In this instructional video, the speaker explains how the abundance of certain weeds on a former strip‑mine site serves as a diagnostic tool for soil health during reclamation. He describes the site’s history—bare rock transformed with added topsoil, compost, and animal inputs—and then walks through specific species: curly dock (and related docks) that signal compacted, mineral‑imbalanced soils; amaranth (pigweed) that indicates high nitrogen, organic matter, and overall fertility. The speaker challenges the conventional view that weeds must be eradicated, arguing that many act as pioneer or “cover‑crop” species that mine nutrients, break up compaction, and improve soil biology. He outlines practical management techniques such as crimping tall weeds, chop‑and‑drop of dock roots, and using simple tools (feet, rakes, pallets) to incorporate their biomass, turning them into a temporary cover crop. Throughout, he emphasizes a permaculture mindset of observation, allowing natural succession to work rather than fighting it, while still maintaining vegetable production. The video blends ecological insight with hands‑on advice for gardeners working on reclaimed or otherwise disturbed soils.
Chapters
I am being overtaken by all these weeds. Guys, I'm gonna let you off the hook today with fighting with weeds. We garden in an interesting way because it's an old strip mine. There is some reclamation and remediation that is taking place within our soil, and a better way to understand what's happening in the moment is look at what's trying to grow, what we would call weeds. They're actually good indicators of where your soil is at or what it needs. Now again, guys, I know this isn't your typical backyard garden. This used to be a strip mine. It was bare rock at one point, and we have added a lot of topsoil to it just from decomposition. This is our market garden area. That's to our high tunnel where we host animals in the wintertime to build compost, topsoil, and provide shelter in the very cold winter months. So what had happened was we planted from seed a lot of vegetables and herbs, and we had this huge explosion of green, really for the first time in this area. Some are sprouts from our seeds, some are vegetables from last year's garden, but a lot of it is weeds. Now I know some of you would be like, "Let's start all over, you know, let's pull all of this." which it is pretty easy to pull. But the question is, is do you have to? In some cases, you'd want to remove them. I understand it's depending on what you like and what you like your gardens to like. But let's look at this as an ecological lesson. A huge misconception of growing food that has to be neat and tidy. And if you have all of this biomass growing in a, in a small spot, they're going to be competing for nutrients. Sometimes that's true. Sometimes it's not. There actually can be benefit allowing these quote-unquote weeds to grow because they're indicating something or they're working for your good. In my work in Reclamation, I have come to find that every species has a purpose. Every species is in succession. It's either helping nutrients, aerating, mining, protecting. For your gardens to improve over time. I also have a mama duck that's very ticked at me. Okay, so let's look at some of the species that we have in here. We have curly dock. It's an accumulator. Like comfrey, it grows a deep taproot to mine nutrients within your soil. It's gonna break up some compacted layers, probably from where we had the skid steer in here. It's gonna bring minerals to the surface. So if we're looking at it and you have this explosion of curly dock, what's it saying about your soil? It's compacted, might be a mineral imbalance, and the soil biology just isn't where it needs to be yet. The other docks that we have in here are bitter dock and broadleaf dock, and they're doing pretty much the same thing. Another indicator that these do is this soil has been disturbed, which it has. It's had animals on it. It was a strip mine. There was a lot of bare rock.— and we just had the skitster in here. Then we have a very common one, especially in Appalachia— amaranth. I think this one is pigweed. This is also a pioneer species for disturbed soil. Rapid biomass production. It shades bare ground almost working like a cover crop. And the best part, it's producing a high amount of organic matter. Now, organic matter is a good thing to have in your growing spaces. This is an indicator of fertile soil. There's high nitrogen availability, which is probably true since we had our poultry in here over the wintertime. It's an indicator of good biological activity. So you have all of these different species telling you something different. If you put them together, what I'm seeing is there are high traces of minerals in here that are present, and there are some that are lacking. The amaranth, which is in abundance mostly, is saying that there are— there is fertility. Within the soil. It's just out of order. Because what's amazing is the vegetables that we did plant in here are thriving. The plants that we had in here last year that went to seed, that replanted themselves, like corn, pumpkins, beans, are thriving. So here's a misconception that I think a lot of growers have, is that if you have more weeds, you're going to have less vegetables because there's always this competition. And a lot of that is true, but not if you have the right system in place. Found a radish. So a good way to benefit from these species that have already been at work in here for some time is to let them grow. And when they get to a certain height, not going to seed, we're gonna crimp them. Show. You lay them down. The roots will still be active for a short time and release what it's been mining. And as it dies and decomposes, it turns into a cover crop. And a lot of farmers do this with their corn fields. They can grow oats or buckwheat. You can do this with amaranth, too. Now, your curly dock will probably grow back. It'll probably stand back up. And what I would suggest with that is to chop it off and do a chop and drop. Pay attention though. It's gone to seed. Pull it. Guys, look at that. Guys, this was on hard rock. This was a lot of wood chips and manure. Beautiful. So that's what we're gonna do. We're gonna let this grow. We're not gonna get overwhelmed, start all over. 'Cause there's a reason why this is growing like this in abundance. Will it be like this every year? No, it won't. But it will be this year. And in the timeline of this being reclaimed, we have to be okay with that. I'm not gonna fight against nature's pattern here or get overwhelmed. You're still gonna produce food. Think of it this way. You can spend a lot of money, exert a lot of energy and a lot of inputs You'll probably have to keep doing that for a couple years 'cause this is gonna grow back. Or you allow the species to grow and do what it's supposed to do. I've used many different tools to crimp. You can do wood pallets, logs. This space is pretty small and we wanna go around the vegetables that are growing. So we'll probably do it with our feet or with a rake. I guess this tip is to say observation is key. It's one of the biggest components of permaculture that there is. So instead of being overwhelmed by quote unquote weeds, ask the question, why are you here? What are you trying to tell me? Happy growing.
