Yesterday was the last Saturday of the month, which is the day of the great Berkeley compost giveaway. From 7:30 in the morning till it runs out, energetic Berkeley gardeners can shovel as much compost as we want into whatever vehicle or containers we bring.
This was the scene about 10 minutes before the official start of the process. I was in the middle, so this is about half as long as the compost mountain stretched. Nonetheless, people come early, as I did.
Then I spent the day carrying bags of compost downhill and spreading it in the unplanted sections of the garden.
As I have most of the growing sections fenced off, I decided to let the chickens participate. They went right to it, picking out weed seeds and bugs, taking deep dirt baths, and generally mixing up the soil for me. For once, they did just what I needed, and left my seedlings alone.
Plus they were very happy to do it.