Hand crafted soils...

Over the last two days I've completed redigging my original double dug plots for the third time. It has been rewarding to feel and see the improvements.

What do I mean by this?

First, they are things that have to be felt by hand. The shovel enters the ground easier. The spade fork enters the B horizon easier. In contrast to the first and second digs - most often I can push it into the originally clayey layer by hand, when earlier I needed to use a foot to pentrate this layer.

Visually, the transition zone at the junction of the A and B horizons is now approaching a black color when it originally had a distinctive brown, more orange color. Earthworms are fat and healthy looking and more common, but I don't think I've reached an optimum population by any means. The crumb structure of the soil is visibly improved. The large strips of sod that were originally buried are considerably broken down but clumps can still be distinguished as part of the origal organic material that was incorporated.

Separate soil tests were submitted for the second and third time double-dug soils - the UW soil lab was utilized this year because they do a total combustion method for organic matter.

2010 Kick-off for the season...

We've had a near record warm and dry March here. I just began the process of double-digging our largest bed. Unlike last spring, this season we begin with a weed problem that is a carry-over from the cold wet October last fall. The rhizome spreading grass was able to proliferate during that cool weather while my "green manurs" sat and watched. It will be interesting to see whether I can manage to get them back under control. They were present in the entire 12" A horizon profile.