Table of Contents
Preparing the soil
To prepare the soil for planting a cover crop for green manure I first attack the weeds.
Race of the ages
I'm often in a quandary about whether to till (with a diamond hoe) and immediately plant a cover crop or to let weeds sprout, and then hoe and plant.
The dynamic is that sometimes the weeds get a head start on the green manure and limit its growth, even taking over.
Latest try
Lately, I have hoed the weeds, planted, and then used the diamond hoe again to work in the cover crop seeds. This takes a lot of time and effort and I'd like to find a way to leave out a step.
There must be an ideal way to go at this. Though sometimes it seems that whichever way I try, the weeds get a foothold before the cover crop does. It may depend on how well I have suppressed the weeds in the previous months. In the sweet corn patch at the farm, which I kept in a dust mulch all season, the cover crop appears to be dominant. Maybe that's a good model, but I can't always keep the weeds that much under control.
More later….