Topic of the Week
Fall Soil Prep
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gary
Location: Washington, Puget Sound Corridor
Posted: Sep-26-2004 at 10:41am
A while back Trav transcribed this fall soil prep:
Here's a summary of Steve Solomon's "one shot soil management" system (note that he followed this by much more detail):
The main thing I want to add is: since the winter stuff will follow the spring garden, be sure to leave space in the spring garden for the winter stuff that has to start early - particularly Brussels sprouts.
Without a winter garden, you just follow the organic matter/ cover crop cycle.
Solomon’s latest edition gives less concise instructions but departs only in using the lime (a blend of dolomite & ag lime) just in his fertilizer mix. I would also add that you should also shape the beds (if you do not use a framed bed) that will hold your early crops. “Early crops” is a loose term for those that you will sow or transplant before your soil is dry enough for tilling in the spring. My sandy loam can be tilled at almost any time but if you have heavy clay, you can be waiting until late May in a wet spring. To decide how many beds, think about your spring soil condition and check the timing lists in:
"Trav's Vegetable Timetable"
I know from experience that you can ‘hand chop’ many green manures with a hoe. Others will require farm equipment to incorporate unless you till before maturity or kill and let lie before you mix it in. For this reason, Solomon latest recommendations for fall sowings are crimson clover and small seeded favas. I add annual ryegrass to make a blend with the clover until about October 15th and use just annual ryegrass after that. Note: this grass is not rye grain, which can give you significant trouble incorporating if you let it get too mature. The grass grows faster early to protect from fall rains and will scavenge leftover N (40-60 lb/acre in CA & MD tests).
I have always thought that cover crop advice is all over the map it truly is “all over a US map”. Longtime AP garden writer solves the spring incorporation problems by using oats. In his great little book “Weedless Gardening” (See Bookshelf), he recounts “I plant oats in any beds that become free of vegetables before the middle of September. Oats enjoy the cool weather, grow on into winter, and eventually are done in by temperatures dipping near 0 F. The plants then flop down on the ground dead, their leaves and stems still protecting the surface. Come spring it takes no more than my bare hands or a grass rake to “roll up” the dead leaves and stems (like a carpet) before planting.”
Lee is gardening in Mid-NY state though and not the Maritime PNW. That description could make me jealous enough to live in a Zone 6 or colder region. Lee’s book has a charts ranking green manures by hardiness zones and 8 other categories. A much more detailed treatment of cover crops can be found in:
"Managing Cover Drops Profitably"
Trav as usual has an article too at:
"Cover Crops and Green Manures"
Beyond very complete tables, this book also has maps of the US showing where when and in the country you can use the crop. Each crop has its own short section with information and examples of use. At $19 I think this book is a must for any market gardener. The rest of us can go to the site above, scan, and print out the pages we want to read.
So what does this mean to my garden schedule for the last week of September? I have 12 raise beds (4x14=55sq.ft.). Four of them currently have Cole family fall through over winter crops. These will just be weeded and irrigated if the weather stays dry past current forecast of14 days of less than normal rainfall (1.2” for the next 2 weeks). Solomon mentions that you can grow clover under Brussels sprouts but I have not had much luck with that. The other two winter beds (beets, carrots, chard, spinach, lettuce, celery) will also be weeded and will get a cloche cover around Nov. 1st. (Used to do it later but in the last two years, we have set 9 consecutive daily records from Oct. 30th to Nov. 7th with 6 of these below 20F.)
This year’s tomato, cucurbit, legume, lettuce beds will receive the Solomon leaf/cover crop treatment described above. I use partially composted leaves which I lawnmower chopped last year and stored in a plastic compost bin. My local leaf source of maple & alder trees hasn’t begun to drop yet. If I wait until they do, I may miss the sowing time for the clover (temp. related).
The last three beds are special cases in my yard. The potato bed (late crop because I plant in June) will have the plant tops cut and then be covered with plastic to keep off rainfall. I use this as substitute for a root cellar until about December 1st when I harvest the remainder and move them to the basement. I will sow ryegrass on this bed after I harvest the crop.
