I have tilled my gardens for the winter (maybe)

[freedhardwoods]

As I have mentioned in other posts, I plant soybeans as a cover crop after my vegetables are done. I always till them in before winter so the organic matter can decompose faster. A month ago I had good weather to do my fall tilling, but I wanted to wait a little longer for cooler weather so weeds would not have a chance to start growing again. It has been raining so much lately that the ground just hasn't had a chance to dry out. The forecast is for more rain in a couple days so yesterday I decided I wasn't waiting any longer. Even though we had rain all day Friday and into yesterday morning, I went out to check how muddy it was after it quit raining and saw that it was solid enough to not get stuck.

I got my lawn mower out and mowed all the soybeans; going over everything 2 or 3 times to chop it very fine. I found one low and very wet spot with the mower and sank in mud about the right consistency to make mud pies, and had to pull it out. I knew that spot was there, but I forgot about it and couldn't see it in the soybeans .

I then went over everything with my Troybilt tiller in high gear, cutting the ground about 1 or 2 inches deep. It does an excellent job of not causing compaction in moderately wet conditions, but I was really pushing the limit. Even though the soil was far too muddy to prepare a seedbed, the freezing and thawing through the winter will undo any compaction damage caused by working the ground so wet.

I put a "maybe" in the title because I will retill it one more time if it dries enough before winter, but I am not counting on it. If no dry spell arrives, I am done for the year.

[a0c8c]

I'd probably til it again, next time it rains it'll compact nice and tight. Everytime I tilled my aunt's gardenin Iowa too early, or too close to rain it ended up like concrete afterwards. I always found it best to til when there's no chance of rain for a while and the ground's already bone dry. Otherwise, wet dirt tends to stick to each other.

[freedhardwoods]

I didn't explain myself very well in the first post. If I had tilled deep I would agree. The compaction I was refering to was the chunks I churned up at the top. When they dry they will turn into hard dirt clods. Tilling them again would only make smaller hard dirt clods. If I till a second time, it will be fairly shallow again just to mix the organic matter better. Freezing in the winter is what will uncompact the clods because that breaks them apart at the molecular level.

I used to have compaction problems. Every year it was like trying to till concrete with my front tine tiller. Since I got my Troybilt 17 years ago, two passes in the spring makes a deep fluffy seedbed. It is so loose that if there is a heavy rain after I have tilled in the spring, it's like trying to walk in quicksand.

[tomf]

I unhooked the drip system and pulled it up. I am pulling out the stakes and getting set to till. I have a few more things to dig up and then I am done with produce. I will put in a winter cover crop of clover after I till.

[jal_ut]

Today I harvested beets, cabbage and kohlrabi, then ran my tiller over the garden. If the leaves ever get off the trees, I will put those on the garden and hope that I can till it once more before snow. It will depend on how the rains come. It is supposed to rain tomorrow. That is why I wanted to get it tilled today. It was on the verge of being too wet, but actually worked up pretty nice. I don't worry about it being a bit wet in the fall, if it turns out cloddy, the winter freezing turns it mellow again.

Have a great day!