Turning vs. Tilling - What's your preference and why?

[Hannah]

Give you experience and understanding of the pros and cons of turning or tilling. What is best?

[Colin Keizer]

So far, I do a combination of turning--with a shovel--and burying kitchen compost.

We also add potting soil each year in the trenches where we plant and in the big pots where we grow things we don't want slugs to reach. The potting soils get emptied into the garden each spring, and refilled with new potting soil for the growing season.

Usually there is more garden than there is kitchen compost in any given year, but we continue to change the places we bury compost so that overall, the garden continues to grow.

Our soil seems gluey and sticky to me. There is a layer of yellow clay and river rocks about 18 inches down.

I'm thinking of adding sand and carbon--anybody have ideas about this?

Thanks!

Colin

[Darien Payne]

Be careful when adding sand to clay soil—I've heard you can make concrete/adobe that way!
My husband Bob is really interested in biochar (charcoal in soil) and has been experimenting with making very small amounts. We're going to try adding it to some of our soil this year. His research has led him to tell me that the charcoal should be pretty mashed up, and soaked in compost tea before being added to the soil.
John Jeavons of GrowBiointensive.org is very big on growing enough compost materials to replenish, or increase, soil carbon, by growing "carbon crops", such as grains, corn, amaranth. I've learned a lot from his books and organization.

[Denise DuBose]

From what I've read, Darien is right - be careful about adding sand. What I've seen says that adding organic matter is the best way to break up clay but that nothing is going to work amazingly well. If the clay is too much of a problem, you might want to put the effort in for a raised bed. The good news about your clay is that clay has more nutrients in it than sand...it's just that the plant roots can't get through it!

[Darien Payne]

I prefer to dig with shovel and pitchfork. Most of this is because I find it so much more pleasurable than a noisy and smelly machine. Also I try to not dig if I don't have too, just put compost on top and dig a hole for the plant; that is from pure laziness. Sometimes a little digging or at least "forking" is required. I love those soil microbes too, hate to disturb them too much.

[Larry Fisher]

Anyone come across in their studies that if the soil microbes are disturbed enough to break up their infrastructure, how long it takes them to reestablish their infrastructure (days, months, a season)?
Larry

[Denise DuBose]

No, I haven't found any information on how long it takes the fungus and such to grow back. I would imagine a year or two. Here are a couple of resources that a friend of mine found. Her dad found out about no-till by accident - he planted a couple of spare squash in a spot that wasn't in his usual veggie garden area and those squash did way better than the ones he was carefully tending.

Here is what my friend sent me:

So I started googling no-till gardening and found a ton of sites about it. I've just started looking into it, after seeing the success my dad had by accident. The basic idea is that it maintains the structure of the soil, the mycorhizal relationships between plants, and maintains the fertility of the soil. As this site says, "it's a process of construction rather than disruption."

http://www.dacres.org/No-Till%20Garden.htm

It also saves water, discourages weeds, and reduces labor for tilling and weeding - so maybe you wouldn't have to water the squash quite as much: http://extension.oregonstate.edu/news/story.php?S_No=870&storyT...

As a side note, if you want more information about mycorhizae and fungus, I recommend "Mycelium Running" by Paul Stamets. I have a copy, but haven't had a chance to read it. He has done some amazing research with fungus! If you have 20 mintes to waste, watch a talk he did here: http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/paul_stamets_on_6_ways_mushrooms_.... (If you haven't wasted time on ted.com, it's great! Lots of amazing people and ideas!)

Karen