we are going to get at least one old corrugated tank to use for a garden, but we are hoping we can elongate it some so it is not full round.

just how wee see it and why we do it.

len

"I always thought it was good to till the soil several weeks before you plant to expose the bugs that had overwintered in the garden. Like stink bugs."

Tilling- a brilliant breakthrough/idea if you ask me. Farm land that would have never offered the air porosity of the same land tilled. Tilling and using conventional methods proves extremly productive making it the most widely used method.

On the flip side. Tilling the soil destroys soil organisms homes. Those organisms in a functioning No-till will till the soil for you. They will make a great happy home filled with air porosity so roots can grow fast.

In a no-till it takes months or years to reach the same porosity as a field tilled in just one day.

This was (is) an educated family, with at least three generations of Clemson graduates. Some years ago, after many long months of searing heat and drought, they decided to put hundreds of their acres into no-till practices. After that, their harvest yields (bushels per acre) were highest in the state for several years. :-)

seen many a farmer tilling the soil pick with a cloud of wind erosion soil following him, looks inept and is inane.

len

No till farm soils are slower to warm up and dry out in the spring here. With the style of farming today, that is a disadvantage. Also the crop likely is a bit slower to take off initially...just like organics compared to booster started crops.

As opposed to the either/or scenario, people might be wise to consider whether a certain practice is valuable or detrimental to the health of the soils they have and the environment they are in. Comparing apples to oranges has never taught us anything. :)

I prefer the cardboard and mulch approach.

Eric

Curt

I'd think not much harm at all.

I stopped tilling my garden several years ago, preferring to mound all kinds of organic matter and compost on top as a mulch and letting the worms do the hard work. But thats on shallow clay/sand stone, and I couldn't till any deeper than 6" if I tried.

Just remember the day man took a tool and used it to loosen the soil was they day till was invented and the day someone was trying to make something easier or more effective or productive. Understand that till methods feed the world today.

Curt

our gardens no fertilisers as such just recycled grass and food scraps over produce we have given heaps away again as usual in these gardens just over 3 months old.

seems to be some or a lot of gaia sort of thinking eg.m,. exhault the rich and punish teh poor who simply want to live simply.

"It's the same the whole world over It's the poor what gets the blame It's the rich what gets the pleasure Ain't it all a bloomin' shame?" out of a song sung around the 1930's

in the 40s and 50's our farmers lived in our communities we all did well simply with produce that freshness that well and truly eclipsed what we buy today and all using some pyrethrum or maybe derris dust in systemic applications.

lets move forward back to the past.

len

No, Oil feeds your world today, but not for much longer!

where i grew up in a sattelite suburb for returned servicemen that is exactly what we had before our farmers started getting influences from across the pacific, with the help of bad science.

eggs came fresh from the egg farm lots of double yokers and some triples

the farmer bought his wares on the back of a truck at least a couple of times a week

milk was delivered to our milk pail with lid fresh from the cow every morning no pasteurisation.

till farming now delivers land degredation, and more and more expensive produce of which the farmer gets least.

just in case you missed it i'm in australia.

len

No-till disadvantages
Three potential disadvantages of no-till are as follows. First, using burndown herbicides instead of tillage to eliminate competition from early-season weeds is relatively expensive, raising production costs. Second, the crop residue left on the soil in no-till systems hinders soil warming and drying, making planting more difficult and germination conditions less than ideal. Third, no-till poses many new management challenges for the new no-till producer. For example, in no-till soybean an increase in residue on soil surface leads to an increase in soil moisture that in turn increases the potential for soybean root diseases."

They talked about less erosion and less time in the field, and also less moisture loss. The disadvantages seem to be well organized in three topics. Hmm strange...

http://www.ipm.iastate.edu/ipm/icm/2000/9-18-2000/notill.html

O wait there is more.

