Bump

Thanks for linking this. I just watched the video and read the article. It was a pleasant surprise to see that the video featured folks from Oklahoma itself. The message of the video about the need to regenerate the soil is vitally important.

I found it really interesting that Craig Childs' critter census found so few insects in the corn field---a spider, a spider mite and a grasshopper. That is just sad. Where are all the good insects that should be there to help the spider? That was one of my favorite parts of the article itself.

I know from firsthand experience that dead soil can be turned back into living soil because I've done it here, but the concept of doing it large-scale with agricultural land seems so daunting. At least when we are "fixing" smaller parcels of land, like a garden plot or home landscape, we can add a lot of organic amendments and get the soil on the road to better health fairly quickly. With farmland, their best solution is regular cover cropping and growing their own green manure crops, and it seems to me that it would take a little longer to do it that way. Still, it is well worth doing.

I can tell you exactly what year that I felt our soil was getting into good shape, because the flavors of everything was much improved---it was 2001. That was after three years of amending, and of course, the soil (and the flavor of the fruits, veggies and herbs grown in it) has improved exponentially since then.

I've been in the kitchen for days now, trying to finish up the processing of all the final harvest from last week, and now have arrived at the stage that I cannot bear to look at one more pepper.....but, I'll get it done, and then I can "coast" and work only on soil improvement and ordering seeds until January arrives and it is time to start seeds.

Dawn

Dawn, Last year I had watched some films from NC where they were using cover crops then going over the standing crop with a crimper on the front of the tractor and a planter on the back, so they were laying down the crop, crimping it, and planting beans all in one pass.

Near our son's place in northern Oklahoma this year we noticed several fields where they had planted soy beans into the wheat stubble. It looks a little funny when the beans are first emerging, but soon the stubs are covered and it looks like a normal bean field. They still had a lot of 'crop dusting' planes in the air though, so it would sure be nice if they could learn to do away with that part of the farm process.

I have been interested in the results of farmers who are changing their methods, but mainly posted this because it was Oklahoma and I thought others might be interested.

We mostly only have ranches around us and not farms, so I don't get to see a lot of planting, except for a farm along Hwy 77 just north of Thackerville that we drive past on our way to Texas. I noticed this year that they have something green in one field, and it looks like a legume-type cover crop. That's the first time I have noticed something there at this time of the year that isn't very young winter wheat plants. They also have a big, long, high tunnel I've never noticed while driving by before. It is pretty far back from the road, so may be it has been there and I didn't notice it, but I still think it is new. They've had a great farm with a carefully planned rotation of succession crops grown in a fairly regimented schedule ever since we moved here and they seem to be successful. This fall, though, it looks like they are shaking things up a bit. Change is good.

I just don't like planting into stubble in my garden, even if all I do is cut off something right at ground level very closely so you cannot see the stubble unless you are very close to it. This spring and summer I interplanted succession crops while dying/dead winter/spring plants still were standing in the rows. It was okay, but I was really eager for the new plants to hurry up and grow and cover up the spent plants that had preceded them.

When I pulled out the tomato plants last week and this week, I used loping shears to cut off the above-ground portion of the plants and left the roots in the ground to decompose over the winter. I haven't always done that in the past but I am trying to leave more plant matter in the ground to rot in place instead of pulling it out, dragging it to the compost pile, waiting for it to decompose and then lugging it back to the garden to put on the beds.

I did pull up three tomato plants before I started cutting them off at ground level. One of those three had nemattodes, which was shocking. I've never had nematodes on anything in my garden here. Then I had to pull a few surrounding plants to see if there was a widespread nematode infestation and there wasn't. It was only the one plant. I grew it from seed, so the nematodes didn't come in on a purchased tomato plant. The few I purchased in February for really early tomatoes were completely on the other side of the garden. I'm wondering if I transplanted something from the back garden to the front last year and brought nematodes from the sandy soil out back to the clay soil out front. I may never figure it out. The nematodes might have come in with soil in 6-packs of purchased annual flowers, but if so, why this year and not the previous 15? I've always been happy because the one thing we don't have here is nematodes. I'm hoping this one plant is a fluke, If I find more, I guess I'll start planting Elbon rye as a winter cover crop even though I like clover (and the butterflies' beloved henbit) more.

Dawn, I don't have a cover crop growing but wish I did. I had grass, poke, and ragweed and I am having to remove it and not compost it. I am removing everything I can and putting down cardboard and covering it with leaves that are half composted. I have enough of this compost to do half of my garden. Since it is late for a cover crop, I will probably just add the fallen leaves from this year to the north side of my garden. They won't completely break down over winter but will still be good cover for the winter and thick mulch for next years garden. At lot of that area will have tomato and other large plants so I will need the mulch anyway. Since I always have plenty of leaves delivered by my neighbors, it would be a shame not to use them. Maybe next year I will do half in leaves and half in a cover crop and see how they perform. I have been leaning toward using clover, so I am interested in knowing which one you use.

I always have henbit in my lawn and what I think is White Dutch Clover and the bees are all over it in the Spring until flowers start blooming.

I have been looking at the Dixondale catalog and wondering just how many onions I can squeeze into my garden.

Our air temperature is 31 tonight which is already one degree lower than the forecast.