New garden in pasture/fescue

[Tracydr]

I've been trying to figure out how to go about starting my new garden. The only sunny area that I have, until we do a huge amount of clean-up from the el truc company, is my pasture. I attempted to till it and it was a no-go. So, I think I'm just going to plant tomatoes,peppers and eggplants like little trees, in other words, dig a hole, put it in, mulch. Maybe a layer of newspaper under the mulch.
I guess I'll have to skip corn because I simply can not prepare the soil for it.
I can probably do similar with beans,watermelon and squash. Just prepare a small hill, put seeds in and mulch around it.
I have tons and tons of leaves and pine straw. Some horse manure, goat poop and will soon start having more chicken poop.
Will this have a chance of working?im hoping after I do this one season, the mulch will loosen up the top layer enough that I can prep the soil for the fall garden. I usually direct sow lettuce,chard,beets,carrots in the fall. Peas.

[rags57078]

See if a neighbor can run through it with a plow and disc , then you can till

[efisakov]

Tracy, if you have fish store near you,
ask for fish guts/parts, freeze them so no animal can smell them and put in the bottom of the hole. Works great for tomatoes and peppers.

[Salsacharley]

I've got a similar problem, and my big issue is that I will only have good soil in the holes I dug since I'm unable to mulch the entire space. The plow idea looks pretty good to me but you'll have to work on amending the soil to avoid being in the same situation again later.

[Worth1]

What kind of soil is it?
What color?
Worth

[Worth1]

This link will give you an idea of what you are looking at.
My guess is you are on the coastal plain.
http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&sourc...o4W4hhAblBfcyw

[Redbaron]

Originally Posted by Tracydr

I've been trying to figure out how to go about starting my new garden. The only sunny area that I have, until we do a huge amount of clean-up from the el truc company, is my pasture. I attempted to till it and it was a no-go. So, I think I'm just going to plant tomatoes,peppers and eggplants like little trees, in other words, dig a hole, put it in, mulch. Maybe a layer of newspaper under the mulch.
I guess I'll have to skip corn because I simply can not prepare the soil for it.
I can probably do similar with beans,watermelon and squash. Just prepare a small hill, put seeds in and mulch around it.
I have tons and tons of leaves and pine straw. Some horse manure, goat poop and will soon start having more chicken poop.
Will this have a chance of working?im hoping after I do this one season, the mulch will loosen up the top layer enough that I can prep the soil for the fall garden. I usually direct sow lettuce,chard,beets,carrots in the fall. Peas.

Well Tracy, I am sure you already know this, but I have been experimenting with no till on untilled pasture/sod. Much like you say, just dig a hole for each plant right in the sod. However, I mulch a strip first then plant through the mulch paper and sod. The reason for this is mowing. To keep the grass from becoming a "weed" instead of a companion plant/living mulch, you need to mow between the rows. But one really cool thing about mowing is that the grassland biome co-evolved with ruminant grazers. (bison sheep deer etc...) So they respond to grazers/mowing with a specific set of physiological changes in the roots. In essence they respond by pumping sugars and other nutrients as well as carbon into the soil. They do that to fertilise the soil for rapid regrowth. The cool thing about it is that the fertilised soil will have your tomatoes growing in it. All you need to tap into that is a symbiosis with mycorrhizal fungi. Cheap to inoculate if the soil lacks them. The mycorrhizal fungi will transport the nutrients to the new dominant plant...in this case your tomatoes... every time you mow the grass between the rows. That was the first part. The second part was figuring out how to suppress the grasses and weeds right in the rows enough to allow your tomatoes to become dominant. newspaper cardboard and mulch does slow it down...but it eventually breaks through. Especially tough ones like Johnsongrass and Bermudagrass, things like that. I don't mind them in between the rows. Mower handles that just fine. But in the rows .. not so good. So two things I learned. One is just before you transplant mow to 2 inches...then EXACTLY 5 days later mow again right down flush to the ground as low as your mower goes. Immediately lay your paper and mulch over it. This stunts the grass long enough for your tomatoes to get up and out. I also add marigolds and basil between the tomato plants. Later in the year when the grasses finally start breaking through, cut flush to the ground, don't pull. Details can be found here: The Red Baron Project year one That first year it was my yard which was thick mostly bermudagrass. But following year I tried it in pasture. Just like what you have. I even let the between row grass get 6-8 inches tall before I mow. I figure the taller it is before I mow (without shading the tomatoes), the more mowing fertilises my plants. (use a mulching mower if you have one)

You might be surprised how well it works. It worked better than I thought it would when I came up with the crazy idea 4 years ago. Since then, every single day I have been working on this. Seriously..every day. I read every scrap of info about soil science and soil biology, permaculture, effects of carbon, and how it gets there..you name it. I do this to try and get and understanding of just what is going on. (and tweek it for even better results)

I even managed to grow sweetcorn with the concept........but modified even easier.

So I would say that since you are in a similar situation as I was...I couldn't plow or till either.....you might want to try it and see if it works for you too.

If you have questions, happy to help.

