SUMMER WEEK 4
BOUQUET INGREDIENTS
marigolds, cosmos, celosia
We're big fans of cover cropping around here and we've been known to use them a bit unconventionally (you may remember our living pathways experiment last year!). This summer I experimented with cover cropping our high tunnel space between our spring crops and fall planting for next season.
Among other benefits, cover crops are traditionally used to generate large amounts of biomass which break down into organic matter when incorporated into the soil, improving soil quality. This is usually done by chopping and tilling the cover crop residue into the soil. Because we farm without tillage, we grow cover crops most often as a grown-in-place (or in-situ) mulch. This allows us to take advantage of the many benefits cover crops provide -- weed suppression during growth, erosion control, increased organic matter and soil fertility -- while also gaining the benefits of mulching -- weed suppression after termination, soil moisture retention, and habitat creation for ground-dwelling natural predators.
At the beginning of July I seeded a grass and legume cover crop mixture into our tunnel beds, and this week I terminated the 6-foot stands by crimping them down. Using a homemade crimping tool made from a board and a length of rope, I moved along the beds stomping the mixture down.
This repeated stomping knocks over and crushes the stems at intervals (hence the name crimping) which interrupts the plants' vascular systems used to transport water and nutrients. When done at the right stage of reproduction, this should be enough to kill the cover crop on its own, but since I'm not always confident I'm hitting the timing just right, I like to place a tarp over the beds to make sure the cover crops are fully terminated by starving them of sunlight before I plant into the beds.
The residue left on the surface of the soil will dry down into straw mulch while the cover crops' extensive root systems break down into organic matter in the soil. In a few weeks I'll plant our spring-flowering crops directly into this straw mulch.
Our farming philosophy largely revolves around caring for the soil and the life within it. These are just some of the techniques we use to care for the land we steward!
Thanks for allowing us to do this work,
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