[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]

Re: Till/noTill



Hi Mike -

I guess I always like to explain WHY things work.  If you don't understand why, then you can get confused and do things that aren't helpful.

So, let's go back to the start - what is your purpose?  You turn weeds in to get rid of them.  Wouldn't it be better to not have those weeds in the first place?  If you keep tilling, tilling, tilling, you will keep having weeds, weeds, weeds. 

But did I just say to never till again?  No.  Don't leap to conclusions, read what I write. 

You till when you HAVE TO till.  So, if you have weeds right now, you till, and please till before the weeds go to seed.  But, now start doing the things necessary to make certain those weeds never come back. 

Those things are:  get a soil chemistry test done (you may have done this already.)  Look at the report.  Any nutrients not balanced correctly?  Go read Albrecht, Kinsey, and Arden Anderson's books.  Or chat with people who know those folks.  You have to balance Ca:Mg.  Balance PO4 and K.  The biology can't help you if you don't have the nutrients.

But how do you hold onto those nutrients if you add them to the soil?  They just leach out again, if you don't have the right biology.  So, do a soil biology test.  What is lacking?  What is out of whack.  I can bet that your beneficial fungi are much too low.  That the active fungi are hurting.  The protozoa are not present in adequate numbers to cycle nutrients for you.  You likely have root feeding nematodes. 

So, you have to fix those things.  Compost or compost tea are the only ways to add the things you are lacking.  If you wait for Mother Nature to bring those things back, you'll be playing with weeds for a long time.  Once you have the organisms back, you have to feed them properly.  Cover crops are good for doing this.  But please put in the right cover crop to feed the right organisms. 

Out of time---  heading to Lismore today, have to go have breakfast on the Beach!

Hope this helps!

Elaine Ingham
President, Soil Foodweb Inc.
www.soilfoodweb.com
SFI Oregon, USA
SFI Australia
SFI New York
SFI Europe
SFI New Zealand

"Hope is not a feeling. It is not the belief that things will turn out well, but the conviction that what we are doing makes sense, no matter how things turn out."   --  Vaclav Havel, former President of the Czech Republic