Market Farming

["cheselka AT theriver.com" <cheselka AT theriver.com>]

Thanks for your comments about this.

I totally agree that putting 3 inches of compost onto my beds/rows every
year would be a pretty poor use for that black gold.  My question was
primarily about getting fairly quick improvements to poor soil.  Steve
pointed out (offlist) that if I REALLY want to improve the soil, I need to
integrate cover crops / green manures into my system.  I couldn't agree
with that more and already knew about that, but I admit it's something I
hadn't factored into my plans.  (I KNEW I was forgetting something -- doh!)

Probably the best thing I can do is do some experiments with different
application rates on a test bed and see what happens.  This doesn't help
much in the short term (like the next 6-8 months), but over the long run,
it will.

I'll also get cover crops into my plans for this year.  Of course I'll
still continue to make gobs of compost for my "tire garden" (300+
2-tire-high stacks for growing melons, summer/winter squash, cukes, and
pumpkins) as well as using it to ammend my virgin soil.

Cheers,

Matt Cheselka
Cosmic Lettuce

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