Today I tillered an extension

[nnjjohn]

Made good use of my little eight inch earth wise tiller.. doubled the size of my tomato bed!

[nnjjohn]

Yes, wanted to share the idea that when breaking new ground for a tomato bed.. lots of back breaking work is needed even when using a tiller machine. This little 8 in. deep tiller uses electric is one powerful kicker.. it pulls and bounces when it grabs rocks in my jersey soil.. it saved me having to do it by hand.. But the tiller did great work aside from needing a few hand tools for bigger boulder rocks that needed to removed with a bar,spade and pick. Albeit, I loosened at least 12 inches deep a virgin bed I plan on cultivating this 2014 season.Today I will test the ph with a ph probe meter and also test using the four color NPK & PH capsule test kit. The soil looks ready to go without needing much if any soil amendments.

[Redbaron]

This vid explains in a balanced way the effects of tillage. You tillered an extension....so it is the first year and can show benefits. Long term though, I would recommend considering either reduced tillage or completely no till.

Personally, I limit my tillage almost to 0% even in the first year. But every person's individual situation is a bit different. Since it was helpful in removing large stones and rocks in your case, probably a good idea. Future years? Not so much.

[nnjjohn]

I watched it.. very interesting and understandable but, I'm talking specifically breaking a grass lawn 12 x20 ft in my back yard with rocks ti dig out. Thank goodness with the tiller cultivator I have made easy work and definitely saved my back. I wouldn't have considered the 6 x 20 addition if it were not for the machine. Anyway thanks for the tip.. i'm pretty much done tilling my beds for the season.

[Redbaron]

Originally Posted by nnjjohn

I watched it.. very interesting and understandable but, I'm talking specifically breaking a grass lawn 12 x20 ft in my back yard with rocks ti dig out. Thank goodness with the tiller cultivator I have made easy work and definitely saved my back. I wouldn't have considered the 6 x 20 addition if it were not for the machine. Anyway thanks for the tip.. i'm pretty much done tilling my beds for the season.

Well, if it wasn't for the rocks that needed removed, sheet mulching and/or lasagna beds are actually far less work and even easier on the back long term. I am 52 and will be doing a full acre of tomatoes this year right over virgin pasture. Actual bed preparation will be the easiest part. I don't have rocks to remove though. So it makes a big difference. Remember, Ruth Stout managed to continue right into her 90's.

[nnjjohn]

It took about an hour with the tiller and hand pick..I have jersey loam soil with few stone now after kicking up a wheel barrel of rock..now all my beds are rock free down to at least a foot for cultivating. I wanted to post some pics but something changed here..either on my end or with the site..seem to be getting errors ..my pic files are too big..never needed an app for resizing attachments here before. I use to just upload in the advanced title bar

[Tracydr]

Scott, how do you control the Bermuda grass? That stuff is unstoppable.
I really love my little cultivator. Except I can't get right up to the very edge of my raised beds. I also have a big tiller which I hope to use the heck out of once we get land in North Carolina.
I don't have any real dirt here in AZ because the previous house owner laid about a 12" layer of rock and pea gravel everywhere so I haven't used my big tiller,yet.

[Redbaron]

Originally Posted by Tracydr

Scott, how do you control the Bermuda grass? That stuff is unstoppable.

Personally I don't even try to stop Bermuda grass. Between rows I mow it, and in the rows it crawls over the mulch but not rooted, so it is harmless. It doesn't get tall enough to cause an issue for tomatoes. Just more photosynthesis to convert into food for my plants next year.

If you lay paper or cardboard covered with enough mulch, the actual Bermuda plants can't get through until so late in the year that the tomatoes out compete it by shading it out. Meanwhile it does provide good habitat for beneficial insects and is a good living mulch and companion plant between the rows.

Another thing about Bermuda grass is it out competes other grasses only if the grass is mowed very short and kept short. Let the taller grass grow to the 4 leaf stage (but not past) and the other grasses will out compete Bermuda. It won't eliminate it, but it will reduce it to manageable amounts.

Another not widely known trait of all perennial grasses is that they can be self fertilizing and create their own beneficial habitat (fertile new soil) through symbiosis with the soil biology. They actually supply 20% of the total products of photosynthesis to the soil microbiology in the form of sugars to feed them. But that's not all. Grasses also shed roots (similar to the way a tree sheds its leaves) every time it gets mowed or grazed. This lignified carbon amounts to roughly the same biomass that was cut off the top of the plant. That soil biology that was being fed all along by the grass quickly starts the biological processes of decay and that releases many nutrients. This process is what created the Mollisols of the world! So mow your grass and you actually fertilize the tomatoes (as long as the tomato is close enough to catch the leaching nutrients. Mycorrhizae helps it to do this! But don't keep it mowed too short, because the depth of those roots is proportional to the height of the grass on top. So instead of tilling to get organic matter in the soil, you let the grass do it! There is far more roots than top. Kill the "weed", and it kills the roots too. Then the "weed" can't make new fertile soil...it's dead. That's why whenever we do that, we have to add so many inputs to replace what what the "weed" did for free.

One trick I learned is when I make the holes through the paper and mulch, I use a bulb planter and cut a plug of sod. That plug I compost in a hot composter. It kills the plug. The hole created I fill with compost/special dirt that is weed free and I cover that with more mulch. Slows everything down enough that the tomato wins that race to the sun.

The only grass I have seen so far capable of creating an issue with this method is Johnson grass. It is strong enough to sometimes punch through the weed barrier and tall enough to win the race to the sun.... and instead of pulling it, I let it get fairly tall right up to the boot stage, using up all it's energy reserves, then use clippers to cut it right at the soil line. A couple times of that and it gives up. I call it the second bite principle...in reverse. Sort of an artificial over grazing.