The 2006 garlic harvest bed was sown a month ago with ryegrass/clover blend. It will grow another 2-3 quick cover crops next spring/summer until Sept. 15, 2005. I’ll till in the last crop and a week later till again with 1-2 lbs of blood meal. The 2005 garlic bed has been through this and waits a mid-October planting. I’ll mulch the sown bed with year old or more straw. After the garlic is harvested, the bed gets a quick buckwheat crop then OW Cole transplants. (Submerged in this is a ‘loose’ 3-year rotation plan but that is another subject.)
You’ll be sure to note that heavy compost mulch is not part of my plan. First, I don’t produce enough good compost in my simple pile method. Second, in my intensive veggie garden, I chose to keep down the population of slugs, earwigs, and sow bugs. Lee Reich and most others would advise differently. Mary Robson had a mulching article this week at:
"Learning to mulch in all the right places"
David Rigby of Seattle wrote of his alternate method in the Feb/Mar 2000 Kitchen Gardener Magazine. He gathers tree only leaves and carries them to the garden to pile them 2-4 inches high. He places netting on top to hold them in place until spring when he turns in the residue with a 3-pronged hoe (a European origin tool that has good potential for aged backs like mine).
As usual, I am well past the ‘target’ word limit of a first posting so let’s stop now and continue after your questions start appearing.
Gary
Lisa A
Location: Oregon, Greater Portland Metro
Posted: Sep-26-2004 at 11:04am
Originally posted by gary
As usual, I am well past the ‘target’ word limit of a first posting so let’s stop now and continue after your questions start appearing.
And, as usual, you have provided us with thorough, excellent information. Thanks, Gary!
Originally posted by gary
I know from experience that you can ‘hand chop’ many green manures with a hoe.
I'd love to know which ones these are since I will be limited to hand chopping in my raised veggie beds. TIA!
gary
Location: Washington, Puget Sound Corridor
Posted: Sep-27-2004 at 6:33am
Lee Reich probably used the Management Challenges table in “Managing Cover Crops Profitably” (see page 53) to develop his simpler table. MCCP explains Management Challenges as, “Relative ease or difficulty of establishing, killing, or incorporating a stand. “Till-kill” refers to killing by plowing, disking or other tillage. “Mature incorporation” rates the difficulty of incorporating a telative mature stand. Incorporation will be easier when a stand is killed before maturity or after some time elapses between killing and incorporating.”
Both use a 0-4 level ranking system “ease of mow-kill” with #4 the best. Reich describes 4 as “excellent” and MCCP uses ‘rarely a problem’. They describe #3 rankings as ‘very good’ or ‘occasionally a minor problem’. The rankings are:
| Legumes | Hardiness Zone | Ease of Mow-Kill | Till-kill |
|---|---|---|---|
| Berseem clover | 7 | 1 | 1 |
| Cowpeas | NFT | 4 | 4 |
| Crimson clover | 7 | 3 | 3 |
| Field peas | 7 | 4 | 4 |
| Hairy vetch | 4 | 4 | 1 |
| Medics | 4 | 3 | 1 |
| Red clover | 4 | 1 | 2 |
| Subterranean clover | 7 | 0 | 1 |
| Sweet clover | 4 | 3 | 2 |
| White clover | 4 | 2 | 0 |
| Woolllypod vetch | 7 | 4 | 3 |
| Non-Legumes | Hardiness Zone | Ease of Mow-Kill | Till-kill |
| Annual ryegrass | 6 | 4 | 4 |
| Barley | 7 | 4 | 4 |
| Buckwheat | NFT | 4 | 4 |
| Oats | 8 | 1 | 4 |
| Rye | 3 | 4 | 3 |
| Sorghum-sudangrass | NFT | 3 | 3 |
| Wheat | 4 | 3 | 4 |
NFT = not frost-tolerant
The hand-chop personal experience I mentioned has been with annual ryegrass, crimson clover, and buckwheat. My tool has been a 6” wide hoe with just a sawed off 18” handle. It was left by the first owner of my house and maybe older than the house (50yrs). Nothing beats buckwheat for ease of killing but it is a summer annual.
