method that was shown. There are two separate land areas in the video, a large Orchard which is 30 years old in 2010 when filmed and a smaller Garden which is 15 years old in 2010 when filmed. ONLY the Orchard gets raw arborist wood chips added to it and when first set up he initially laid down raw arborist wood chips to a depth of 12 inches. The color of the ground in the Orchard is light and not dark. Paul never has added fertilizers or chicken manure to the Orchard area. The Garden area on the other hand ABSOLUTELY DOES NOT get raw arborist wood chips, raw sawdust or other crazy materials I have seen people using. The Garden gets aged already composted wood chips ground up and combined with general green waste that are then screened down to a small size removing all the large left over pieces. Paul rakes this aged composted and screened dark material carefully to a depth of just 2 inches. The Garden area also gets constantly amended with ALREADY COMPOSTED Chicken Manure, also screened and applied of a rate of 1/2 to 1 inch. Since Paul has been doing this for so many years, he says he needs to add less fertilizer every year and less often over time. After 15 years he was applying it every second year but before then he was applying it EVERY year to the garden area. The top surface of the Garden area is completely dark, full of heaps of manure nitrogen. Those are two completely different growing environments. There are only two times Paul added organic matter to his property in the video and those are exactly what he shows. Everyone with failed implementations need to go back and rewatch the documentary like a Hawk and see exactly where he says to do their made up in their mind methods instead of what he actually shows and teaches in the documentary and expect the get the exact same results from their methods their very first year as his now 43 year old Orchard and 28 year old Garden have been achieving when using the methods he actually showed and explained in the documentary. This is not a criticism of the video here but of everyone involved including the commenters all passing on what they think was the method and doing a disservice to those they they are trying to be helpful to.

Worms love cardboard. They break down the cardboard. I use it all the time.

Melissa use a bagger when you mow that beautiful grass. Put ALL of the clippings in your garden. OMG the results are phenominal. You can literally hug your plants with the clippings and watch them thrive! Also they break down and put tons of nitrogen back in the soil. When I weed I throw the weeds in my rhubarb area. My rhubarb is first year rhubarb and already larger and more vibrant than my neighbors who has had theirs for years. I love my lawn bagger. I am 63 have a large acre and a half mowing area and love the results.

I am a master gardener for 30 years. Do what you want. Do what you love.

Did I hear you say you used "saw dust"? It's definitely NOT supposed to be saw dust. You need leaves and twigs in the mix. I'm sorry to say that this was not what using wood chips is all about.

USA manufactured cardboard is supposed to be free of dioxins, foreign manufacturers may not be regulated. I have done many woodchip gardens with winecap mushrooms(Stropharia rugoso annulata) and ramial woodchips, 70% or more hard wood. After the second year, almost anything I want will grow in it without additional amendments. If I really want to pamper my plantings at that point, I use compost.

You all might want to see Charles Dowding's videos about Soil Testing with NO DIG gardens. Soil tests primarily report "free" Nitrogen...but with no dig the fungal network and worm castings in the soil converts nitrogen into forms that the plants absorb easily...but won't (mostly) show up in soil tests.

I did cardboard then 25 bags of leaves then composted horse manure. Neighbors raked up another 25 bags of leaves which covered dead logs and limbs to act as sponges , then composted garden soil and finished it off with 7 bales of Timothy hay . Then on November 5th , planted garlic. It was awesome ! Now no weeding , no fertilizer, no watering , and no digging !

So many people take the general idea of back to eden but don't pay attention to what Paul does. Then they expect the same results.

If you drink coffee, every day or week - spread coffee grounds over the wood chips. Worms, fishing worms will come, digest the wood and love and stay for the coffee. Really works. Stack of chips digests itself in 2 years. Rich soil left. Casings from worms is very good for plants.

When we first laid down woodchips 5 years ago, we used brown packaging paper instead of cardboard. They come in rolls. Easy to work with.

When we had a house of our own we started using leaves and grass clippings on our flower beds and vegetable gardens. It worked wonderfully giving just the right amount of plant food and cover to keep the garden cool in the summer sun and not have to use artificial means for enriching the soil. Newspaper served ad a cover to keep the weeds under the medium from growing. After about 20 years we had the richest soil around our neighborhood.

Best line........I don't care what camp you are in as long as you are growing your own food.:)

Melissa you are an inspiration to us all. Your family’s homestead is just incredible and the healthy lifestyle is what we all need. God bless.

Back to Eden specifically said to use wood chips that have leaves chipped up with the branches included. Just saw dust does not have leaves.

Where I live, tilling also causes soil erosion and all the beautiful topsoil blows away in the dry, hot conditions. So much is specific to your location.

I can tell you that here in NJ, I used to add manure every year but now I cover the bed with wood chips 2-4” (brown material) and in the fall I chop up the fallen leaves (green material). I till them all together 2-3 times from fall to spring with the last being approximately 2 weeks prior to my first planting. After planting, I add another 2-4” of chips. The soil health is excellent and I rarely have to add any amendments. Where I live, we have a heavy clay soil and all the added material breaks up the clay and increases drainage but also helps to retain water as it doesn’t just run off.