In this episode we answer a question from a viewer who asked me to go a bit deeper into a topic we touched on a while ago about nitrogen fixation and then asked us to discuss tilling vs. chopping and dropping when it comes to which method is better for returning nutrients to the soil.
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I used miracle grow on my strawberry plants and within 3 days all the leaves and berries are dead! Is there anything i can do to revive my plants? I've replanted them in fresh potting soil so theyre not continuing to sit in the miracle grow. Any suggestions?? Thank you!!
@migardner do you think that '3 sisters' is a waste of time then? I'm doing my fist go with that method and now I'm wondering if it would have been better to just do them separately?
what do you think about cover crops
Two years ago I planted peanuts in between my tomatoes. Me also being in Michigan I I started them indoors from a bag of raw peanuts I bought at Walmart. The peanuts didn't do anything possibly because they got shaded out a lot but the tomatoes grew ridiculously well, the ones closer got crazy big.
Peanuts palnts are very fun to grow btw, the leaves open up like a fan when there is light and close when it gets darker and the peanuts start out as attractive flowers that turn into pegs then force themselves into the ground
Thank you for the information ..and that is the reason i love your videos….thank you for your time…!!!
If you chop and drop, do you literally chop the plant and leave the root, or what would I do with the roots? Thx
Luke chop and drop is a lot better than tilling. When you till you kill the mycorrhizal fungi.
I use fish fertilizer for nitrogen
Why don't you mulch the ground in the beds so that the leaves do not touch the soil? Is that not important? I find bugs and bacteria get my leaves chewed up if they touch the soil. Thoughts?
I'm working on getting the walking paths between my boxes covered and I'm trying to decide which is better Mulch or pebbles?
I purchased your squash vine borer be gone. Can you do a video how to use your squash vine borer be gone? can you talk about the trials you did. squash vine borers kill my squash every year. would like additional information about how you control them and squash bugs in your garden.
cover cropping in fall, winter,spring with a blend of thousands of grass/ beans/peas seeds plus adding mycorrhizal fungi rhizobium bacteria then chopdrop in spring then bury with compost is the my favorite way to improve soil /reduce/prevent plant disease.
How about sowing legumes in the months before frost claims them so they get to grow but not flower, but instead die down during winter. Surely that will be a boost to the soil.
I like how the word 'truth' is bandied about by people.. when only THEIR truth is that matters. Not 'The Truth' otherwise, cognitive dissonance sets in and we attack in response, never to change our minds when challenged and shown new evidence. We ALL have our opinions and that's all they are! The facts are the facts (truth) not our interpretation. Look at nature, everything grows together, not separated in boxes for aesthetic or practical purposes. Look to Real Nature and not artificially created, sustained, or fed through external methods. Tilling kills to soil.. fact! Otherwise, nature would till. Cover crops build soil, not organic additions. We all have our egos to support, reputations to protect and subscribers to feed. Namaste
Very Good thank you…
Chop and Drop is mentioned a lot here. Farmers do it in the spring and I was told this was because this prevented more nutrients from being washed away. People here are doing it for ground cover too and I see that the stuff being chopped is green. For your home garden is it best in spring or fall or anytime?
I think the indians and the 3 sisters thing is more about treading water as far as nitrogen. There is probably a small amount of giving of nitrogen that takes place, but at the same time you can grow beans right on top of corn and squash without the beans taking nitrogen away, whereas if you planted tomatoes that close to corn and squash, all 3 would struggle because of the competition for nitrogen. And then of course the 3 sisters has the benefit of the auto-trellising of the corn and the evaporation protection from the squash. I think of beans not as a plan to use to use as a fertilizer, but as a crop you can grow without depleting the nitrogen from the soil.
With that lettuce example wouldn't the soil have more than what it started with from water or the sun?
Hey from Rogers city!!
I have grass and clay. I don’t want to do raises beds but I want to kill all the grass and put food in it. Could I benefit from leaves and cardboard placed over “forked clay” with the grass left in and next spring have the grass be dead? Do I have to pull the crab grass before I cover it with organic matter or will it be killed by the mulching? & if I want to plant a cover crop for this winter, can I sprinkle a tiny bit of coco fiber on the top of the cardboard and leaves to germinate the clover in? That way I have something to protect the microbiology from winter and next spring there will be decomposed organic matter to fix my clay dense soil? That’s what I’m gathering from all the info I’ve got & I don’t have enough cardboard or leaves to do my entire yard but I was even thinking about laying traps down to do the same thing. Please let me know what you think?
I planted a winter rye crop to fix nitrogen and keep weeds out over the winter (I'm in Massachusetts). I recently turned over the crop and was told to wait about 6 wks before planting heat loving plants, cucumber, squash, etc. My question is I usually add blood meal each year based on my soil test results (the lab recommends nutrients to add). Should I do that now or wait until closer to transplant time, 6 wks? The labs are closed at this time so soil testing isn't an option.
Proof
Thank you. Tucking it in soil once plant dies after fruiting or raw plant?
You have dispelled some myths I have been hearing for decades. Very educational. Thank you.
I don't think chop and drop is necessarily for raised bed that already have good soil. It's more for plants/trees in the ground. And, you grow the plant to be chopped and dropped not for production. So, you grow legumes and turn them in BEFORE they bloom and use the nitrogen. Even on raised beds, use a winter cover crop of clover and turn it in in spring before it blooms and a few weeks before planting. Or grow deep rooted plants to break up the soil, chop the tops and leave the roots or even tubers to degrade.
Should we not rotate legumes?
Lol, that episode you're referring to that got flak still had 10 to 1 positive to negative upvotes….I think you're fine 🙂
You can do legume cover crops that are designed for nitrogen fixing, and terminate them just as they are starting to flower and you will get actual positive netgain of nitrogen in your soil.
Hi Luke, I love your videos and I have a question for you.
I am preparing a new patch of land and planning to amend it by growing cover crops on it first, then chop and drop and then cover the terminated crop with mulch like hay. This way the fresh cover crops don’t get beamed by the sun and the patch of land can rest like this over winter and I can use it next year. Nowhere on the internet I can find something about covering terminated cover crops with mulch (yeah I know it’s a double layer), so wanted to ask what your thoughts on this are?
Thanks a lot
You need to kill off the fixers before fruit and flower or else the nitrogen is used for protein synthesis. Pretty obvious?