Buckwheat also ranks as a “0” in weed potential as do rye and annual ryegrass. Oats, berseem clover, cowpeas, and field peas rank as #4’s while the rest are #2’s with a few #1’s in weed risk. Do eliminate all before they go to seed unless you want them to reseed.
I may do a small meadow trial over the next year with buckwheat and crimson clover. Their "hard seeds" easlily last until the next growing season as I learned some years back in a garlic bed that had me 'weeding' buckwheat all spring. And I know folks that use white clover in the paths for weed suppression and mow it to mulch the beds.
Gary
DebbieTT
Location: Washington, Kitsap Peninsula
Posted: Sep-27-2004 at 11:47pm
I like the idea of clover for paths and mowing to make mulch for beds.
I am translating this to a cutting garden, only it won't be so clear for rotating crops and cover crops. I do bring in an organic compost that has gone through ovens to kill pathogens and seeds as a mulch. By doing so does this mean I can skip the cover crops? Or and good suggestions for cover crop for what I am growing?
JeanneK
Joined: Jul-28-2003
Location: Oregon, Greater Portland Metro
Posted: Sep-28-2004 at 9:36am
Great thread, Gary. Thanks. I have been wondering about the different cover crops. I put in vetch and clover a couple of years ago and found it easy to till/kill the next spring. Good to know when to put the cover crop of your choice in. I did find I had to battle some weeds but it wasn't too bad. I might try the rye or oats this year.
Jeanne
gary
Location: Washington, Puget Sound Corridor
Posted: Sep-29-2004 at 6:00am
For Deb & Lisa’s questions I found some answers in a short excerpt from the book, The Flower Farmer. The author, Lynn Byczynski, discusses:
Cover Crops
Another way to improve soil is to seed it with a cover crop, such as annual ryegrass (in fall) or buckwheat (in spring). In the fall, plow or dig your garden area, then seed it with annual ryegrass. The seeds will germinate, and plants will begin to grow, then go dormant when the weather turns cold. They'll grow again in spring. Two to four weeks before you intend to plant, turn them under with a shovel or tiller. If they begin to flower, mow them to prevent them from going to seed.
If you're starting your garden in spring or summer, plant the cover crop during the growing season. Instead of planting the entire garden, do small rotations by seeding just one or two strips of a cover crop this year and growing flowers in the rest of the garden, then switch next year.
Deb has The Flower Farmer on the Bookshelf under Cutting Gardens. The online article also has a planting layout for a 5’x12’ = 60 sq ft cutting garden that will provide bouquets throughout the summer. You can read the full article at:
"Organic Flower Farming"
I have already referenced one book by the Sustainable Ag Research & Education (SARE) folks, Managing Cover Crops Profitably. Building Soils for Better Crops is another of their publications and is also available to download at:
"Building Soils for Better Crops"
The book has a great cover crop quote along the line of “let us not try to reinvent the wheel”.
Where no kind of manure is to be had, I think the cultivation of lupines will be found the readiest and best substitute. If they are sown about the middle of September in a poor soil, and then plowed in, they will answer as well as the best manure. —COLUMELLA, FIRST CENTURY, ROME
Two excerpts from this book struck me this morning as providing some answers for Deb & Lisa’s questions. The first is a common vegetable rotation with a quick mention of sunflowers. It seems that you should rotate them through your garden because their rooting depth will mine nutrients and improve soil structure.
Many producers are also including sunflower, a deep-rooting crop, in a wheat-corn-sunflower-fallow rotation. Sunflower is also being evaluated in Oregon as part of a wheat cropping sequence.
Vegetable farmers who grow a large selection of crops find it best to rotate in large blocks — with each containing crops from the same families or having similar production schedules or cultural practices. Many farmers are now using cover crops to help “grow their own nitrogen,” utilize extra nitrogen that might be there at the end of the season, and add organic matter to the soil. A four- to five-year vegetable rotation might be as follows:
Year 1. Sweet corn followed by a hairy vetch/winter rye cover crop.
