Healthy soil and sustainable growing

["Tradingpost" <tradingpost@lobo.net>]

Ken is right that the principles are the same. Trying to reduce tillage is a 
good start. I'd add this: your climate is not suitable for some crops, and 
even if you can manage to grow them it'll be unprofitable. Hauling water 
costs too much. Forget wood chips, and you don't plow under your mulch 
whatever it is. BTW I'm using loose, spoiled hay and it does not blow away, 
even with our frequent 50 mph winds. Dryland farming probably won't help you; 
our winds just blow loose dust into the next county. The last thing you want 
is to lose what topsoil you have.

Mark, I don't know how much land you're trying to work into organic 
vegetables. Best to start small and make small mistakes. By small I don't 
mean a few acres. I mean a few square feet. When you learn to grow in a 
postage stamp garden then you learn what it takes to grow in a larger area. 
How large? I make a good sideline income market growing on one sixth of an 
acre. And I have a much higher gross and net, per square foot, than most any 
large farmer. If you're younger and have more startup capital then you may be 
able to work it into a full time income.

There are a few rules of thumb we've worked out and verified in practice 
ourselves. Retail, like growers markets for example, or farmstands. Wholesale 
puts you at the mercy of the middleman who pits one grower against another to 
pay him the lowest price. Grow what will sell locally, grow what people 
normally buy in the store, not what you think you'd like to grow. Not globe 
artichokes. Limit yourself to higher value crops for the ground space they 
require and the labor they need. Not watermelons. Grow in permanent beds (not 
necessarily raised or framed) with permanent aisles to walk on, and plant 
intensively as explained in books on that I've mentioned before. With smaller 
root crops you get far more production per square foot than with wide tractor 
rows. With larger plants you don't get the same increase, but by growing in 
permanent beds you still make the gains from not compacting the soil by 
walking on it. I do this and it just a better way from every standpoint. I 
can go into a lot more detail on these methods with documentation, including 
mulch issues.

Now, crop selection is up to you, and whether you will double crop, irrigate 
some way, and so forth. How you extend your growing season is up to you, 
whether you grow starts or buy them, spend for low tunnels or hoop houses, 
and so forth. Your aim will be to hold down costs relative to your total 
gross income, obviously, because the difference is your pay. This is just a 
broad outline. BTW none of these methods are original; they've all been done 
and described in many places for many years.


paul tradingpost@lobo.net

*********** REPLY SEPARATOR  ***********

On 7/2/2008 at 3:19 PM mcoldiron wrote:

>I'm trying to move toward organic vegetable farming as much as possible.
>I
>still till the soil like a regular farmer, but am trying to find a way not
>to do it so much and conserve water.  I live in a very hot and arid part
>of
>west Texas with an annual rainfall of 18 inches or less.  The soil is a
>sandy loam.  Due to the unpredictable rain here I want to try using mulch
>and drip irrigation.  The well water isn't good, so it'll have to be
>hauled
>in.
>
>I have questions about mulch?  It's so windy here until the end of June,
>that anything other than wood chips will just blow away.  Can I use wood
>chips for mulch?  If so, what will that do when I plow them under each
>year?
>Will their decomposition tie up the Nitrogen so I can't grow anything for
>a
>year or two?  What about planting, won't the chips interfere with the
>planter?  Sure could use some very basic "been there done that" advice.
>
>Thanks
>TxBeeFarmer (Mark)
>West Texas Zone 7b
>