Soil FIXer

You hear it over and over -- plant cover crops, but why? What service do they perform and do you have to wait until winter?

This five minute video explains the cycle  better than anything I've read. It also inspires me to interplant bush beans with all my crops NOW whether we get one bean off of them or not, we will get bacteria! Grab a cup of coffee, watch, and then go plant a fixer.

Back Story:

Last year we expanded our beds at Red Hen Garden. The year before we had used soil that had a LOT of manure and it turned out to be too heavy and wet, so last year we used Secret Garden's 4-way soil (vs. their 4-way plus with manure), that was 13 yards of a wrong decision. Nothing seemed to be taking off in that beautifully loamy soil EXCEPT the peas and beans. All the other plants are languishing. This video explains why. It isn't the lack of vitamins, it was the lack of bacteria. Worse (for us) we added lots of amendments based on the soil samples and they could be hurting the critters that we need.

There's still time.

While it's early July and we can still start beans, we're going to  interplant bush beans  throughout the beds with the new soil. This winter we'll plant  Austrian Peas just like  Ruth  did at the Coop Garden. Can't hurt. Could help. AND... we'll have more food for the food bank in beans and pea shoots.  We'll see what happens and report back.

Submitted by Mary Hunt