Re: no-till gardening


Also from Berkeley: 

Not wanting to deal with the clay soil all at once, I dug holes for three rose
bushes next to my front walk and mulched them pretty heavily each spring,
without digging anything into the soil. I was astonished to find that the soil
is now light and easy to dig...I suppose the earthworms did the tilling for me.
The part of the walkway bed that hasn't been mulched as much is still a heavy
clay. 

My conclusion - and I do have one - put the mulch on top of the clay, the more
mulch the better, and forget about digging it in. The worms will do it for you. 

>From 
Kay Dreher
in Berkeley


Richad Starkeson wrote:
> 
> A suggestion from another inhabitant of Bezerkeley:  I think the "no till"
> method of farming presumes you have good soil to begin with.  In almost all of
> Berkeley, there is 10-18" of adobe clay overlying normal clay, with at best two
> inches of what one might call "topsoil" or humus.  It has almost no drainage,
> except in rocky hilly areas.  These are great conditions for growing native
> plants, but hardly ideal for anything else.  (As evidence of the adobe soil's.
> ability to compact like concrete, most of  the California Missions were
> originally built by making "bricks" out of it. )  If you want not to till the
> soil, you should have amended the heck out of it first (into it?).  After that,
> continuously dumping organic material on top, will allow you to get away
> without "tilling".
> 
> Barbara Sargent wrote:
> 
> > I have a small backyard garden in Berkeley and have been attempting, for
> > some time, to try no-digging methods. I have the sunniest spot set aside
> > for summer vegetables, i.e. tomatoes, beans, lettuce, cucumbers, peppers,
> > etc.
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