Testing Out A New Cover Crop

The soil I was able to cobble together this spring for the growing season was not an ideal soil by any means.  It was full of rocks and clay and not full of enough organic matter.  Organic matter (O.M.) is the key to a successful garden. The more of it you have in your soil the less watering and fertilizing you have to do as organic matter greatly increases the water holding capacity of a soil and it provides organic nutrition for your plants.  How much the water holding capacity is increased it a matter up for debate as it seems to change from soil to soil and type of organic matter.  But despite the disagreement on how much is held the consensus that it does improve is not up for debate.

To learn more about water holding capacity of organic matter check out this article done by the Michigan State University Extension 

Anyways their is a couple ways one can incorporate organic matter into your garden soil.  You can either spread a bunch on top and mechanically mix it in using a cultivator.  Or you can used the traditional and newly rediscovered method of using cover crops to add O.M. both above and below ground.  Cover crops can either be planted as part of a rotation and done once every couple of years or you can squeeze them in between the main garden crops.  This will usually mean a spring planted cover crop that is killed and incorporated into the soil prior to the main veggies going in.  Or what I consider to be the easier method of the fall cover crop and let it go till the frost kills it.

Some of you may live where frost is not a concern and would worry about the cover crop becoming a weed.  If that is the case you may have to try to kill it mechanically or chemically(not a fan).

So to circle back around to my main point I have planted a cover crop of Peas and Oats.  The combination of peas and oats is a strong one as it suppresses weeds, fixes nitrogen from the atmosphere, and shoots roots deep into the soil loosing up the clay and adding organic matter all through the soil profile of my garden.

The goal with the cover crop is to have a loose, weed free garden bed ready for planting next spring.

Here are some pics of how it looks now with the cover crop being seeded just yesterday.  I will take pictures ever so often and update the progress before giving my final results next spring.