Year 2. Pumpkins, winter squash, summer squash followed by a rye or oats cover crop.
Year 3. Tomatoes, potatoes, peppers followed by a vetch/rye cover crop.
Year 4. Crucifers, greens, legumes, carrots, onions, and miscellaneous vegetables followed by a rye cover crop.
Year 5. (If land is available) Oats and red clover or buckwheat followed by a vetch/rye cover crop.
To put flowers into the mix take a look at this 10-year rotation cycle by a Chapel Hill, NC market gardener. Chapel Hill is in USDA Zone 7 so those over-wintered flowers should work here. The summer heat there will grow lots of things we can’t though. The USDA info came from Niche Gardens so you might want to look at their catalog at:
"Niche Gardens Catalog"
Alex and Betsy Hitt’s Rotation (cover crops in bold)
Year 1. Tomatoes (half no-till)
Oats w/ Crimson Clover
Year 2. Cool Season Flowers
Sudangrass w/ Soybeans
Oats w/ Crimson Clover
Year 3. Spring Lettuce
Summer Flowers
Rye w/ Hairy Vetch
Year 4. No-till Squash
Year 5. Over-wintered Flowers
Sudangrass w/ Soybeans
Rye w/ Hairy Vetch
Year 6. Peppers (half no-till)
Wheat w/ Crimson Clover
Year 7. Summer Flowers
Oats w/ Crimson Clover
Year 8. Mixed Spring Vegetables
Cowpeas
Year 9. Over-wintered Flowers
Sudangrass w/ Soybeans
Oats w/ Crimson Clover
Year 10. Summer Flowers
Wheat w/ Hairy Vetch
No-till means just what it says. The Hitt’s are planting directly into a mow-killed cover crop that is allowed to lie as mulch on the ground. The allelopathic of rye do not affect large seeded crops like squash or corn so you can seed through the mulch.
Again Lee Reich’s Weedless Gardening (a huge bargain in gardening books and listed on the Weeds and Pests Bookshelf) also provides some answers for Lisa and Deb.
Cover Crops
Cover Crops, plants grown specifically to improve the soil, present an exciting alternative not only to weeding, but also to hauling mulch and even fertilizing. Dense growth of cover crops can shade weeds and provide organic materials that you would otherwise have to gather up or purchase, then spread. Some cover crops, such as rye, oats, sorghum-sudangrass hybrids, and subterranean clover, have an “alleopathic” effect; that is, they combat weeds by releasing natural, weed-suppressing chemicals into the soil (Ed. note: SARE puts an extra ‘L’ in the word; Reich does not). Cover crops also help nourish your plants by pulling up nutrients locked up in soil minerals, and by clinging to nutrients that rainwater might otherwise wash beyond the reach of roots.
Cover crops can do even more: After these plants die, their rotting roots leave behind channels for new roots, water and air and enrich the soil with humus. Some cover crops can even act as “subsoilers,” breaking up compacted layers within the soil (see sunflowers above). Some, like buckwheat, attract beneficial insects to decrease pest problems. And finally, the garden simply looks prettier in winter with the ground covered by a dense stand of plants that it does bare.
Where Can They Grow?
Enthusiasm for cover crops could come screeching to a halt with the question of where to put these wonderful plants when you already have a full garden. In a vegetable or annual flower garden, cover crops might grow when the ground would otherwise be bare, such as from late fall to early spring. Or a different part of a vegetable or flower garden might be set aside each year for a whole season’s growth of a cover crop. In perennial borders or mixed borders of perennial and shrubs, cover crops can grow among fplants for part of the season, then again during the cool months. The right cover crop might even look decorative among (other) ornamental plants. The show from crimson clover –its blossoms clustered tightly on upright stalks like crimson popsicles –is so spectacular that you’d hardly suspect it was improving the soil.
