What Methods for Preparing Land Previously Bare ?

[GregP]

If there's basically just dirt, sand, under the thin sod, should the garden site be prepared a year in advance by growing some sort of crop like buckwheat or alfalfa there first?
What other ways are there to prepare a plot of land that was just bare yard, which is now intended to be a place for growing healthy vegetables?
(It's already known that there was no chemicals or pesticides, petrochemicals or other toxins on or under the sod, the place is clean that way, just sandy and maybe a bit too acidic.)

[Roger]

Hello Greg! A good cover crop, like you mentioned, would not hurt to enrich your garden site if your soil is particularly weak or poor. A lot of people in my area also use vetch or several different varieties of greens as well [turnips, mustard, kale etc] for the same reason.

Some other options that come to mind would be incorporating old leaves, manure, compost and similar items into your soil, to help hold water and to slowly release their components into the garden area. Just about anything organic in nature would help enrich the location just by rotting slowly into the soil. There is tons of info on this site about compost. I use a lot of leaves myself, as I have a lot of trees on my property. Black and white newspapers work well too.

You could grow a few plants at the site and concentrate on fertilizing, composting, and mulching your plants immediate area. It may turn out the soil at the site is better than you suspect. That way, while you are waiting for your cover crop to do it's job, you could get a reward of a few tomatoes, or a couple of peppers, or whatever tickles your fancy. If not, well, you were planning to wait until next year anyway, right?

[pixelphoto]

if its real acidic you could plant plants that like an acid soil blueberries just love it.