As you may have already noticed, Jared and I are attempting our first garden this year. I’m hoping the plants grow in spite of us AND that we will learn a lot. Here’s what we’ve done so far:

First, we had to flip the soil. Big Tractor Go!

Flipping the Soil

That worked great! We flipped a large garden spot…. THEN we noticed a plot not too far away that looked like a garden had been there before. People in our area use a lot of manure and compost, so we knew the soil would be better there. Start over!

2 Garden Plots

Here is close up of the two soil. One has had a hundred years of manure cultivated in it along with several years of rest. Can you tell a difference?

We will be using the black gold, and re-seeding grass on the orange.

People flip the soil in February so that it will freeze several times. This helps break up the hard packs of soil that develop. Then, it is easier to disc and till. Speaking of discing…. that is what we did next. Don’t have photos of that process though. Oh-Before discing we limed and put down old manure. The lime provides correct Ph (I think) and the manure is natural fertlizer. You want to use old/dry manure not the “green” (or fresh) manure.

Next will be tilling. Post more on that later.

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