One hundred pages later Reich is discussing flower gardens and formal bedding:
Maintenance of formal bedding gardens is no different from that of vegetable gardens. Plant and then clean up at the end of the season with minimum disturbance of the soil, keep the edges neat, and weed as needed. Rather than leaving the beds bare through winter, as is usually done, consider planting a late-season cover crop to protect and improve the soil, and to avoid the bleakness of bare ground. An annual dressing of an inch (or more) of compost will do its part in weeding and feeding the beds. (Remember though mid-NY state is not as warm as Chapel Hill Reich’s summers will still breakdown compost faster than in the Maritime PNW. You might start with a half-inch on top of your cover crop seed and see how much is left next fall.) Other tidy mulch possibilities include buckwheat, rice, or oats hulls. Additional fertilizer is unnecessary with an annual compost mulch, and is unlikely to be needed even with other mulches except in poor soils. If a little boost is needed, sprinkle soybean meal (at 2 pounds or less per 100 square feet) or some other high-nitrogen fertilizer over plant beds before mulching. Avoid the temptation to overfertilize with nitrogen, for it can lead to excess leafy growth at the expense of flowers.
It should be obvious by now that Reich’s “Weedless Gardening” is a top down system. Here is a quick description from the introduction.
The essence of this new way of gardening is to care for the soil from the top down. All feeding is down at the surface, which is always snuggled beneath a protective, perhaps nutritive, “cover”. The particular cover might be a mulch of compost or wood chips or living plants—depending on what you’re growing and how you want the garden to look. Annual disruption of the soil (whether by rototiller, plow, or shovel) is eliminated so the soil can develop and maintain the layering found in its natural state.
So what late-season cover crop should you use? My Framers’ Market flower growers use annual ryegrass or rye grain because by the time they get the dahlias dug it is too late to sow much else. (My Sept 1st mixed sowing of ryegrass and crimson clover in the 2006 garlic bed has 6-8" tall grass and sparse 2" clover.) Rye can germinate in 34F soils and the clovers in the low 40F range. Our problem is the lack of enough daylight by early November. You will also have to increase your seeding rates to make up for the lower germination.
Tom Cook of OSU has posted the best article I have ever seen for planting a new lawn. In it he comments about increasing the sowing rates for grass during the fall as follows:
If you plant during an optimum planting period and want a perennial ryegrass - fine fescue lawn the answer is a minimum of 5 lb. mix/1000 sq. ft. For each week you plant later than the optimum period in the fall, increase the seed rate by 2 lb. mix/1000 sq. ft. Since the fall optimum is Aug. 15 to Sept. 15, if you plant on Oct. 1 in the Willamette valley, you should use a minimum of 9 lb. mix/1000 sq. ft. By Oct. 15 you will need a minimum of 13 lb. mix/1000 sq. ft. After Oct. 15, I think you are wasting your time. In most years you may get a stand but chances are it will be weedy and thin and you may well have to start over again the next spring.
Tom’s is article is a great reference for you to pass on to neighbors/friends who ask you how you got your lawn looking so good. Keep some copies to hand out. You can read the whole thing at:
"On Planting New Lawns"
Clay Soils
I have based all the above advice on working with existing beds. Mine are sandy loam on top of REAL sandy soil. I grew up on a clay soil garden, which my parents fought for 40+ years. Then in 1995, I decided to follow 25-year-old advice from Angelo Pellegrini’s A Food Lover’s Garden and 6-year-old Steve Solomon advice in his 3rd edition Growing Vegetables West of the Cascades. Both recommend hauling in good soil to put on top of it. Pellegrini hauled the clay a wheelbarrow at time one way to a vacant lot and returned with Mt. Beaver dug sandy loam for a whole summer on his North Seattle lot. Solomon argued this way:
If hauling in loam seems like a ridiculous amount of work or expense, compare the effort of working clay with how easy it is to work loam and multiply by the time you expect to garden on the site. I’ve had experience with both soils ; I know how much work it is to haul pickup load after pick pickup load of manure in a attempt to fluff up clay. There is not only a huge difference in the amount of effort to get a crop-the crop you get on loam will twice as large for the same amount of space, water and fertilizer. Vegetables will sort of grow on clay, but they Grow on loam. Your choice.
