if you rototill i have a question

[tjg911]

this year i'm adding manure to the garden. i have a rear tine toro 5.5 hp 18" wide whose tines turn in the direction the wheels turn ie it is not counter rotating, i've used counter rotating tine tillers and detest them. each fall the soil is hard to break into as most of it has been walked on and is very hard packed. i have found that it is best to till 2" deep then 5" then the max, i think 8". trying to go 4" then 8" is hard as going down 4" on the 1st pass is difficult. tossing alpaca manure on the garden is going to make this harder on the 1st pass.

so when you till in manure do you just spread it and till or do you till some distance into the soil then spread the manure? if the former how deep do you go on that 1st pass?

thanks,

tom

[barkeater]

tom,

With hard to till soil I've found a much better way than going over the ground multiple times lowering the depth a couple inches each time. My troy built was counter-rotating though I think. Also I'd spread the manure first then till. This is how I did it back in the day when I was tilling about 30 gardens a year for money, many of them from scratch:
1. Start at the highest end of the garden and till back and forth just that one strip until near the depth you want.
2. Then overlap the untilled ground by about a third to a half, using the slowest setting, for each successive pass. The tiller will be tilted into the freshly tilled side and will dig deeper than normal while easily cutting into the untilled section on an angle.

It's kind of the same principle as plowing I guess and was quicker and I tilled deeper and faster than the other way. Give it a try and see if it works with your tiller. Good luck!

[tjg911]

that's an interesting idea.

btw, my problem is not rocky soil just compacted from walking on it and it settling. i've removed most rocks even small ones 1/2 to 1/4 the size of a golf ball. they do come up from below tho as there's always some new ones to dig out when tilling.

typically i till the whole garden north to south then drop the tines and go east to west then drop the tines to the lowest setting on the last pass north to south again. i used to try to do it in just north to south then east to west but as i noted getting down 4" on pass 1 was hard on me! the tiller would jump out of the ground due to compaction and i'd have to hold on and back it up.... way more work than going down a little at a time.

i'll see if your method works this year.

keep the ideas coming please.

tom

[dice]

If you have enough, you could just pile it up on there a foot deep and
leave it that way over the winter, then till it in spring. Soil aggregation
by fungi under the mulch will do a lot of the work for you:
http://www.puyallup.wsu.edu/~Linda%2...dments%202.pdf

[yopper]

Tom I have a troybilt horse mdl. 7hp.I bought new 40+yrs. ago.[the best piece of machinery I ever bought] and the tines rotate the same as the wheeles.When tilling in manure in the fall I don't go for depth I just try to get the manure mixed in and covered with dirt about 2 passes with the tiller.In the spring the ground has mellowed from freezing and the micro organisms that have been feeding on the manure all winter. [gosh darnoodley I'm sounding like one of them MASTER GARDENER fellows!] In the spring about 2 passes and I'm at the depth I want. Tom how do you train them alpacas to poop in your garden I can't get my dog to do that!!! YOPPER