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milford, CT,

I've been doing some research on no-till methods and many of the sources say that tilling and plowing kill beneficial micro-organisms. There arguement is that the real food source are the microbes that break down the nutrients and act symbiotically with the root systems.. They also say compaction is not a problem because the worms and roots create space in the soil. I usually till in the fall and in the spring but am thinking about maybe trying this method. What are your thoughts?

12/31/2005 2:31:17 PM

[email protected]

Not for this crop Mark. Not the way we add organic materials. And certainly not with a Tulip Tree right next door. LOL

12/31/2005 5:09:48 PM

Mn

Thanks for posting this here Mark. In my area we have to worry about hard pan with our trackter that we use to disck my patch. I'm not sure on either method. Maybe it'sn just good to till in the spring in fall or just the fall. I wish we had a real soil expert to ask this question to.

12/31/2005 8:43:36 PM

Minnesota([email protected])

I'm contemplating tilling once in the spring, before planting. Then mulching(with straw or grass clippings) two thirds of the patch(except the third where the planting sites are) to keep weeds down. I won't mulch near the plants, until the soil heats up. As the plants get to the mulch, I can pull it back, bury the vines, then put the mulch back.
I hope this won't cause a rodent probem. I'll have to consider this possibility.
The mulch will conserve moisture, allowing the roots to grow right up to the soil surface. It will hopefully promote a healthy environment for soil microbes and earthworms.
I may not even till in the spring, as I had a nice stand of annual ryegrass in most of the patch, this fall. It may act as a natural mulch this spring. Late last fall I dug a shovel full of soil from the patch, and there was a nice earthworm population under the cover crop.

12/31/2005 9:49:37 PM

milford, CT,

Steve..my question then is....should you re-innoculate beneficial fungus and bacteria every year?
P.S. Your right ..can you imagine the mat of roots that would grow if I didn't till and dig them up every year!

1/1/2006 12:10:46 AM

[email protected]

Bacterial inoculants are not persistant. They cause a shift in population that lasts for about 3 weeks. After that time the levels swing back to where they would normally be. Mycorrhyzal inoculants need to be applied once to the germinating seedling & remain effective all year if the conditions are favorble. But our rediculously high Phosphorous levels might negate that effort entirely. I've always meant to have this tested but I'm not willing to pay the folks at The Soil Foodweb lab $185 for a C02 emissions test. For that kind of money I would want a more specific set of test performed but the closest lab (NY) doesn't offer better tests. I'ce been too lazy to seek out a better lab.

1/1/2006 1:18:27 AM

Montoursville, PA

One does not need, to pay, to test, the presence, of Mycorrhyza. If the hosting is positive one can pick it up, by the hands full and see it with the naked eye. The difference between plant roots and fungi, in association with those roots can be easily seen, with the naked eye.

The hosted mycorrhyzae is always out ahead, of the roots, so to speak. If you find spider web like roots that are not root you have the fungi, in hand. Move towards the plant until the web turns into a root appearing web that will not smash or colapse in you pinching testing investigation. At that point you likely will have some, of each. The root has body significantly more solid than the fungi.

Testing for the presence, of bacteria and the levels can be done with equipment made, by Woods Hole. It is well described there and is believed, to be the best single inexpensive test, to identify, by reading the asperation, of the bacteria, in the soil. The cost will work out, to be, under ten bucks per test.

To get a professional lab test, for the bacteria, fungi or critter presence and count is indeed expensive. They are used by organizations and individual growers, with the need and cash flow, to make them price worthy. The fees charged include consultation leading, to ballances or corrections when needed.

The bottom lines are simple........If you want, to play someone has, to pay. The biological tests are based, on facts based on living content within the soil. They lead to available nutrient facts based, on a set, of known soil living elements at known levels. It is rare that anyone less than absolutely interested would purchase these tests. None, of the above, is possible, to asertain, with the NPK acid methods, of testing approach. Unfortunately no one can guess at it either. However one can read the condition of the plants and test for levels, of asperation, quite inexpensively. You can physically see the Mycoorhizae.

