Garden is going in today. Nothing ambitious, just ½ acre of weeds and brambles going to turn into an heirloom and wild edible garden in the space of a year. We will see what happens. I did run some soil testing and found out the pH was 5.3 and nutritionally there was nothing in the soil. Not the greatest place to start, but knowing is power so back in March, when we got the tests, we did spread a large quantity of “fast lime” (about 200 pounds) as well as taking about a ton of manure out of the stacking area and spreading that around. In my heart of hearts something is screaming “rototill!” The teachings I received this past late spring and looking at the old ways says no. Tiller parked firmly in the barn (if I am successful at this, there may be a nice Troy- Built pony tiller for sale in the future) we begin with part one.
For part one head to the store and buy lots of Roundup. Okay, so much for chemical-free, but the Conservation District and several other people I talked to said Roundup is basically a salt complex, and totally inert the moment it hit’s the ground, or within five hours anywhere. I need a good kill and a bit of hope so on goes the spray. What I will do is assume a good initial weed kill with that, and for the rest of the year use white vinegar in between rows as needed.
Roundup sprayed yesterday so now on to plant today. I will begin my three sisters area. All the directions I have start with a good tilling and then spending days making hills .. 4’ apart and 20” across. Well, making hills is tilling so to speak .. And in no-till they inject the seeds so here is what I tried. In areas about 4’ center to center I took my digging tool and jammed it in the ground. Inserted an orange spray painted popsicle stick and planted four heirloom corn kernels around the stick, about 8” apart in a cross formation. I did this right into the 9” high grass that was sprayed yesterday. In theory, the grass will die in about 10 days, right when the corn should be sprouting, so one going up and one going down for a nice mulch mat. We will see how it works out. When the corn is about 4” high, I will add the bean seeds near each corn stalk and the squash about a week following the beans.
The other thing that went in today was the acorn squash .. A family favorite. Same theory applied. I have about 20 that were started indoors, and those were planted right into the tall grass (sprayed yesterday). My thinking is that the 6 to 10 days the grass takes to die will be a good hardening off time for the seedlings to recover. I did plant about 40 more from seed in the front area that did not have as much grass. Will continue to document and check the results come harvest time.
Three things planted in a day does not seem much, but those three (I forgot spinach, planted in between the squash rows … just sprinkled the seeds direct to ground at the grass roots with the same hope ..the dying grass will provide enough cover and mulch to give them a great start). Anyway, three items does not seem like a lot for one day .. But I planted a LOT of those three things in rather difficult conditions. Again, the theory is that in a few years the soil and conditions will be much easier in the long run than if I went till .. So we’ll plant, document and see what happens
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