Your idea of adding organic matter to your soil is a good one, but just throwing stuff onto the dirt isn't the best way to go about it. If you have grass clippings, you can compost them, or spread a thin layer of them on the soil to dry, then till in when you also add a nitrogen fertilizer. Decomposing plant matter uses up nitrogen in the process.

Wet grass clippings make nasty clumps and don't decompose readily.
As for coffee grounds, in large quantities they will acidify your soil. Consider if you want or need this.

I think starting a compost pile would be your best practice.

This post was edited by ltilton on Wed, Sep 24, 14 at 10:08

You can do something called spot composting where you dig a little hole and put a day's worth of scraps in it. Just dropping your scraps on top will look messy, they won't break down very fast just sitting there. Everything else sounds like a good idea to me.

I just came in from doing some spot composting, Sunnibel. :-)

Don't till the asparagus!

Coffee grounds won't acidify the soil.

Don't add fertilizer until you plant. But do incorporate the manure in the fall so that the microbes can break it down.

Coffee grounds won't add acid but they will definitely add the needed nitrogen to help everything else in your pile decompose.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/07/080707171641.htm

You sound nice. I kinda wish you'd cool it on coffee though. I lost a cousin to coffee causing an irregular heartbeat. He was a coffee-holic too.

Congratulations on the success of your first garden. I spot compost all my 'clean' food scraps and waste and by clean I mean the stuff varmints aren't likely to get into. No meat products or grease. Yes on manuring now. If not now, allow time for it to age before you plant in it next spring and to allow it to be safe. I plan to muck my chicken coop soon and shall hill it on the fallow part of the garden and till it in next spring. As Jean says, don't waste commercial fertiliser on it now. The nitrogen will be leached out by the time you need it and just run off to pollute. No need to till it now either. I don't recommend grass clippings, or if you add them only in moderation or they'll be a stinky anaerobic mess. Leaves or pine straw or straw or other organic matter is preferable if you want to add organic material. We mow over our garden with the tractor and annual grass covers it by the time winter gets ripping. It keeps soil from eroding, and that may not even be an issue in a raised bed. You may wish to remove any garden debris, if there have been issues with insects or diseases. Don't let any weeds go to seed in your beds or you'll deal with them next spring. If you have horse stables, friends with chickens or farms, they may GIVE you all the rabbit/horse/cow manure you can haul. I let friends have the chicken muckings with poop and old hay/straw for their gardens when I clean the coop in summer to take home and age for their gardens.

Thank you all very much for information and assistance!

From what I am taking, I will till and manure this year - and throughout the winter, I will try to spot compose. I was told by a few people around me that tilling can probably wait until spring, but I enjoy the work, as of now :)

I also will cover the bed with some Straw (or hay - does it matter?), leaves, and other 'browns' I can find.

And Shaxhome - I can't take it, the asparagus is contagious - it wont stop growing and spreading, haha.

seriously -- don't till the asparagus. It is a perennial. It stays in the ground. Just plant what you want in other areas of the garden. You'll get your asparagus to eat in the spring -- keep on cutting it before it gets too tall, and you'll have a few weeks of great eating.

I agree about NOT tilling the asparagus! Cut it back when it turns brownish in the fall. Keep it mulched to control the weeds. Let it be it's own bed!
You really need to go over to the composting or soil forums to learn about different ways of composting!
Things like straw or hay (hay has seeds), different kinds of manure have weed seed in them and you want to find out from people you get the manure from if their animals are treated with certain things or their feed is treated.
Not sure about this "spot composting", but if you get as much as I do each day, you'll have little holes all over your yard!LOL. You might be referring to trench composting? (I hope I have that right) digging a trench and adding your kitchen waste as you go????
You will have to find a source of "browns" to go with all of those "greens". Your straw (chopped up!) lots and lots of leaves, also chopped as well as you can! UCGs are great also!
Anyway, make your way over to the soil board and do some perusing! It'll keep your winter full of things to learn! Nancy