Healthy soil and sustainable growing

["Barbara Fischer" <cen12205@centurytel.net>]

What are chooks????   LOL

Barbara
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Harvey Ussery" <huboxwood@earthlink.net>
To: <livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Wednesday, November 01, 2006 7:13 PM
Subject: [Livingontheland] Covering the soil (was: A couple questions)


> > What do we do when the price of oil
> > causes straw to be so expensive as to be prohibitive?  Isn't there a
> > better way to be approaching this idea of keeping the soil covered?
> > I'm thinking of trying a few beds sowed with a perennial clover next
> > year to see how that works.  Have many of you had experience with this?
~Uriel
>
> My answer is to cover the soil with whatever you got--any time, all the
> time. Be an opportunist. This fall I've done better than ever before
> about planting cover crops just as soon as I took the last crop off, and
> now I have beautiful covers all over the place. I used a little straw to
> help with germination, but none of the beds are thickly mulched with
> purchased straw. Some of those cover crops, BTW, will winter-kill--a
> mulch grown in place come next spring.
>
> I'm able to get a supply of the big round bales, spoiled and several
> years old, but cheap and thus great for rolling out real thick. Last
> year I put couple dozen chooks on such a mulched plot, and over the
> winter the shredded it into fine, easily applied mulch--fantastic stuff,
> and they did all the work.
>
> I no longer allow cardboard or newspaper to leave the place--I use both
> for various mulching needs.
>
> I'm decreasing the amount of space I waste on "lawn" all the time, but I
> still have some, and I still mow, so all those clippings mulch other
> areas. (Clippings are great for covering the cardboard and newspaper.)
>
> Yes, if you have the space for it, growing a separate area as a
> "fertility patch" or source of mulch/compost materials is a great idea.
> I don't have the space in my garden, but I do use my pasture as a source
> of cuttings for mulch, especially in the spring when the pasture is
> fast-growing and easy to cut. (I much prefer to cut with a scythe for
> this purpose, rather than a power mower.)
>
> Fall leaves, pony poop, chips from tree companies (in certain
> applications), boughs from an evergreen you've trimmed or cut
> down--anything and everything. If it's non-toxic, organic, and will
> decompose, it's a great cover for soil.
>
> ~Harvey
>
> --
> Harvey in northern VA
> www.themodernhomestead.us
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