Principles And Construction 11:
The Planters 4

Smaller Rocks, Gravel, Sand, and Soil

Once the large rocks are in place, the team adds a 10-cm-thick layer of smaller rocks (stones 1-5 centimetres in diameter).

Outside, the team members who sorted through the pile for large rocks and smaller rocks, have been sifting the remains. What falls through the sifters is sand. What remains in the sifters is gravel (stones a few miliimetres in diameter). They place the gravel in buckets...

...and bring it in to the planter. On top of the smaller rocks, they place a 10-cm-thick layer of gravel.

The gravel is smoothed and leveled.

The team places newspaper on top of the gravel. This newspaper will prevent the next layer, sand, from falling down between the rocks and gravel.

Team members begin bringing in sand.

The sand goes on top of the news paper, 10 cm thick. Chuck levels the surface. Bt this time, all the horizontal pipes are covered.

The next layer is soil. Pat takes the wraps off the pile of topsoil.

Team members shovel the soil into buckets to bring it into the house. But they are also looking for weeds, roots ...and creatures, such as slugs and potato bugs. These must be excluded.

The soil is added on top of the sand, at least 20 cm thick, almost to the top of the planter walls.

Chuck levels the top of the soil, checking the surface with a bubble level laid along the top of a stick (which leaves the marks on the soil surface.

Next: adding water and plants.

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