So let's talk no till gardening. Now I've never owned a Rototiller or been able to get my hands on one so I can't compare methods but I can tell you what I know about no till/no dig gardening. In particular I'm talking lasagna gardening also known as sheet mulching, sheet composting or sheet gardening. Seeing as I've never had access to a tiller no till gardening was a no-brainer who wants to hand turn a 20x40 foot plot? Now I love to dig, you should see the duckpond I dug by hand, but I do not want to dig that much garden up. So when I wanted to expand my veggie gardens, and I mean a serious expansion, I went with a lasagna garden, actually three, then another two and then just one more (insert a crazy smile). The term lasagna garden comes from the layers that the garden is made of. First a layer of cardboard, followed by layers of the manure, soil, mulch, straw or hay (straw is preferable because it lacks seeds), bedding from my chicken coop and whatever else I could get my hands on for free or cheap. If you had lots of grass clippings those could be added. If you had lots of leaves litter that could be added, get creative. I even add partially composted yard waste (pulled weeds), and kitchen scraps. The order of the layers isn't really that important save for the first and the last. Always start with the cardboard, it's what prevents the grass and weeds from growing up into your garden. Over time it will actually kill the grass and your garden will be connected to the soils below. Your final layer should be something that you can work seeds or seedlings into easily, my preferences are aged wood mulch and aged manure or of course soil. I cover the soil with mulch after I plant. If you add partially composted materials to these layers it's not going to smell too pretty until it's covered up with that final layer. In my experience building a number of lasagna style beds once it's covered it won't stink. I've also built lasagna style mounds on top of already established beds for heavy feeding crops like pumpkin and squash which really enjoy the nutrient rich ingredients of the mound. So far I haven't found anything I cannot grow in a lasagna style garden, potatoes, carrots, beets, they do well as long as the garden bed is deep enough. Greens flourish, strawberries do great as well as other perennial crops like oregano, and thyme. I also have raspberries and currants growing in beds started this way. I prepped the site for my greenhouse in this same basic manner and have grown corn, squash, tomatillos, tomatoes, beans, and more with good results. I had a overwhelming tomato harvest the first season in my greenhouse, an estimated 400lbs. I like to credit the method with that first harvest. Perhaps it was simply the virgin ground and tilling would have had the same results. I have my doubts personally, my soil is almost nothing but heavy clay and I think tilling would have caused compaction more than anything. ...You really should put something down to stop the grass and weeds in their tracks...So let's break it down really quick and easy. You really should put something down to stop the grass and weeds in their tracks. I skipped this step on one bed, and though in the end it did turn out well, it required and will probably still require more maintenance than the beds I used cardboard as a base for. I've used a lot of different kinds of cardboard, and I've tried thick layers of newspaper. My favourite substrate for lasagna gardens are the wax coated boxes that tree nurseries packs seedlings in for tree planters. Locally they're pretty easy to find, the dump doesn't take them, they don't get recycled, more often than not they are just burnt so I like to think this is an eco-friendly way to dispose of them. Regular cardboard takes 1 to 2 seasons to break down, the tree planting boxes take 2 to 3 seasons to break down, occasionally longer to break down. The longer that base layer takes to break down the better the chance that you're going to kill everything underneath it including dreadfully hard to kill Canadian thistle. You can go one of two ways, with a frame like a raised bed or without one. That is up to you I've done both it just depends on what I want in my garden. It depends on what I'm going to plant and how I want it to look. Lay your cardboard out where you want your garden, overlap individual pieces by 6 inches so that you don't have sneaky roots from those weeds creeping up into your bed. Now's the time to put your frame in place, for best results let the cardboard extend past the frame up to a foot. Don't worry that cardboard will degrade and won't be an eyesore for very long. Oh, the newspaper... I say don't bother, it's just not long lasting enough though I see it recommended for this method elsewhere. Now come the layers. The order isn't super important in those middle layers in my experience, but if you're using anything stinky, like half rotted kitchen scraps, dirty animal bedding or fresh manure, put that down first. Stinky things are often really nitrogen rich and it is good to get things that are really rich away from the plants and put some things that are more carbon rich between the plant and that nitrogen rich food. the nitrogen rich ingredient should mellow by the time the roots of your plants reach them. If you want you could ask a local coffee shop to save up the grounds for a couple weeks for you. These will give you a nice nitrogen rich base. Those same coffee grounds can be sprinkle on the top too. They repel a number of pest including slugs. Also they release their nitrogen slowly and will not burn your plants (bonus info: coffee grounds contain magnesium something lacking in many soil's). So you got your stinky stuff down, the nitrogen heavy stuff, now put your other ingredients on top: old hay, straw, wood mulch, leaves, grass clippings etc. Top those layers off with some age manure, some soil, aged wood mulch or a mix of all of those. ...Now you're ready to plant, yup! you can do it all in one day if you want...Now you're ready to plant, yup! you can do it all in one day if you want. Seed it, put transplants in, dig your potatoes in a little bit, whatever you want. Now after I do this I usually lightly mulch the surface with something I have on hand, often old hay or wood mulch (remember hay is full of seeds, so it's not for everyone. Hay = weeds). I believe in mulching for a lot of different reasons: it adds to your soil integrity, holds your seeds in place when you water, it protects from erosion (water and wind), it insulates and it will break down and feed things. Now just sit back and watch things grow. In this picture you can see 2 of the finished beds. The one in the back is edged with logs to prevent the soil sloughing. The one in the foreground I have to re-pile after heavy rains or if I over water. Usually this is a non issue but these beds were piled a foot high for root crops. Sloughing won't be a problem in beds that aren't piled as high. The yellow lumber wrap I used to suppress the grass on my pathways, in the photo below its been mulched over. Lasagna gardening works really great when you have poor soil in the first place. I have a yard that is nothing but gravel fill and clay. The soil here doesn't exist, I would have to bring in topsoil. So instead I bring in these cheap and free ingredients and let nature create my soil. Given time the layers of your lasagna garden will be indistinguishable from each other and you should have nothing but dirt. Personally I don't have any experience with sandy soil's but I assume that this would work great given that sand is kind of the opposite end of the spectrum from clay. This style garden will also work if you have exceptional soils of course. ...If you don't till or dig you don't disturb the ecosystem that's below your feet...I keep up the health of my soil by adding to the top of it from the ingredients list that went into the original garden. I also like to water with compost tea if I think they need a little extra food. A lot of my gardening inspiration comes from permaculture, mimicking nature, and from sheer laziness in a scenes. Nature builds beautiful soil by layering materials. If you don't till or dig (I dig some depending on what I'm planting, harvesting or weeding) you don't disturb the ecosystem that's below your feet. The layers of that ecosystem and how they're layered, what organisms are in each one are important to your soils health. They all interact with each other, flipping it all upside down when you don't have to doesn't sense. Of course I am just one of many opinions in the world of gardening, and honestly as long as it's some form of organic I'm behind whatever you choose. Just grow something. Lasagna garden ingredients list: cardboard leaves aged wood mulch coffee grounds compost fresh manure aged manure hay straw grass clippings soil kitchen scraps bedding from chickens, goats, ducks, horses, rabbits, pigs, and cows... etc.
1 Comment
Angie Pollok
3/12/2018 06:06:59 pm
This is really well written and easy to understand. I will definitely be trying this, this year. Thanks.
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