Tilling the Soil with No-Till Agriculture

Happy Spring! I've been enjoying being able to work outside and do some physical labor. The farm is busy and slowly starting to turn green. In addition to sprouting seeds in paper towels and moving them to the seed flats, we have been getting the ground loosened up to start planting in a couple of weeks. It has been terribly dry the past few months so we hooked up the drip irrigation system to saturate the ground. Once it was moist, we were able to start breaking the clumps of clay into smaller pieces, mixing in compost, llama manure, and recycled coconut fiber. Over time, we will keep adding organic material and the soil should get easier and easier to work each year. In the picture, you can see the unbroken blocks of coconut fiber (coir) on the right and the ones on the left already incorporated into the raised beds.

Biointensive methods recommend minimum turning of the soil in order to conserve the natural processes and biota that live beneath the surface. Earthworms, nematodes, and millions of bacteria are working hard to naturally improve the soil for us. Using heavy mechanized tillers disrupts their work and although it may make the soil easier to work this year, in the long run, we would be damaging future crops by aggressively turning the soil over. Instead, we use what is called a broadfork or U-bar.

This handy tool makes it easy to loosen the ground so water and organic matter can be mixed in with the raised beds. I enjoy being able to listen to podcasts and the birds singing while working with the broadfork. There is no noisy motor or smelly fumes and after a week of jumping on the fork, you won't need to go to the gym!

That's all for now. We should be able to start planting cool-weather veggies in a couple of weeks! Hopefully we will get some rain!