Cover Crops and No Till

This year in the garden I want to try a more regenerative approach to my gardening practices.  I know that my soil is in pretty bad shape and very compacted so I want to do what I can to improve it.  I have added compost and mulch to the beds in the last couple of years and that has helped some, but I know that I can do better.   I have been watching videos about soil ecology posted by Living Web Farms on You Tube.  There is a wealth of information there and I have only scratched the surface, but with my background in biology and ecology I am eager to learn more.

In my garden I have mixed crops together in beds, but I have never really done any cover cropping.  I always figured that my small garden beds wouldn't work the same way as a large farm field.  This year I want to try growing cover crops if only because they will hopefully lower my work load as far as mulching, watering and weeding goes.  The information that I have been learning about recommends a 50/50 mix of legumes and grasses for cover cropping with greater diversity being better overall for improving soil health.  The particular species to use depends on what you are wanting to do to improve the soil and what season you are planting for (there are different cover crops for warm or cold seasons).

I am going to start small in my garden with my limited budget so I purchased some buckwheat and hulless oats.  I also have a peas, radishes and turnips that I want to try adding to the mix.  I want to break up the hard soil with the root crops, use the peas to add nitrogen to the soil, use the oats to add carbon, and the buckwheat to attract pollinators.  I am still thinking about how I want to incorporate this type of cover cropping to my small garden, but I am leaning towards using this mix in a couple test beds to see what happens.  I may have to rethink my planting plans for each of my beds to make sure that I have enough room for everything that I want to grow.

I also want to plant this type of mix in the paths between my garden beds to act as a buffer zone around each bed.  I don't want weeds to grow there, but bare earth isn't good either.  Last year I mulched the paths heavily which worked well, but I want to try a living mulch this year.  If things are going to grow anyway, I might as well make sure that what ever is growing is useful.  In my case all of those cover crops can double as food for my small flock of chickens.  I often throw them all the weeds that I pull in the summer anyway, so giving them nutritious filler instead is a win win.

Things are going to get messy this year, but that is one of my favorite things about gardening.  There is so much to learn. Each year is a chance to try out new ideas and hopefully make changes that grow into something better than what was there before.  This year will be the year of the cover crop for my garden.