Re: no-til gardening (Newspaper Over Soil)

David King wrote:
> 
> Only but barely thicker, perhaps the LA Times uses more material per page than your
> local.  I did mine about 3- 5 layers deep (I didn't have a plan, just piled 'em on
> till it felt good).  I don't have enough compost to cover so I purchased bagged stuff
> (whatever was onsale although I preferred "redwood compost" if i could get it cheaply
> enough) to about 3 to 4".  This proved absolutely impervious to water.  Now, this is
> not rain, but water from a hose.  I haven't had enough experience with rain to know if
> that penetrates, I cannot remember the last time we had enough rain to bother
> measuring.
> 
> At anyrate, running the drip under the newspaper/mulch combination was the cat's
> pajamas; a distillation of creative genius over several seasons...
> 
> I don't comprehend your fallow plan at all - my unused plots I like to put into "green
> manure" - clovers, buckwheat, rye or whatever.  Although, I've been reading your
> "no-till" thread with a lot of interest, I would have a lot more interest if I could
> figure out how to incorporate green manure crops into such a system.  I am of the
> opinion that soil growing ANYTHING is better than soil growing nothing - I would
> rather have a plot of weeds than a plot of barren soil.  Although, otherwise, the idea
> of no-till really appeals to my back and shoulders!

David
 
Forgive me breaking off this thread before Christmas, but we had a
family crisis and I found myself engaged in looking after a pair of very
lively grandsons. Now all that is happily over and I am trying to catch
up with a lot of neglected correspondents.

My winter fallowed beds may not have anything growing in them, but they
are not just passive. In fact they are actively engaged in building up
fertilty for a future crop. The setup is first a mowed-down layer of any
remaining crop residues along with weeds which may have grown among
them. If there is not much material I might augment this with some from
elsewhere. The newspaper goes on next and then on top of this a thick
layer of fallen deciduous leaves. As we have most of our (fairly
considerable) rainfall over winter there is no difficulty with anything,
even the paper, not being moist enough to break down. 

It seems my climate differs very considerably from yours with plenty of
rain (around 70" a year) and a marked, though mild winter, during which
we get a lot of rain, and temperatures are mostly in the range from
about 10-15C in the daytime and hover around 0C at night, from time to
time going down to around -3C. The reason for having some of the beds
fallow is the fairly limited range of crops which will grow successfully
over winter. I mainly concentrate on cole crops, celery, chard, carrots,
faba beans, leeks and winter salads.

I used often to grow a green manure crop at this time, but age made
digging this in a less attractive proposition and I have not actually
attempted one for some years. If I was to grow one again now I have
adopted no-till, when it was ready to use I would simply mow it down and
put a paper+mulch "sandwich" on top so that the soil organisms would
have protection  while they were dealing with taking it into the soil.

I have not made much use of paper in the summer, but occasionally I have
had the odd bed which was not needed for a  while and have covered it to
prevent a lot of weed developing before I used it again. While crops are
growing most of my weed control is effected by a regularly augmented
layer of grassclippings over the entire area between the plants. I use
it in some of my ornamental plantings too, though in others I use
material from my shredder. 

I have however heard of people who keep on a permanent cover of paper
plus mulch and just make holes in it to accomodate their plants. I have
just this year begun to experiment with this. I had a terrace bed which
was so weedy I despaired of ever getting it back into good shape, so a
few remaining shrubs were pulled out and the rest of the vegetation
mowed off with a string trimmer. Over the entire surface a 1/2" layer of
newsprint was laid and this was covered with a layer of several inches
of chips. I then replanted immediately with a mixture of lavenders,
marguerites and a few herbs, making holes through the paper and putting
in a little compost as a starter. These have subsequently been spot
watered about once a week. Interestingly, while the marguerites and
herbs looked happy from the start, the lavenders (Stoechis vars) were
not so accomodating and for a few weeks they looked so grey and
shrivelled I thought I was going to lose them. However, gradually first
one and then another turned green again and started to put on new growth
and now all are well on the way to recovery. What was happening I am
unable to explain. Oh, I nearly forgot, right at the back of the bed I
put a small rooted cutting of Centaurea cinerea and this has found the
bed so entirely to its liking it has already already grown nearly 2ft
high. Weed control has been generally good, with only a few coming up in
the holes where the plants are and along the wall on the upper side.

Moira
-- 
Tony & Moira Ryan <theryans@xtra.co.nz>
Wainuiomata, New Zealand. (on the "Ring of Fire" in the SW Pacific).
Lat. 41:16S Long. 174:58E. Climate: Mediterranean/Temperate
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