1/1/2006 12:56:30 PM

Anamosa, IA [email protected]

Last year, due to bad shoulders, a worn out tiller and all my money going to medical bills, I used very limited tillage. To start with I made raised planting mounds because my soil is usually wet and cold in the spring. I used roundup for early weed control, then the hoe (mostly my son used the hoe). By mid summer the weeds were getting ahead of us so I had my son make one shallow tiller pass. By then the soil was dry so it didn't chop up any worms. We lost a couple of pumpkins to splits from over watering, and because the average September high temp was near 90 we had one 700+ and one nearly 900 mature too soon and rot from the inside out. Overall I was pleased with the results.

USDA research shows that the more you till, the more damage you do to the soil. Tillage kills worms, wrecks soil pores and soil aggregation, releases carbon dioxide to the atmosphere, speeds up the loss of organic matter, and causes soil crusting after hard rains. I have seen side-by side soil investigations on long term notill and tillage corn-soybean fields and there is definitely an improvement in the soil with notill. On the other hand, I have seen notill fields have worse inscet problems than tilled fields, especially with cutworms.

Adding lots of extra organic matter like most pumpkin growers do may offset some of the detrimental effects of tillage. I still worry about killing worms. For the near future I will keep on with my reduced tillage. I don't see a new tiller in the picture for a while, so the reduced tillage will get a longer term test on my patch.

1/1/2006 7:08:39 PM

Nashville, TN

I do till the veg garden area, primarily to mix the composted manure in deeper.

Now my large front gardens - haven't been tilled in 8 years. I use the 'spagetti garden' method. I layer 4" wood mulch on one year, the next year layer 4" of fresh barn waste... This garden has the softest, darkest, 'natural potting soil' you'll ever find! Cannas regularly grow to 14' - and one Canna Rhizome will turn into 100 within a summer! (I've had 5 Canna Rhizomes - fill a 10' X 25' empty bed in one summer, ended up harvesting 600 rhizomes that year..) Everything goes crazy in my front herb & flower gardens.

Eventually, I'll quite tilling the Veg gardens. Once I develop a good dark organic base around 2' deep. But these are new areas (one started in 2005, the other will be started in 2006) - so I expect to till these areas until 2007. After that I'll probably use natural 'spagetti gardening' techniques....

After all, this is how the deep forests have created the organic, nutritious, deep soils that they have.

1/2/2006 11:28:28 AM

Mn

now thats a garden.

1/2/2006 5:06:16 PM

Roselle, IL [email protected]

I think you a talking about Lasagna gardening. It's a no till approach of layering organic materials.

1/3/2006 10:12:31 AM

Alaska

I like the no till approach in my yard my perennial bed and that's about it. Maybe I'm just old school and can't break old habits? Mother natures approach is a fine model when you exclude man from the mix. Growing heavy feeding high powered cultivars requires quite a bit more tinkering. I wonder???? Do the Checkons, the Dills, the Bobiers, the Eatons, the Hollands, the Whittiers, the Wykcoffs and so on, use the no till method to consistantly grow the big ones??????? I think a pole is in order. Later Scott.

1/3/2006 2:56:05 PM

Montoursville, PA

Hitler took a pole while thousands, perhaps millions, raised their hands with approvial. While, in the power seat, he was the leader and thought, to be right.

1/4/2006 7:38:54 PM

Garden

I'm not following, so Hitler tilled or didnt till?
What was his PB?
:)

1/4/2006 9:39:19 PM

Montoursville, PA

That was an eye opener.....A pole was called for. A pole is only as good as the average knowledge, of the mass information base supporting the area being poled.

1/5/2006 11:55:16 AM

Central Connecticut

how about a poll? taking a pole sounds painfull...lol

1/6/2006 2:13:45 PM