permaculture

["Lawrence F. London, Jr." <lfl@intrex.net>]

Rick Valley wrote:
> Frank;
> In the book "Successful Small Scale Farming- an organic approach" by Karl
> Scwenke, (Storey, '91) there is an illustration on p.45 of how to make "a
> terraced waterway" (which sounds to me exactly like a "Swale") with a
> mouldboard plow. "In most instances the small scale farmer will find that he
> can move enough earth with his plow to make any terracing that he needs
> without having to resort to hiring outside earth moving equipment"

Plow a row in a N/S line creating a hill on E or W depending on how the plow 
is set up.
Go back on the furrow side of the hill, with one tire in that furrow and plow 
another hill,
which will fall into the previous furrow. Go back over _that_ hill with the 
plow, with one
tire in its furrow, and move the hill onto the first hill. Keep doing this as 
long as is
practical or as needed until you've created a big long mound with a fairly 
deep, equally long
ditch on the uphill side of it.

Then is you have hilling discs, go over it all again with that implement, if 
it appears that
it will improve your swale. Going over the big wide ditch wioth the hiller 
would be a good idea
to make a pattern of parallel ridges, to help distribute water, catch 
sediment and organic matter
and otherwise help water soak into the ground and thus into the swale.

--
L.F.London
lfl@intrex.net
http://market-farming.com
http://www.ibiblio.org/ecolandtech/pcwiki/index.php/london