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market-farming - Re: [Market-farming] Now What?

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Subject: Market Farming

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  • From: Richard Robinson <rrobinson AT nasw.org>
  • To: Market Farming <market-farming AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [Market-farming] Now What?
  • Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2010 19:34:26 -0400

On Fri, 3 Sep 2010 16:11:32 -0700, alicia best wrote:
> I really meant to get the winter rye that I planted last fall tilled in or
> mowed down or something.  But it was too wet/cold/, I was too busy doing
> something else important.... Now I have about 1/2 acre of winter rye that
>has
> huge rye berries on it and I don't know what to do.  Suggestions?????
> Thinking of removing the rye berries (by hand) and down the standing straw (
> by hand) and using it to mulch in my garlic.  See any problems with this
> idea???? thanks in advance.  I am new to cover cropping and do realize that
>I
> missed the whole point of planting the rye in the first place.... alicia in
> northern wa

You haven't really missed the whole point--even if you cut it and remove it,
the roots provide lots of biomass for soil improvement. If you need the rye
somewhere else, like on the garlic, you might consider scything the standing
rye on a moist morning, then gathering it roughly into sheaves and chopping
the heads off en masse--it might save time over doing it retail. But if it
were me, I'd let it be. If you are going to leave it in place, one thing you
could try is rotary-mowing it to chop it up, then either till it in or just
leave it on top of the soil as a fast-decaying mulch. If you don't remove the
rye seed, some of it will sprout, but much of it won't. And it''s probably
easier to deal with the few volunteers in the spring, rather than with the
entire half acre now.


--
Richard Robinson
www.nasw.org/users/rrobinson/
Hopestill Farm
www.hopestill.com







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