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"No till" gardening for peppers

Roguejim

Roguejim

I am not a farmer, but I'm fairly certain that Man has been tilling the soil for a long time, and for good reason, i.e., it produces desired results. Anyway, I'm coming across a group of farmers who advocate a "no till" method for treating the soil. Their claim is that tilling results in soil compaction, excessive weed growth, death to the earthworm, and unnecessary time and labor. They seem to have more of a naturalist, holistic view of the plant/soil relationship, or so they claim. From what I'm gathering thus far, both "tilling", and "no tilling", are effective at producing the same results.

Does anyone here use the "no till" method? Make your pitch, please
 
sounds like an excuse for being lazy with an annual garden, sure they will grow, plants grew a very long time before we got here, but we play part mother nature when cultivating, been proven since recorded history

i am sure every farmer in America would love to never till or disc soil just pop seeds in, there is a reason for the hard work, firs thing comes to my mind is the fairy tale/fable of the squirrel who didn't save his nuts
 
Tilling allows enriching with compost, turning under weeds, and would beat untilled ground unless the gardener had enough other problems that the plants would be stunted either way.
 
It actually has a lot of scientific and biological and ecological reasons behind it. You still have to dig a hole or cut a small trench to plant but instead of tilling between the rows or plants you leave the usually previously planted beneficial low crops such lucern or clover intact. When this dies down and subsequently self seeds and regrows it fertilisers the soil at the same time and you can fertiliser on this crop and it will leach into the soil just the same albeit slower the a tilled crop.
 
I think the idea that no-till is "easier" than tilling may be short sighted. From what I understand, the purpose of a no-till system is to protect the soil food web, and involves adding organic matter to your soil regularly. I get the impression that no-till gardeners have a good idea what's going on in their soil, which is why I'm too lazy to try this method myself. If you are into chemical fertilizers, no-till is not for you.
 
Pash said:
I think the idea that no-till is "easier" than tilling may be short sighted. From what I understand, the purpose of a no-till system is to protect the soil food web, and involves adding organic matter to your soil regularly. I get the impression that no-till gardeners have a good idea what's going on in their soil, which is why I'm too lazy to try this method myself. If you are into chemical fertilizers, no-till is not for you.
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This, my dad is big into it. Once its up and going its great but it takes 2-3 years for the soil to Fully develop; He would pile hay, leaves, etc in the garden area 3-6 mo's before planting to give it a chance to break down.

As it breaks down you add to the pile keeping it at least 6" deep to kill any weeds, when you get ready to plant, just down and around big enough for the plant and then bring the bedding back to it; This Will cut your watering in 1/2 with no need for any chemical fertilizer.

Ive seen hard pack clay, sandy dirt turn into good soil via this method..
 
This no till method is just making new(2-3 years to develop) soil, stacking hay, straw, dead leaves ETC. is the process mother nature already does just accelerated. You couldn't do that here in Florida, to many shallow traveling roots around here.
 
I'm on my 3rd year of using no-dig garden beds, which is pretty much the same concept as no till. I never disrupt the soil in the garden beds, just top up with more organic material and watch as it rots down into nutrient packed soil for future crops.

This year I added sheep manure, coco peat and pelleted chicken manure that had a whole bunch of other stuff added to it like zeolite etc.

i also had 10 Bhut Jolokias in a garden bed, of which 9 survived the winter with no cuttings done before winter took hold. We rarely get frosts, but we normally get cold enough to kill any Chinense, so I'm quite surprised to see so much growth on 2 year old plants so early into the season.

IMG_20121112_124831.jpg

I really do believe that the science around the soil food web will be just as important and dramatic as fertilisers were mid last century.
 
Just watched the video below, Back to Eden. It impressed me enough that I'm going to follow the method explained therein. Some will no doubt object to the author's biblical referencing(didn't bother me), but get past that and look at the guy's rationale and results.

http://backtoedenfilm.com/
 
Look at windchicken on here, he uses a version of no till, he piles organic material to make raised rows. Look at his results.

For the shallow root problem, they add, and keep adding material until they develop an area where the soil web thrives.

Breaking and turning the soil may actually be the "lazy" way. Adding organics and letting mother nature do her work may take more effort.
 
There is no-till, and there is Conservation Tillage (CT), and both exist for good reason. The dust bowl of the "dirty thirties" resulted largely from poor land management practices by the wheat farmers in the southern plains. It was undeniably caused from over tilling, without putting enough rich organic matter back into the earth, but there is certainly more to it than that. If you think people who consciously practice no-till are lazy, look at what they know to be afraid of:

http://www.pbs.org/kenburns/dustbowl/

This shows what happens when poor soil conservation went rampant on a massive scale.
 
armac said:
Look at windchicken on here, he uses a version of no till, he piles organic material to make raised rows. Look at his results.

For the shallow root problem, they add, and keep adding material until they develop an area where the soil web thrives.

Breaking and turning the soil may actually be the "lazy" way. Adding organics and letting mother nature do her work may take more effort.
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The only way to beat a Ficus or Banyan, and dozens of different invasive species, is to cut em down or till em up. For Ficus and Banyan I have to dig trenches around my boxes or the roots come up from under and compete directly with my plants. Then there are these crazy grasses that send out runners 6-10 inches deep for dozens of feet, forget the 50 or so different vines that choke everything all year long.......Then there's the Fire Ants, Iguanas, rabbits, ETC.

http://www.eddmaps.o...rt.cfm?id=us_fl
 
I am familiar with Florida lived there for 35 years.

You have a lot of banyan trees on your property? Seen them at the Edison home and a few other places, never thought they were that prevalent.
 
Lake Okeechobee and South is Banyan Central, damn birds spread em everywhere. Been here since 1978 its gotten really bad the last 20 years or so.
 
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