Who else felt like Mark was opening up the best Christmas presents ever when he dug down on the winter rye? You can see the effects of glomulon ( spelling) holding the soil and organic matter together. This is purely enjoyable. I'm not fixing the USA dust bowl ( sorry ) but I am doing a small piece of land. I put winter rye in plant dishes ( what a pot plant sits on ) the rye comes up quick and believe it or not I can slip it off just like a pizza. I can talk forever when I'm this excited. Thanks Mark for my third lease of life i😊😀😁😂
We just moved a couple weeks ago, and that meant that I had to tear apart the raised beds at our old place. Some of them were made with cattle panel and hardware cloth as you taught us in your videos. I never dug into them except to plant a seedling. I just kept growing things in them and adding some mulch, compost etc on top as I went along. I was *very* pleased to find that when I pulled the metal structure away, all the roots from growing covers and veggies in there for a couple years held the soil together... a person could easily put seeds or transplants right into those mounds and keep right on gardening. Because the soil itself has structural integrity but also good drainage and richness, and healthy populations of worms etc all through it. The dead roots from seasons ago serve a purpose much like peat moss or coco coir. The number one "secret" is leaving the roots in there! :)
The microscope at fifteen minutes - well! For years I have been watching gardeners preaching about fungi in the soil and I always wondered, do they really know what they are talking about? What if it is all bad science and myth? So, I appreciate this.
I looked at it the same way you where. So I bought my own microscope to find out the truth. Soil has to have a equal balance of F:B of 1 to 1 in the vegetable garden. ( fungi to bacteria ) to be healthy. Thanks for sharing.
"I need a more powerful microscope." Spoken like a true science nerd...lol. Love it! Fascinated to see you've cover-cropped your raised beds. I've been wondering about whether this would be worth the effort. Following this experiment closely. I'm definitely doing cover crops, including Horseradish, in my new yard this Autumn. The ground is bare at the moment, silt in the top 10-12", compacted clay below that, and completely devoid of life. Something must be done, in this new and foreign-to-me, arid high desert wasteland. I've got my work cut out for me. Thank you, Mark, for being out there with your scientist mind, and teacher's heart, sharing your discoveries with the rest of us who are toiling in the soil, and secretly fascinated with the nerdy stuff. Appreciate all the extra effort it takes to do a yt channel. 💚
I'm a student of the no till. You are my guide. Along with Elaine Ingham and Jeff Lowenfels , James Prigioni , Paul Guacchi. I am going to use the grass shears to terminate my cover. I got a microscope 🔬. Thanks Mark. Very good. I'm so enthusiastic about my backyard garden.
I love your enthusiasm. I'm all about organic, so I'm drawn to your channel. Are we in the same zone? I live in Howell, NJ. In one of your videos, you showed a raised bed where you don't have to bend. I'm interested in knowing how you built it. I'm in my 70s, so too much bending bothers me.
THANKS, I do think we area in the same zone. This is a link to that video just click on it. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-9L03VfXxDJ8.html .
I filled my box beds with “box mix” that I got from a local landscape pit. Turns out it was sand and clay with very little organic matter. Everything I planted last year really struggled because it compacted so badly! This spring I added wood chips, wood compost and coffee grounds, but after watching this video, I’m SO tempted to just completely empty my beds and start over with leaves and a little soil! Your results are amazing! I’m still holding out hope for my soil. I’ll follow your suggestions in all your videos and hopefully I can turn things around!
Such passion! Brilliant! Those are amazing roots and I love the microscope analysis. You need one of those archeology core-driver things, to bring up two metres of soil...! I saw one of my beds for the first time this year yesterday - broad beans + garlic + a cover crop mix including winter rye - they all looked so happy together! I also prepared an entire bed using my bread knife - all the weeds sliced just under the surface of the soil. No soil disturbed! I'm experimenting with sowing all my vegetables with a sprinkling of cover crops, to see what happens. I'll terminate the cover crops if they seem to be crowding the vegetables.
Using a bread knife that way is a fantastic idea, thank you. I've let crimson clover keep growing tall through the flowering stage in beds with large plants like tomatoes and it worked out fine, I just thinned out the crimson clover a bit. Grasses seem to be more of a competitor in my experience. When the rye has gotten too tall, I've just cut it and laid the material down as mulch. It will come back through in spots but then I just chop and drop it again if it's bothering other plants. With both the crimson clover and winter rye I only put transplants in with them, I didn't try to seed into them. It gets pretty humid here so I try to leave room for airflow around my veg plants around their bases... it helps pervent fungal diseases. That might be something to keep in mind. I leave low-growing clovers and native purple deadnettle alone in my garden beds. That seems to work out well; they attract pollinators early in spring and when the weather heats up they just die back on their own as larger veg plants take off. Then they come back next winter/spring when the weather is right for them. I'm following Mark's example of trying to always have living roots going. I'm interested to hear how your ideas work out!
Looks like you lightly burnt the raised bed. Looks great Mark! Hope you like it! If not it will fade unless you waterproof/clear stain it. If you do like, you can burn it even more and it will last longer. My fence posts are still looking good after 3 years.
Thanks Mark. I too have winter rye growing in my raised bed. I am in New Brunswick Canada so my spring season starts later than yours in your area but the principles remain the same.
Thank you for another great video! Is amazing how deep the roots grew. Wow! Soil looks real good already. Can't wait to see how vegetable plants produce this summer and fall in that bed.
Great results, have you ever tried growing daikon radishes as a cover crop. I’m thinking of doing it to get deep root penetration in our hard Arizona soil. I do grow winter rye and alfalfa to build soil and it works well for the top ten inches and thank you for sharing.
Very interesting. I need to d I this. My soil is like cement. My shovel will not go down in the soil unless l soak it first. This will take a while. l have to be patient. THANK YOU.
Real soil( sand silt and Clay ) this is all minerals the plants need This a video on it. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-afJPULVJO00.html