"No-Till Fails For These 10 Reasons

While many people are convinced no-till is the way to farm, many others are convinced it does not work. Clearly no-till farming can work, but failures typically occur because of one or more of these 10 reasons
Selecting the wrong seed variety
1No-till seedlings may experience cooler and wetter seedbeds. Planting varieties that tolerate these conditions is important.
2. Lack of crop rotation
Crop rotation is important to break up disease, insect and weed cycles. Double cropping the same crops every year is not a crop rotation. A field must grow a different crop at the same time of year in consecutive years to be in a rotation.
3. Lack of equipment
The main equipment needed is a no-till planter and a sprayer. The technology of both of these has improved significantly in the past decade. Using old equipment may be of as little benefit as using the wrong equipment.
4. Trying to reduce inputs and expense
Often, producers try to use lower rates of herbicide or fewer herbicide applications than needed. It is wise to plan on spending at least as much on herbicide as would have been spent on tillage. Time, labor, soil moisture, and wear and tear on equipment may all be saved, but not pesticide dollars.
5. Failure to correct nutrient deficiencies before starting
Fertilizer and lime can be surface-applied, but they don't move much below the top 1 inch of soil without some type of tillage. Ideally, soil nutrient levels should be adequate throughout the rooting depth and not just in the top inch of soil; yields may suffer if the levels aren't sufficient.
6. Failure to leave enough residue
Residue serves many functions, such as catching precipitation, feeding beneficial soil microorganisms, preventing topsoil and nutrients from eroding, covering bare soil so weeds have difficulty germinating and preventing soil crusting.
7. Not having equipment properly adjusted
Since pesticides are heavily relied upon in no-till, sprayers must be properly equipped, calibrated and operated. Likewise, pressure on disk openers and closing wheels on planters and drills must also be properly adjusted.
8. Lack of knowledge
No-till farming is not the same as conventional farming. It involves much more than simply not plowing. It requires different skill sets to optimize all the required inputs.
9. Lack of attention to detail
To illustrate this point, consider this example: a plow controls all small weeds equally well, but pesticides are more selective. Spraying at the right time and right rate with the best equipment does no good if the wrong pesticide is used for the target weed or other pest. Everything must be done correctly.
10. A failure to commit to making it work
This is the reason for most no-till failures. If a producer doesn't think no-till will work and doesn't want to make it work, it probably won't. No-till farming is a commitment to a long- term process of soil management. The production benefits of no-till are greater in year 20 than in year two. This means no-tilling for three years and then plowing every fourth year isn't really no-till, it's just not plowing for three years"

http://www.noble.org/ag/soils/notillfails/

TMG is really pushing a barrow by the looks of it got some sort of agenda, can't see the forest(what's left after farming) for the trees. but he has his right or her right to an opinion even if pushed with some force.

might be driven by that greek mythology. blame the poor and down trodden for what the powerful do.

anyhow leave it with you for now just accept you are i a world media.

take care there are really more important issues.

we grow naturally organically and use no man made applications.

len

I'd like see better sources to back up your statements TMG.

Eric

I have posted no videos here in this notill post at all. What are you talking about?

Here is the sources for my above posts.

http://www.noble.org/ag/soils/notillfails/

http://www.ipm.iastate.edu/ipm/icm/2000/9-18-2000/notill.html

If you will notice I stated both the advantages and disadavantages of notill gardening.

In our climate and soils, no-till has very little value in large acreage food porduction. In fact, I would hope that we(our farmers) would recognize how things could be done better. Perhaps then, we might be able to switch to no-till and the soil would sustain; but to go to no-till with what we have is folly.

Being a half of a globe away and not even being in the same hemisphere, I certainly am not going to tell you what your experiences were, and I hope that you do not discount mine. Together, we may come to a sensible answer. :)

The point is that nearly any system of food production requires soil disturbance at some point. I don't need to read the OG article to know what it's about, of course they simply mean to put away the roto-tiller that most gardeners way over-use.

"In a no-till or limited-till system, the land is not plowed or is plowed infrequently."

Not too many gardeners are using a turning plow, though what a turning plow does is analogous to turning sod with a spade. A typical garden "roto-tiller" is arguably worse for soil life when used frequently than plowing is. Old-fashioned gardening used a spade and a fork, which is certainly tillage in my book.

