Hi there, Gardenerds. I'm Christy Wilhelmi from Gardenerd and this will be our last video of
2020. but before we get started I wanted to thank you for watching and commenting and
asking questions this whole year. It's been really rough on all of us. And I especially want to thank
the 5,000 plus people who joined and subscribed to this channel since the beginning of the year.
So thank you, and off we go. Today I want to talk to you about cover crops. This is
one of my cover crop patches that I am growing this year. A lot of people ask what are cover
crops and why should I grow them? Well let's talk about that. By now you've probably heard
a lot about soil carbon sequestration or, you know, keeping the soil covered because
open and bare soil releases a lot of carbon to the atmosphere. So does tilling and a bunch of
other practices in agriculture that aren't the best for us, or for the planet. So cover crops
are one of the ways you can keep carbon in the soil, and it's the old-fashioned way of putting
nutrients back in the soil. So let's start there. First of all when you plant a leguminous crop like like these peas here, or fava beans, bell beans, and even vetch, these are called nitrogen fixing
crops. Where they grab atmospheric nitrogen out of the sky and they put it into their roots.
And then when you cut the crop down after a few months when about a third of the flowers are open
and leave those roots in the ground, they have these little pink nodules on them that are full
of nitrogen. And those nodules and the roots will, as they decompose, release the nitrogen
into the soil. That's the old-fashioned way of how we used to fertilize. And I think it's not
such an old-fashioned way, it's the natural way. so let's think of it that way. Now usually
the more varieties of things, the more biodiversity that you put in your cover crop, the better it
is for your soil for a number of reasons. So this cover crop that i have here that I've just started
has peas, bell beans, hairy vetch, oats, and a couple of other things that I always forget.
But it's something that you can either broadcast or plant deliberately.
Now let's back up a second. There are other reasons why you may want to plant a cover crop.
So you can plant a crop for weed abatement, because mother nature abhors bare soil. She's going to work
to cover it no matter what. And to you and me that means weeds, so instead of having weeds growing in
your garden over winter, if you're not using it, you can have a cover crop growing that's going
to actually benefit the soil come springtime. Some of the other reasons for planting a cover crop
are the nitrogen fixing like I mentioned or to prevent erosion. You know, if your landscape
is sloped and you need to anchor the soil when heavy rains come there are soil erosion crops
that you can plant that will help they put down deep tap roots and lots of feeder roots and they
anchor the soil in place so you don't have to worry about your soil washing away over winter
or in the rainy season. You can also provide cover crops for habitat. You know, if you're
trying to attract good bugs to your garden or prevent bad bugs from the garden, habitat
provides a nice ecosystem for beneficial insects and other creatures to live so that they don't,
you know, eat your stuff that you care about. So let's let's talk about planting cover crops,
because there are a couple different ways to do it.
The first one you may hear or see the word "broadcast" which you might not know. what that means it's kind of an obscure obtuse word for
scattering seeds over a seed bed. And that's what we did here. Basically you take handfuls
of seed mixed together, all the different types you want to grow, and scatter it across the seed bed
and then cover it with about an inch of compost, water it well, wait about three weeks, well you're
gonna water it the whole time. And in a few weeks you'll see it start pushing up through the soil.
The second way of planting cover crops is to deliberately plant in an offset row or hexagonal
planting pattern a la How to Grow More Vegetables Than You Ever Thought Possible on Less Land Than You
Can Imagine. The Grow Biointensive method from John Jeavons. and in as you can see in this picture
you can drill holes on offset rows on three inch, four inch, five inch centers, whatever your cover
crop demands, and that's if you're, for example, planting one thing. In the picture that I showed
you I'm planting shelling peas and I plan to harvest those. Which brings up another point. Let's
talk about harvesting at the end of the season. It's usually, you plant your cover crops in October,
November, or December in warm winter climates and that will grow through until about February-ish,
maybe earlier, depending on how early you planted. And the rule of thumb is that when a third of the
flowers have opened then you cut it down at soil level or in warm winter climates just below soil
level. You want to just cut right underneath and I'd use my hand shears to do this in a small patch
it's only four by four for me, but if you need uh, you know, to use a scythe or something bigger
to clear your area, you just want to leave the roots in the ground. And for me because we don't
get freezing temperatures if we leave anything above ground, that's going to start growing again.
So I always cut just below soil level leave all the roots in the soil. Don't turn the soil yet. Pile
up all that stuff on top of the bed that just came down, chop it up with a shovel or some loppers into
about two inch pieces, and then cover the whole thing with a layer of compost, about an inch layer
of compost or manure or straw or whatever you want to use, and then water it well and keep it keep it
moist until it breaks down. Over about three weeks it's going to break down and then you can just dig
holes and plant your crops for spring in that. Meanwhile the roots are degrading and releasing
all of that nitrogen into the soil. The second way of doing it is to let the crop, if it is a
an edible crop, grow to maturity and that's something like your fava beans or your bell beans
or your shelling peas or something like that or a wheat crop. You know, we grow wheat a lot of times
here at the Gardenerd test garden. Just a small patch just to try it out. You know, Turkish Red,
Sonora White. We've grown Triticale, we've grown rye, you know, that kind of stuff. So in those
cases you're gonna actually wait until that crop matures. Harvest the crop itself and then take the
biomass and chop it down, chop it up, and either lay it down on the ground cover it like I said
in the first example, or you can take that biomass away, chop it up, and put it in your compost bin.
Either way, cover crops provide biomass for your compost bin so you get the crop and the compost
bin gets the food, which is either in a green state, a nitrogen state, or in a carbon state after it's
completely dried and, uh, and is ready to use as your brown ingredient in your compost bin. So it's
a win-win situation for you your compost bin and your soil. So there you have it. Cover crops are the
way to restore soil fertility, soil nutrients, soil biology, habitats, ecosystems, everything, the planet,
my God, everything...really everything. Make a plan to at least plant one of your beds with a cover crop
every winter and see what happens. I guarantee you, you will see an improvement in your soil.
For me, I have a strategy where I pick where I'm going to plant my tomatoes the following year
and I plant a cover crop in that bed over winter. And then after it's done breaking
down the whole thing that I described. I put my tomato plants in right in with the biomass
and they go gangbusters. So try it see how you like it. Find a cover crop that's right for you. There
are lots of websites and seed catalogs out there that sell cover crop blends. The rule of thumb
is the more diverse, the better. So pick something with at least five different varieties of crops
growing in them and you will see an improvement in your soil I promise. If you like this video share
it with your friends don't forget to subscribe and turn on that notification button. Of course you'll
find information like this and so much more in Gardening for Geeks, and don't forget to pre-order
your copy of my new book that's coming out March 202,1 Grow Your Own Mini Fruit Garden, where cover
crops work really well with fruit trees. all right, happy gardening, and we'll see you in 2021.