Complimentary Blueberry Juice

It’s hot, real hot, record-setting hot, and tinderbox conditions have fires popping up everywhere from inside the city to our provincial parks, while the wind blows uncovered topsoil around enough to reduce visibility.

This would be a good time to have an update on our cover crop situation, whose soil is not blowing away. For previous cover crop posts and to see what we did last season, there’s more here.

This past week we opened up our cover crop to plant our potato trial. We weren’t sure how it would be…would it be hard to deal with the plant residue? Could we plant in it? Would it hold moisture?

Yes, it held moisture. Yes, the residue covered the soil and kept it from blowing around in our current dustbowl conditions. But the most amazing part was feeling the soil, to the touch, it was soft and it crumbled. With the potato hopper, the discs folded beautiful hills around our potatoes…which is not what happened with the other 8 acres of potatoes we planted into bricks and rocks of clay.

I have to admit I am thoroughly impressed and continue to be amazed by this experiment: all parts of it have gone above and beyond, from planting and installing it, to the fall treatment, and now, planting in it.

The cover crop has done and accomplished everything it was supposed to: it grew and suppressed weeds, it grew into the fall, it protected the soil, and it built soil structure. Lastly, it was a breeze to plant into.

In these record-breaking early May temperatures and while we look at a 3rd season in a row of climate-induced season extension, seeing the dust and topsoil blow off the neighbours fields (and ours) pretty much seals the deal here. Regardless of what happens with the potato trial itself, it is crucial that we cover crop as much of our operation as we can this season.

I’d much rather plant into 8 acres of cover crop residue, easy breezy, no problem, making perfect hills in soft soil, than watch our precious organic layer blow off and wonder if bricks of clay will cover enough of the potatoes so they can germinate.

I’m sure I will have many more photos and trials to share on this front throughout this season.

Graham

thanks for reading complimentary blueberry juice