This year hopefully I will have enough time to detail things better for my Red Baron Project year 2. A large % of that new land I am renting has THICK Bermuda grass, especially at one end. This is because that farmer used to raise horses and had too many. Parts of he pasture was kept too short for too long and became completely smothered in Bermuda grass. He even planted it, wanting something that would provide ground cover even under harsh conditions! It will be the most difficult possible test.

Personally I find working creatively with the grasses very interesting and exciting. Nature didn't use rototillers or Mouldboard ploughs to create the fertile soils of the world, it used mostly grasses in synergy with grazers and soil biology. Trying to work with and understand nature and mimic those natural process and relationships is what gets me up in the morning and out in the field! That's what Permaculture is all about!

[Tracydr]

Very cool! Thanks,Scott. I think my next garden will be much different. I was planning to incorporate a lot more permaculture ideas. I am also sick of the limitations that raised beds give. Plus, they're expensive! With our heat, I usually have to replace large amounts of soil/compost in each bed to keep the levels high enough. I have one bad from last year that looks like it was never filled!
My horses have been moved to Texas on lease to have babies so I no longer have easy access to manure.
No more raised beds!

[Tracydr]

Scott-do you feel the Bermuda steals nutrients from the garden or you don't have a problem with that? I don't have any other grasses near the garden so nothing that grows taller.

[nnjjohn]

Scott , you have any photos or link for those beds you mentioned? Also, for my existing beds, going to use a florida weave this season

[Redbaron]

Originally Posted by Tracydr

Scott-do you feel the Bermuda steals nutrients from the garden or you don't have a problem with that? I don't have any other grasses near the garden so nothing that grows taller.

It can, but it also can release nutrients as well. If the primary source of nutrients to your crops is outside inputs, then any "weeds" can be viewed as "stealing" nutrients from your crops. However, if the primary source of nutrients to your crops is from recycling nutrients from the land, then the "weeds" can be viewed as "storage" of nutrients, locking them in place and preventing leaching so they can be released at a later date by the biological process of decay. It's a subtle difference and requires viewing your garden as it's own managed mini ecosystem.

Originally Posted by nnjjohn

Scott , you have any photos or link for those beds you mentioned? Also, for my existing beds, going to use a florida weave this season

I don't have pictures of my home garden, but I do have pics of those beds in my project, along with a better explanation and many links to references that I have been using for my original research and synthesis.
The Red Baron Project

[nnjjohn]

Now how is a one ton roll of hey easy to use in my suburban yard? lol.. i have a bail of straw and thinking of trying this spread out on a rock retainer ,, it is approx.. 6 feet x 4 ft.. I could loosen the dirt below and pad the straw over .. that should help keep the roots moist and loose ,, last year i had plants there but the soil is somewhat loam-is but on the heavy clay side.. so they straw should help considerably after a a few shovel holes full of MG potting soil mixed with peat. I was reading up on straw as a good mulch topping..one article said there is nothing better than straw.. what do you think ?

[Redbaron]

Originally Posted by nnjjohn

Now how is a one ton roll of hey easy to use in my suburban yard? lol.. i have a bail of straw and thinking of trying this spread out on a rock retainer ,, it is approx.. 6 feet x 4 ft.. I could loosen the dirt below and pad the straw over .. that should help keep the roots moist and loose ,, last year i had plants there but the soil is somewhat loam-is but on the heavy clay side.. so they straw should help considerably after a a few shovel holes full of MG potting soil mixed with peat. I was reading up on straw as a good mulch topping..one article said there is nothing better than straw.. what do you think ?

My focus is in scaling up what I have been using already for years on a small scale. Yes I used to use the small bales of straw or hay, sometimes even just grass clippings and/or leaves I raked up from the yard. All small scale higher labor techniques, but certainly appropriate for a small kitchen garden.

Don't get caught up in the round bale thing. See Ruth Stout published her mulching ideas (The no work garden) around 60 years ago. Following her came Masanobu Fukuoka's The One-Straw Revolution: An Introduction to Natural Farming. (Do nothing farming) There is also Patricia Lanza's Lasagna Gardening. These are all well proven and have been repeated by many 10s of thousands of people at least. Maybe 100s of thousands? I simply took these labor intensive techniques and tried to find a way to make it flexible enough to use large scale. Now keep in mind ALL these are reduced labor techniques. Just not reduced enough to be used by modern full scale farms...which here in USA are hundreds and even thousands of acres.

So basically one could say I am even lazier that Ruth, Masanobu, and Patricia combined! Because all their low labor techniques are too much work for me! But they all use straw, hay or some other similar material layer to cover the soil. Round bales simply are even easier to spread even larger amounts quickly.

Let's say you want to do 100 acres or more? Can you imagine breaking up little square bales over the whole area? By the time you finished, next winter would have already set in! But with round bales, and only covering the rows and leaving between the rows in grass, it becomes feasible.

Take a look.

Now imagine if that was a vegetable bed instead of feeding cows. Imagine a roll of commercial paper unrolling right in front of that as a weed barrier. In a couple minutes you are done with bed preparation on a very large scale! With that it becomes possible to do 100 acres or more. For people larger than a kitchen garden, but smaller than a full size commercial farm...like me.... I use the round bales, but unroll them by hand. Get it? A system usable by nearly anyone large or small with just a little creativity to adapt it to your own personal situation.

But for you? Sure you don't need that. Small square bales of straw work fine.

[nnjjohn]

Scott . that sure looks practical for farming.. but I do beg the question ,, why it is said jersey is the garden state and same with the jersey tomato? It is more likely the soil and regional climate has a lot to do for growing tasty jersey tomato.. not to say I am growing true jersey tomatoes but anyway, do you think planting on top of hey might compromise the taste compared to one grown in jersey native soil?