Steve was right. The next spring I built the first seven of my raised beds and filled them with Great Western Supply’s Turf Mix— 1/3rd mushroom compost plus sandy loam. I did not get plants as large as my mother but she had 14 hours of June sun to my 6. My sand pocket site (neighbor has pure clay) couldn’t hold fertilizer long enough for the plant to use it. And watering with an overhead-oscillating sprinkler hurried the flushing.
To read about the other option for clay, check out this article from the April/May 2000 issue of Kitchen Gardener Magazine:
"Improving Clay Soils"
Gary
tommyb
Joined: May-01-2004
Location: Oregon, Willamette Valley
Posted: Sep-29-2004 at 7:40am
Thanks for the good info, Gary! As my edible garden is one three by eight planter and thus totally artificial, the flower bed information and the reference to new soil preparation in the last post is fantastic.
I've recently been introduced to a pumice based "clay buster" ammendment: 50% pumice, 30% manure compost, 20% (mystery) fiber. Application is 50\50 mixing. Any thoughts on this material in an attempt to use clay soil rather than replacing the stuff??
Tom
JeanneK
Location: Oregon, Greater Portland Metro
Posted: Sep-29-2004 at 8:23am
Thanks for the detailed info on cover crops. Sounds like a vetch/rye cover crop plus maybe some crimson clover for looks might be just right for my veggie garden. The quotes on the weedless garden look very interesting. I have been wanting to pick up this book.
Jeanne
gary
Location: Washington, Puget Sound Corridor
Posted: Sep-29-2004 at 1:25pm
Watch out for those vetches! I should have included the entire paragraph by Solomon in the latest edition (emphasis mine):
It is essential to use the right green manures. Farming and gardening books are full of recommendations for cover crops that don’t fit our climate or could fit our climate but are suitable only to mechanized farming because they’re far too tough for easy by-hand removal. So beware of green manuring with rye grain or many kinds of grasses and winter-hardy cereals. Also avoid red clover, a rather slow-growing perennial that is very hard to get rid of. I also strongly suggest avoiding any kinds of vetch, because vetch seeds can sit in the soil all winter and sprout the next summer, becoming a weed. The two cover crops I recommend most highly are crimson clover and small-seeded fava beans.
I looked up hairy vetch in MCCP and hey say it requires irrigation here. I thought that’s hard to understand for a winter annual. Then I noticed that its minimum germination temperature is 60F. Based upon my 7AM soil temps this year, that means it must be germinated before September 15th, thus the need for irrigation in almost all years.
Solomon latest edition recommends making your own vegetable on site by mixing 6-8 inches of “fines” with about 3 inches of your subsoil clay. “The fines, consisting of smaller sand and silt particles, must be washed out or screened out of the sharp sand used for concrete. These fines tend to accumulate in piles around the gravel yard and are exactly what make great vegetable soil, with the addition of a bit of clay.”
Tom’s product for clay doesn’t sound like the above. I think that how effective it will be depends on what kind of clay soil you have. If it’s heavy clay, I’d follow the advice above and treat it like your subsoil and haul in something to become the topsoil.
One should also read Tom Cook's thoughts on sowing lawn on clay soils (see above).
I picked up Byczynski’s The Flower Farmer at the library this morning. Among things that jumped out in my quick first scan; Betsy Hitt (see 10-year rotation above) is the recommender for the Top Ten flowers in SE USA.
And I started thinking about taking out my veggies when I saw that in the early 1990’s and using only 5 oz of seeds she sold 12,000 stems of Zinnia ‘Giant Dahlia Blue Point’ or ‘State Fair’ for $4,800.
I recommend that flower growers go through it. Not just because it is from the same publisher as Eliot Coleman’s The New Organic Grower, it fills the same info base for flower growers.
Gary
JeanneK
Location: Oregon, Greater Portland Metro
Posted: Sep-29-2004 at 3:15pm
Good to know. Thanks, Gary. Crimson clover and fava beans!
