Tips

You searched for soil health and found 13 tips.

Benefits of Cover Cropping – Cover crops, often planted in between main cash crops cycles, are grown for their benefits to the soil: nutrient cycling, weed suppression, limiting soil erosion, alleviating compaction, and carbon cycling. Read more →
Brussels Sprouts : Tips from Seed to Harvest – These nutritious miniature cabbages are often under celebrated and even disliked. Don’t give up on them though! It is well worth noting that often store bought Brussels sprouts are picked too early – it shows in their bitter flavor and tough texture. Picking them fresh from the farm or garden after a few frosts sweetens the flavor and makes them tender, offering a whole different experience! Read more →
Companion Planting – Companion plants help each other to grow in some way. For instance, some plants can extract certain nutrients from the soil and make them more available for other plants. Read more →
Compost: Turn food waste into soil nutrients! – Compost is an important soil amendment made of decomposed plant matter including food scraps. You can make right it in your backyard! With the right recipe, your compost heap will not omit bad odors, will lighten the load (and cost) of your trash, and will greatly reduce greenhouse gas emissions from landfills. Adding compost to soil helps to restore the organic matter content allowing for greater moisture and nutrient retention and providing necessary food for essential microorganisms that live in healthy soil. Read more →
Container Gardening – Don’t let lack of space keep you from gardening! Read on to learn how to grow successfully in containers. Read more →
Cover Cropping for Soil Health – There are four commonly agreed upon tenets for building and maintaining soil health, and cover cropping is a part of all four. Read more →
Cover Crops – Got an area in the garden that just is not going to get planted? Try a cover crop! Cover crops are crops that are grown simply to enhance soil quality, rather than to directly produce food for people. Cover crops provide food for the living soil. Read more →
Geotextiles: Black Plastic – Plastic mulch has been used in commercial vegetable production since the 1960’s. The material has proved to be a boost to agricultural productivity. Read more →
Nematodes 101 – Nematodes are microscopic, worm-like organisms that live in the soil. A single handful of garden soil can contain thousands. While some nematodes can cause harm to plants, others can help your garden thrive. Read more →
Planting Garlic – As the winters get shorter, we plant our garlic later. It used to be late September as the nights begin to cool and the light fades, but these days the best time to plant your garlic in the northern New England climate is more like mid October to early November. Encouraging strong root growth before the freeze helps to sustain healthy and vigorous spring growth. Seeing the first garlic shoots in the spring is one of our earliest spring green pleasures on the farm. Read more →