Do you, Kimm, want to say what it is you mean by "no till" or shall it remain a mystery?

My first question is what kind of soil(s) are they talking about? They must be pretty deep to sequester so much carbon in the form of roots.

lol yea pretty much! :)

Wait, what about davids question? Hmm speeking of against learning anything new? "

I said this because it was odd you did not adress their question. I was interested in hearing more.

To speak of "no till" when it comes to annual crop production is a contradiction. Tillage, or soil disturbance, can be reduced, but it cannot be eliminated without eventually eliminating the crops.

"There is no doubt that healthy, well-structured soil supports robust plants and abundant harvests. Untilled soil supports numerous worm holes, ant nests, and other subterranean tunnels that increase water penetration. Soil aggregates clumps of soil particles held together with organic matter also tend to be larger and more abundant in untilled soil, which improves the water-retention capability of the soil. Finally, untilled soil tends to have a healthier population of plant-supporting soil organisms than tilled soil."

The article gives us numbers / results, not technique. What does it matter what the soil base is.

Eric

http://www.soilandhealth.org/01aglibrary/010125yeomans/010125ch5.html

Oh, every few years I might take a spade to them and turn the soil over to get rid of adjacent tree roots moving into the beds.

But answer me this please: In large farm operations, if heavy equipment is used to plant and harvest crops, etc.., doesn't tilling help to counteract compaction?

(You gotta get rid of the hardpan layer but there are chisel disks that can be used to do this.)

So now we have a starting point for an actual discussion. What we are talking about is different kinds and amounts of tillages. What the article is talking about is mulching to reduce weed domination and pulling weeds by hand and doing any tillage that does happen with hand-tools. I did that for years, and still do. It's fine, there is nothing wrong with it, per say, and it does have all the advantages as noted. It also has limitations.

The biggest is that it is not easy to introduce important materials, for example finished compost, rock powders, etc, throughout the active soil profile. Another is that adhering strictly to layering rather than incorporation on light soils leads to very low levels of some macro-nutrients. That has been my experience. Occasional flipping of the soil can be useful. Flipping soil is tillage, whether with a spade or a turning plow.

Not in my book or area.

The no till farm soil is firmer than chisel tilled soil [ a very common tillage on non no till]. This chisel/rip/strip tillage partially incorporates residue.

I am with Pat on using some incorporating tillage on home gardens. I also doubt that mycorhizae filiments overwinter on annuals in colder regions.

Lloyd

I like some tilling in my gardens though as I can amend the the texture and structure quickly and in the desired direction easily. In large fields I can see where the no-till and limited tillage is likely better because cover/green crops are the exception and not the rule. It is pretty easy to do home gardens right, but it is much more effort to do it on 3,000 acres.

And on a home garden level, 'tilling' is running your 7 hp tiller over your garden/flower beds - or not. :-)

I believe that if you have the organic material there, the worms will come. Yes, some may be disturbed or hurt by tilling, but if you plant cover crops like the "tillage" radishes in the fall, they do the work of earthworms. They bring up minerals, fiberize channels for air and drainage, add organic matter, leave holes for warming in the spring, and help to bring some nitrogen over the winter while leaving the soil mellow.

And, to re-iterate, since I guess you weren't paying attention, crops can be sown with truly zero soil disturbance. It is a method invented by Masanobu Fukoaka, and I insist that you go read about his work (starting with the 'one straw revolution') and then discuss it with me rather than me simply telling you what I'm talking about. I will say that I have tried the method a few times and found it pretty ineffective in my conditions and climate, which are quite different from southern Japan.

Yea really.

How would you convert a piece of pasture that has not been tilled in a very long time? To make it a thought exercise that works in your one-size-fits-all way of thinking, lets pretend this pasture is in MI near a very large body of fresh water.