[Tracydr]

Originally Posted by Worth1

What kind of soil is it?
What color?
Worth

It's sandy down deeper. Black and loamy on top. PH around 6.3. Has been mowed and sometimes not mowed with long grass left as mulch for about 30 years. Has not been farmed or grazed, although my pony was on it for a few months.
It's far better than any other dirt I have, but I suspect low in nitrogen.

[ContainerTed]

I cut my garden out of raw pasture back in 2010. The main problem I've encountered is weed control. Each spring, I burn the old grasses and then use "Terminator" on anything that survives.

Like suggested, you need to get someone to use a plow and disc, or one of the large tillers that comes on the back of a full-sized farm tractor. Your PH suggests you may be too acidic. Some lime might be the key.

Black dirt with sand beneath sounds like Carolina substrates - Good drainage.

[Tracydr]

The other parts of my property are acidic but I suspect this section has been liked. The people who built the house were really into gardening and kept it like a park where the pasture is. The pH is much higher there.
I've been trying to find somebody with a small plow but the peoe with tractors that I've called don't have plows.
I'll call the gravel guy and see if he has something.

[Worth1]

I wouldn't touch the PH of the soil 6.3 is practically perfect for most garden vegetables.

This one reads a little high compared to some too.
What kind of tiller did you try to use?

Worth

[carolyn137]

When I moved up here in 1999 I needed a place to grow tomatoes and I'd made friends with a couple who were developing a huge pasture that hadn't been used as pasture for almost 40 years.

Put a spade in it and it would bounce back and that's b'c the roots were a tangled mess, I saw it.

What they did worked and it wasn't trying to get someone to plow it, as they could have, which would probably NOT be successful, but what they did was to cover each new bed to be with heavy black plastic, put down rocks and bricks to keep it in place and left the plastic on for the whole summer season, came back in the spring and then they used one of the large Troy built tillers, which they rented, and that worked OK.

The heat generated killed the weeds as well as the roots.

We here in upstae NY have less of a sun angle than does NC, and my brother and family now live in NC, so I do know about that.

So please consider what Mary and Craig did, year after year to reclaim that pasture.

http://store.fastcommerce.com/slatehillfarm

To the left of that picture were many acres they reclaimed and they also raised peonies to sell as cut flowers, it's where I put my grandmothers peonies when I moved up here, and they also raised LOTS of tomatoes, yes, I gave them many seeds, and reclaiming that cow pasture certainly worked for them, but it took time.

Carolyn, who remembers one event she will never forget. She was fooling around with her tomatoes at their place when a helicopter descended right above her and whirred in place for several minutes. I asked my brother about it and he laughed saying it was one of the marijuana helicopters out looking for MJ plants and they even used infra red to ID them. Good thing that, b/c in a way tomato leaves do look like MJ plant leaves of the highly dissected RL type, so I know from pictures in the paper when they make a big bust.

[Tracydr]

Originally Posted by Worth1

I wouldn't touch the PH of the soil 6.3 is practically perfect for most garden vegetables.

This one reads a little high compared to some too.
What kind of tiller did you try to use?

Worth

I have an old Pony by Toro. I wasn't going to add anything for the pH, either.
I did plant the blueberries on the acidic side of the pond, where it's 4.9.

[Tracydr]

Originally Posted by carolyn137

When I moved up here in 1999 I needed a place to grow tomatoes and I'd made friends with a couple who were developing a huge pasture that hadn't been used as pasture for almost 40 years.

Put a spade in it and it would bounce back and that's b'c the roots were a tangled mess, I saw it.

What they did worked and it wasn't trying to get someone to plow it, as they could have, which would probably NOT be successful, but what they did was to cover each new bed to be with heavy black plastic, put down rocks and bricks to keep it in place and left the plastic on for the whole summer season, came back in the spring and then they used one of the large Troy built tillers, which they rented, and that worked OK.

The heat generated killed the weeds as well as the roots.

We here in upstae NY have less of a sun angle than does NC, and my brother and family now live in NC, so I do know about that.

So please consider what Mary and Craig did, year after year to reclaim that pasture.

http://store.fastcommerce.com/slatehillfarm

To the left of that picture were many acres they reclaimed and they also raised peonies to sell as cut flowers, it's where I put my grandmothers peonies when I moved up here, and they also raised LOTS of tomatoes, yes, I gave them many seeds, and reclaiming that cow pasture certainly worked for them, but it took time.

Carolyn, who remembers one event she will never forget. She was fooling around with her tomatoes at their place when a helicopter descended right above her and whirred in place for several minutes. I asked my brother about it and he laughed saying it was one of the marijuana helicopters out looking for MJ plants and they even used infra red to ID them. Good thing that, b/c in a way tomato leaves do look like MJ plant leaves of the highly dissected RL type, so I know from pictures in the paper when they make a big bust.

What an experience!

[Worth1]

Originally Posted by Tracydr

I have an old Pony by Toro. I wasn't going to add anything for the pH, either.
I did plant the blueberries on the acidic side of the pond, where it's 4.9.

I googled toro pony tiller and kept coming up with troybuilt.
The only Toro tillers I could find were front tine tillers or monster tillers.

Do they not make tillers anymore.

I have found that certain soils the ground has to be just right to till.
Too wet and you do my harm than good.
Too dry and it can be a nightmare to break up.

With heavy tree roots it can be impossible.

Worth