Gardening question

[FarmerChick]

While things get easier a little down the road (yea we all know fighting weeds is forever! HA)

starting a brand new garden means jump in and break that land and til

we have a good tiller thread so search rototillers on here and you should find good info.

 

[xpc]

Listen to these people, they know what they are talking about. Two years ago I started a garden about the same size and it failed miserably due to my hard clay ground. The dudes over at Southern State said i needed to til with mulch at least 2 years before planting in these parts - I gave up and didn't bother, planted everything in raised beds instead and never looked back - I now get more food than I can eat.

 

[FarmerChick]

very smart xpc
truly, if the ground is lousey, raised beds would be easier

very true!

I have Carolina Red Clay here. Yup, it is clay!

 

[1stepcloser]

Maybe raised bed is the way to go. Our dirt is very clay like, not to mention the local builders had a nasty habit if burying their house building trash in the yard. I have friends who tried to dig and found it nearly impossible with all the broken bricks. :/

 

[FarmerChick]

get out the old shovel

turn over a few big digs where you want to garden


then....how horrible is it?

my clay is red and sticky and rough and tough and slimey and RED
everything can stain red here in a minute....good thing I love the terra cotta color..HA HA

 

[punkin]

Yep, listen to FC, and you should buy a tiller.

Start tilling now. Try to till between freezes if you can during winter.

Raised beds would be easier (alot). You can also start working on them now. Start composting now, if you don't already.

Our garden is through. I still have to remove the tomato cages and such before I start tilling. I'm already putting grass clippings and chicken poop on it to be tilled under and will do that all winter long.

 

[patandchickens]

Yes, till it now UNLESS (and this is a big "unless") there is any possibility whatsoever that it will turn out your desired veg garden site ends up underwater in spring thaw time or after large thunderstorms.

If you are on a site where there is no possibility of that, do it now.

But things can surprise you, more often than you might think, and IMHO it would be a shame to put a lot of hard work and compost into a site that turns out not to be very good. Once you have been there a year, or even a winter-and-early-spring, you will have a better idea how the property behaves... also what your other plans are, as you likewise do not want to put lots of labor and material into an area that ends up becoming a horse paddock or swimming pool area or shed or something like that.

You can always do containers and a small not-permanent-main-garden-site veg patch next year, remember.

Good luck, have fun,

Pat

 

[enjoy the ride]

In order that you should have a variety of opinions- I have never tilled anything in my life. I have also never had a commercial garden. And I have access to unlimited composted manure.
Originally, I double dug gound for raised beds adding amendments and never walking on the growing part. It was hard work but lasted for 10 years til I moved.
By the time I got to my new place, I was too old to find such work appealing and had the worse ground ever- clay spiked with redwood logs buried 1 foot to 4 feet (as far as I ever went) deep.
So I decided to go the easy way- I simply placed cardboard down, constructed wood raised beds, put hardware cloth down (gophers) and made my own soil out of composted horse manure, redwood dust, pellet stove ashes (very little,) ground up eggshells and vermiculite (the only purchased item.) Grows great, I can add amendments each year- and conserves water.

Then I decided to plant a blueberry patch- I simply put raw manure down, covered that with cardboard and topped with shredded bark mulch in the fall. By spring I had wormy, wonderful soil and planted without weed growth.

Since then I use cardboard and manure with covering mulch to kill the lawn and prepare it for planting the following spring. The cardboard disappears by spring and the whole thing is churned up but the various insect life. Each year I repeat and the soil gets better and better. And manure is available everywhere- especially in the suburbs as desposal is a problem for any small acreage horse keeper.

I doubt this would be good for large scale commercial growing where large swaths of a single crop are grown but for home gardening, I think it is a very easy, nutrient rich method of gowing.
You avoid stirring up dormant weed seeds each year and the decaying grass in your case would make a wonder boost to the nutrients in your soil. JMO

 

[farmerlor]

I would till it now, get a soil sample, add whatever's needed NOW, till it in again, if you can get some compost or manure put that on top and leave it until spring and then till that in. That's what I would do.
And yes, I would definitely buy a tiller. We bought a big Craftsman but then we have a HUGE garden. My little Mantis was my first tiller and that's very nice for smaller gardens. I can start that puppy by myself and run it for an hour without hurting myself and it handles very, very easily because it's so light.