Plows

Okiepan

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As the title says How do you work your ground up to be fertile growing soil ?
Do you use a walking plow , single bottom , etc Tiller ?
I use a walking plow , A single bottom plow , followed by discing , A cultivator follows, every once and a while I use a tiller .
So how do you do it ???
 

tortoise

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I have gone to no-till. Part of my garden has been tilled annually. We dread working on that section. Its so difficult to weed! The no-till areas are easy to weed.

I start with having DH rototill early, 4 or 6 weeks before planting. I dug out perennial weeds and hoed every 3 days (1/3 of garden every day). After a month of that the crabgrass was gone, except creeping in the edges. Regular hoeing of weed seedlings works well.

I'm experimenting with underplanting/living mulch with white clovers. In an area ot has established in, it successfully excluded most weeds. Some grasses compete.

My advice is dont mulch, compost in place, or try living mulch until a garden is free of perennial or biennial weeds
 

tortoise

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I have gone to no-till. Part of my garden has been tilled annually. We dread working on that section. Its so difficult to weed! The no-till areas are easy to weed.

I start with having DH rototill early, 4 or 6 weeks before planting. I dug out perennial weeds and hoed every 3 days (1/3 of garden every day). After a month of that the crabgrass was gone, except creeping in the edges. Regular hoeing of weed seedlings works well.

I'm experimenting with underplanting/living mulch with white clovers. In an area ot has established in, it successfully excluded most weeds. Some grasses compete.

My advice is dont mulch, compost in place, or try living mulch until a garden is free of perennial or biennial weeds
The first year we hired and Amish neighbor to plow it. Then DH tilled it a few times. It was a rough start
 

tortoise

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As the title says How do you work your ground up to be fertile growing soil ?
Do you use a walking plow , single bottom , etc Tiller ?
I use a walking plow , A single bottom plow , followed by discing , A cultivator follows, every once and a while I use a tiller .
So how do you do it ???
What size is your garden?

Mine is 90×100, DH uses a 5-foot 3-point tiller on the part I usually dont maintain. I hope to plant it in 2022 - I did most of soil prep already this fall so spring prep will go easier.
 

Hinotori

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I only till the garden. We have a good size Husqvarna rear tine tiller that can actually make it through our rocky soil. Our ground isn't really good for row crops.

Grass is insidious here and I'm constantly pulling it out. Plus the stupid blackberries just looking for someplace to spread more.
 

CrealCritter

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I have a old (really old) ferguson two bottom that was gave to me this summer. I hitched it up and it plows just fine. I plan to use it to plow the garden this spring. I really would like a single bottom to cut trenches and plow single rows for grape vines, strawberries, asparagus and the like but free is free, so no complaining over here, what so ever.
 

tortoise

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I only till the garden. We have a good size Husqvarna rear tine tiller that can actually make it through our rocky soil. Our ground isn't really good for row crops.

Grass is insidious here and I'm constantly pulling it out. Plus the stupid blackberries just looking for someplace to spread more.
What is your rocky soil like?

I have silt loam with glacial rock - like big round river rocks. Generations of farm kids have picked rocks out of fields so its not too bad. My garden is pretty much free of rocks. The fields we rent that are pliwed most years are more rocky.
 

Hinotori

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Glacial till as well. I pick out anything bigger than a fist. Clay about 2 feet down so I have to be careful. Marshy in winter.

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