You don’t need to be hard working to be a suburban farmer.
You don’t need a ‘farm’.
You don’t need fancy pots and containers for your plants
You don’t even need neat and tidy rows.
This time of year, my dad always borrowed a friends tiller to churn up the soil, mix the nutrients and get things ready for planting.
As it turns out, you don’t need to till up the soil either.
Tilling is bad for the health of the soil.
No till gardening is getting its due in the permaculture world and I’m glad. Avoiding tillage, helps maintain the natural structure of the soil, which promotes better water retention, aeration, and microbial activity.
On top of that, when soil isn’t tilled, it captures and holds carbon, holds more water, is generally more diverse in composition and less likely to erode.
If the soil is working, rich in nutrients and producing great vegetables, there’s no need to till. Keep adding mulch, manaure, and compost to the garden. Build up the soil and your garden will thrive for life.
It’s a funny thing though, in the mental health world, we frequently take a tiller to struggling soil.
If you’re not performing optimally do you till up the soil and deal with the mess, or can you add to what you have and just keep growing?
This analogy is so fertile 💚
Love this analogy. Thanks for dropping this seed on me!