Jeanne
gary
Location: Washington, Puget Sound Corridor
Posted: Sep-30-2004 at 1:07pm
Organic Flower Farmer, Lynn Byczynski, has been publishing a newsletter for more than ten years. You may want to check some back issues and see about subscribing at:
"Growing For Market"
Gary
gary
Location: Washington, Puget Sound Corridor
Posted: Oct-02-2004 at 6:36am
I believe that the excerpt below is from Chris Smith’s column in today’s Bremerton Sun. Whoops, it is now called the Kitsap Sun and the name change last week also coincided with a complete makeover of their website. Right now there is no identification of Chris or his Sound Gardener column but the article sure reads like one of Chris’.
There's still time to plant a cover crop, though if it's to include a legume, you'll need to get to the job by mid-October. After that, legumes don't germinate as reliably. Grains like rye and oats are hardier and germinate well at least to the end of the month. My preferred cover crop is a mix of crimson clover and fall rye seeded at a rate of approximately half a pound of clover and three pounds of rye per 1,000 square feet.
You can read the full article at:
"Chris Smith on Cover Crops"
I’d also like to give a quick report of my neighbor’s test on how good Tom Cook’s On Planting New Lawns article mentioned above is. I gave him a copy on 9/15 as he was beginning to renovate his front yard. I have the local sand pocket but he got the clay bank (his was the last house built [12 yrs later] and the home builder lived in my house and the one on the other side of Bill’s home). The lawn was mostly moss. He had started removing clay so that he could bring some topsoil to plant new lawn since the result needed to match the existing walkway and yard slopes.
After reading Ciscoe’s Lawn Outline and Tom’s article, he probably shoveled out a lot more clay than he had originally intended. He followed Tom’s instructions to treat the clay as your subsoil. He got a truckload of the “Turf Mix” from Great Western Supply (1/3rd mush. comp. & 2/3rds sandy loam); spread and contoured; seeded @ 2 lbs extra per 1,000 sq. ft. for the one week past Sept. 15th; mulched lightly with peat moss; and watered softly w/my Israeli sprinklers. The first emergence was last Friday, the sixth day after sowing. Yesterday, day 12, the grass is two inches tall with 6-10+ blades per sq. in. From my yard 50 feet away, it looks like a green carpet. It is not yet thicker than sod would be but it looks like it will be difficult to tell the difference by Nov. 1st.
Bill and I are prejudiced about the Turf Mix product partly because we both have daughters that played year round soccer for many years with the two girls of the family that owns GW (now 3 teachers and a fish biologist). They sell the mix at only $1.50 a yard more than their 100% screened topsoil. As it comes premixed, you only have to shovel a little extra depth for the breakdown of the organic material. You might see what products your local suppliers have that compare to GW’s Turf Mix. I say local but GW will take 10+ yds to Chehalis for just an extra $3/yd or $5/yd to Shelton/Elma.
A new Topic of The Week is due up tomorrow but I will keep monitoring for your questions so keep them coming. I’m sure I learn more researching than you do trying understand my writing.
Gary
DebbieTT
Location: Washington, Kitsap Peninsula
Posted: Oct-23-2004 at 5:05pm
I see I forgot to thank you for your answers Gary. So Thank YOU! This will be archived so others can access this great information.
Update on the turf, Gary?
gary
Location: Washington, Puget Sound Corridor
Posted: Oct-25-2004 at 12:59pm
The neighbor's lawn is now past its third mowing at 3". Yes, you can still tell up close it is a sown lawn but at 5 weeks of age, you do need to be up close.
I still got good germination on Oct. 15th sowings of a crimson Clover and annual ryegrass mix though the grass was slower. Perhaps the larger seed went deeper into the leaf muclh soil till. A lot of the clover seemed to be germinating on the surface.
How well established it will be may depend upon not getting those temps in the teens and twenty's on Halloween as we've done the last two years. That doesn't look too likely in the 10-Day Forecast though.
Gary
Gardening for the Homebrewer: Grow and Process Plants for Making Beer, Wine, Gruit, Cider, Perry, and More
By co-authors Debbie Teashon (Rainy Side Gardeners) and Wendy Tweton