No Till questions

[ducks4you]

Thanks. That's what is satisfying about gardening for ME. When I make a mistake the world doesn't end.

 

[journey11]

Yep, there's always next year.

 

[seedcorn]

The great news about radishes, is they die in winter and then STINK in the spring as they rot.

Winter annual rye, either a hard time killing it off or chemicals. Does best job of breaking down compaction.

Turnips do decent job, even better cooked. Probably least effective to break down compaction.

IF you use a cover crop and don't remove it, you will fight small mammals and insects.

I consider myself a minimal gardener. Till garden one time, bed it with straw, plant it. From there it is hand weed or if I need to work off some frustrations, HOE them DEAD--again tillage.....

 

[journey11]

Hoeing isn't tilling...particularly in the sense that this topic is discussing. If done when the weeds are little and done with a sharp hoe, you are only scraping the surface. I get it, permaculture is not your thing, but don't get hung up on the terminology. It is not that literal. No-till in this regard only means you are not annually turning over and disturbing the soil strata. It's just a different approach to maintaining a garden that some of us are interested in. If you're not interested in it, why hash out the particulars anyway?

 

[seedcorn]

Not the sharpest tac in box, I looked up permaculture. That is my life, didn't realize it had a name, thank you. We call it farming.

I am truly interested, which is why I read most threads. No-tillers would be offended with the misuse of their term. In Ag, we do everything from full conventional to strict no-till where soil is not disturbed except to put seed in a 1/2" or 1 1/2" slice. They never disturb the soil with any piece of steel.

All my life I have been hoeing wrong as I go deep to kill roots. I don't get to the weeds on a timely basis. Again, I'm not the sharpest tac in box.

 

[MontyJ]

I till. Always have, always will. My garden is just too big not to. And the ground gets so darned hard over the winter. I rotate crops every year and never know what's going where. I understand the no-till concept. It just isn't practical for me, especially when I have to lime or ammend to keep the balance I like.

 

[seedcorn]

I till. Always have, always will. My garden is just too big not to. And the ground gets so darned hard over the winter. I rotate crops every year and never know what's going where. I understand the no-till concept. It just isn't practical for me, especially when I have to lime or ammend to keep the balance I like.

Have you contemplated zone tillage? I'm setting up a young gardener with that method for pumpkins.

In true no-till, the worms and cover crops increase soil texture. Once established, the environment balances itself with continual feedings. I'm up north, so might get more freezing and thawing. I'm able to just till 2-3" deep now that I broke my hard pan. My #1 problem is heat burning roots (& my bare feet), why I mulch with straw.

 

[MontyJ]

One of the largest obstacles I have to no till is the clay content of the soil. We also have natrually acidic soil. To keep the pH up, I have to lime every few years. If I let it go, it will plummet. When I first started growing on that site, the pH was a whopping 4.9. I manage to hold it around 6.2, but if I let it go, it will start dropping. Without tilling, I don't know how I could ever keep it up.

 

[seedcorn]

4.9. Wow. Bet you do have problems.....

IF you were farming, long term no-till would help problem.

 

[journey11]

I'm not trying to be argumentative here, just trying to clarify distinctly what it is that we were talking about under the intended topic. And I don't think we are talking about the same thing at all... There are entire forums out there dedicated to the topic. Go ask them what constitutes tilling, because I'm not claiming to be an expert, just someone who is considering trying it. I have nothing against conventional tilling...and I'm not saying that no-till is the greatest, bestest, most wonderful thing ever either.