There is no one-size-fits-all method that works for every soil. Well, tilling works for every soil, but it can become both excessive work and cause damage over time in some areas. No-till amendments in areas with pH issues (esp. high pH in high temperature areas where organic amendments "burn" before incorporating into the soil) or trying to grow sweet potatoes in heavy clay doesn't lead to anything a grower would consider positive. You can no-till amend high pH issues a lot easier in Wisconsin compared to Utah. You can no-till sweet potatoes a lot easier in Oregon compared to North Carolina.

If you're "blessed" with nice, loamy soil you can no-till your heart out whether you formed it with amendments or it was already there. If you're growing a mixed-planting home garden and you want to no-till you might have to pass on growing some stuff unless you can condition the soil before you start a no-till method.

When it comes to soil, gardening in Arizona has different considerations than gardening in Iowa than gardening in South Carolina...etc

Texture, pH management, nutrient management, and any additions you make to change any of these react differently in different types of soil.

Nc-crn has the correct view: nearly every factor in crop production can vary. We could correctly call them variables. Your edicts carry no allowance for variance, which means they are true only in certain circumstances.

For instance, once soil has been "properly prepped", tilling is not necessary EVER again? Never is a long time. Even the working lifetime of a gardener is a long time, and I'd be willing to bet that such an area will have to be tilled again, in some way, or else it will cease to be usefully productive within some timescale that would be unacceptable to most gardeners.

If you live in an area where your soil experiences pH changes every 1-3 years tilling to at least 6-10" when needed is a lot more beneficial than no-till surface applications. This isn't an issue for everyone, though.

Nutrient movement and soil texture changes are a lot easier than pH adjustments in no-till. pH is a bit harder to adjust without using more expensive fine-particle, liquid suspended applications.

Some soils benefit from a good tilling every few years (3, 5, 10, etc) depending on the pH influences going on in the area...native soil, quality of rain/irrigation, etc.

Some people don't have to deal with this depending on their soil or what they're trying to grow in the soil.

Probably those dropping some seeds into the ground after pulling back some mulch are not doing a very large area of gardening.

That's a fair guess, I bet. I do some of my beds that way and it's very limited. Without herbicides, minimal-tillage would not produce much food for the masses, not unless those masses all have little gardens. Which would be an ideal, actually.

Curt

How do they affect your garden?

I have another garden up in the sandy ground up by St.Cloud and actually transplanted some up there.

Curt P.S. Do I need a new post on this?

Of course you might have the only earthworms in the world with teeth

Look up basic earthworm biology.

Clays...the type of clay you see in the North-West are vastly different than the ones you see in the South-East (grey vs "red" and the parent materials). Even though moisture may be similar, the soils of the North-West can allow potato/sweet potato production under no-till a whole lot easier. In the South-East it's a bit trickier to "bad idea."

In the South-East a lot of the "red" clays can be quite hard throughout the soil profile with little else in the clay soil aside from the clay, itself. Tilling is usually a lot more beneficial.

I think we are missing the real solution to the problem.
The real solution is to stop buying corn fed beef (eat grass fed).
Farmers will grow corn as long as people buy it.
It is easier to make beef taste good with corn, but it can be done with grass.
It is just harder.
If managed properly, permanent pastures are the best way to stop erosion and actually build soil.

We should also stop using corn for ethanol even if it is "no-till".
It consumes as much as it produces and still causes erosion.
It is important to keep pushing for true no-till or even partial no-till,
but lets chop off the head of the snake, not the tail.

In my garden, I can only use no-till about every 3-4 years.
Most of the time I disturb the soil by mowing first.
Then I till shallow.
Then I till deep if necessary.
It gives the insects and worms a chance to withdraw.
Then I plant very quickly to cover the soil and feed the mycorrhizal fungus.
Everything recovers quickly.

Also, permanent pasture when poorly managed or on marginal soils is a terrible use of land, much better to let it grow into scrub.

"TMG is really pushing a barrow by the looks of it got some sort of agenda, can't see the forest(what's left after farming) for the trees. but he has his right or her right to an opinion even if pushed with some force."

Its called thinking Rationally. You should try it some time.

There are large swaths of the country where grazing is about the only sustainable land use. And grass-fed beef is good stuff.

Feedlots are awful.