The deeper your pioneer roots go, the more you'll want to plant. After planting our garlic bulbs in raised beds for two years, we've decided we want to plant more.
If you need to enlarge or create a new garden bed, fall is the perfect time to get started.
When you're starting with lawn, lay a heavy and dark tarp over the grass. Make sure to weigh it down. Don't use white or clear, the light will still get through and you'll create a greenhouse effect instead of killing the grass.
Leave the tarp down for at least two weeks. Lift up a corner to make sure the grass is dying. It's best to do this in the fall when grass is already beginning to go into dormancy.
After grass is killed, till up the ground. The first pass will leave larger clumps of roots. Keep going back through until they're all tilled up.
Now is the time to find out what kind of soil you have, if you don't know. We happen to have very acidic soil, which is great for blueberries and raspberries. But we add lime to our vegetable garden soil.
It's important to add organic matter back into your soil. Fall is a great time to add this in. It will have all winter to break down and enrich your dirt for spring planting.
We use chicken manure that's been allowed to sit for a year. Chicken manure is high in nitrates and will burn plants if not allowed to sit for a period of time. Dried cow manure, well-rotted horse, and dried llama manure all make great natural fertilizer.
Don't have access to poo? Spread leaves over your soil. By spring you'll have great dirt ready for seeds and starts.
What are your best gardening tips? Do you plant any fall or winter crops? Have you had to enlarge your gardening area since you started?
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Your awesome! I was just thinking about asking what next…? For when my pumpkins and zucchini and corn and watermelon are ready to be harvested and I have the empty garden bed How do I keep the weeds from growing back I will deff try the leaves I was also told cardboard?? or is the tarp the best bet for that? Should I till up the ground after picking everything and add fertilizer then? Then follow with covering the bed with something? I really want to have an early spring start on my garden next year and don’t want to have to deal with all the weeds before I get started so any helpful advice is much appreciated!
You can lay cardboard on top, but I always wonder what is in the cardboard? Has it been treated, what chemicals are used? I don’t know the answer to that. If you till everything up after you harvest, it will stop a lot of things from growing during the winter. I’d definitely add a layer of leaves. If you can stop weeds from going to seed, then you’ll stop the most of them. And those leaves are starting to fall!!
I love preparing a spring bed in the fall, so that it’s ready to go when planting time comes. We’ve used cardboard and paper with some success. I am just starting a new homestead related link up, and would love you to join. If you get a moment, come by and check it out! http://www.simplejoyfulliving.com/2012/09/backyard-farming-connection-bees.html
[…] prepared new garden beds for our garlic last month. We plant our garlic the first week of October, but if the ground […]
So, we don’t know much about gardening, but really want to learn. It’s now spring and didn’t know about prepping the soil in the fall. What would be the best way to prep soil now to try and minimize crazy amounts of weeds and make sure it’s good soil for growing in?
Thanks….. gardening is tough when you didn’t grow up with it and have no one to show you how!! But I’m determined to learn so I can pass this way of life to my little girl. 🙂
Liesl in Wisconsin
Liesl,
If you can find some good compost that would be good, usually large nurseries or even feed stores will sell it by the large bag full. You can also purchase bags of chicken manure at feed stores and mix that into your soil.