We were trying to dig the garden by hand and use no till methods but we eventually broke down and bought a set of cultivators for the tractor. The cultivators seemed to be the jack of all tillage, not great at anything but can do anything. Ideal tillage would be to use a plow followed by a set of discs and or a rototiller with some time between tillage to allow the sod to rot. That seemed expensive and we need to plant sooner rather then later so I opt’d for a cheap set of cultivators. It actually worked quite well for breaking up the sod and preparing it for seeding.
You can see the lonely tuilip that was tilled into the soil. I’ll beable to adjust the cultivators so I can cultivate between rows if I wanted to. The other advantage to cultivators is it isn’t quite as destructive to the soil structure as plowing. The garden is currently 100ft by 100ft (almost 1/4 of an acre) and I’d like to till up another 5o ft by 100ft for just corn (won’t be a problem selling surplus corn). Tonight we picked our first harvest of baby lettuce, spinach and radishes for dinner. It was quite refreshing! We can’t wait to get the remainder of the garden planted. Next year with the cultivators we’ll beable to take the garden to the next level and rent a few acres of land to plant for a full time market garden/CSA. This year will be a small run with a few friends as trial CSA members. If you are interested in a share of the harvest you’ll have to let me know very soon *hint*hint* :) The first share (although a small one) will likely be going out next week.
What type of no till method were you trying to use that involved digging? We’re going to put in more gardens later this year that are no dig a la lasagna style with a touch of the ruth stout method.
I’m glad the cultivator worked out. Steve has been filling me on the details. Do you have a picture of your whole garden? How are the chickens and the new coop? Any news on the piggy?
We were trying to use no till and dig by hand where required. We weren’t following any specific method. It would probably be better described as minimal till. I was hoping to just turn the soil over where we wanted to plant the seeds and mulch the rows and for potatoes I wanted to plant them on top of the ground and grow them in straw/compost. It was going to end up being too much work for which we didn’t have enough time (Isn’t that always the case). If there wasn’t any sod it probably would have been easier. I’ll add a picture of the garden for my next post
Re the piggy, no firm plans yet.. haven’t really had time to purse it much either. It may even end up being a next year project.
You guys should do an entry about your non-stock animals. I really think they’d enjoy having a bit of a spotlight on them and the services they provide to the farm.
The problem with just the culivater is that you are going to harvest weeds/ grass well. Breaking the sod into a bunch of little clumps without removing it, will encourage new growth that you will fightingespecially in a garden your size.
Plowing the “green” fertilizer (sod) in THEN culitvate (here is where the manure (older stuff is better) (probably a nearby farm of some kind near you) comes in and finally harrow the ground smooth will result in a garden that is ready to go.
Horror of horrors is that you Roundup the area in the fall, hit it again in the spring and THEN cultivate and harrow. The chemical doesn’t affect the soil (if not POURED on) as it attacks the root of the plant.
I appreciate being carbon netural/ chemical free and all that but sometimes you just got to get the job done quickly AND thoughly
There are rototillers that are built for tractors as well, but a 1/4 acre is alot of tilling.
Now that the ground is broken up, mulch like crazy with straw and you wont have to worry about the grass/weeds coming back up.