Cover Or Cultivate?

[Bigmallly]

We are fast approaching that time of year when the beds are becoming vacant. What is your preferance? Do you cover with Manure, Plastic, Cardboard, Green Manures then deal with the beds in spring or do you prefer to keep growing & try to make the most of the soil?
Personally, once the Autumn Onion Sets & Garlic are in, I tend to cover any vacant beds with manure & leave it till the following spring, hoe it all in & start planting my spring crops. My thinking is that the soil will benefit from the rest.

What do you do and why?

[Elfeda]

It is all upto you BM, based on what you want.. parts of my plots go in rest when I am not doing much in that corner. I might use those beds to pile comost or menure , or pile up weeds safely by placing a membrane/cardboard at the bottom.

If I can/feel to spend time as much...then I will make use of the space also accordingly. I would prefer to mulch only during spring as all the nutrients helps for growing useful stuff than weeds/weed roots.

This year I am trying to incorporate crop rotation of 8 beds. I also want to be selfsfficient as much but not going to spend all my spare time over there. so I prefer to make as much of pereneal beds. or let the annual beds to get self seeded for leafy greens. plant the legumes,alliums and brassicas through the black plastic mulch (I would remove the mulch at the end of the first year to get into self seeding cycle.

Basically I want to start the season from autumn. and plant all my basic as much. so that there will be less to prepare,plant and care during prime time (summer) as there would be other jobs of picking,processing and enjoying fresh food.

Leave few beds where you want to plan the heat loving plants..but use the as seed beds or for leafy greens till they get their annual residents in ..so no space kept unused if it is really in usable state


well that's all what I wish/dream to do. reality might be far from it though

[Penellype]

What I do depends on various factors - what I have left to plant out, what I am going to grow there next year and how accessible the bed is over winter.

The beds I am going to use for onions and early peas need to be available in February or early March, so I will tend to cover them with compost and fleece (to deter the cat) and leave them empty. This year I have 25 30 litre buckets available, and I may therefore use these areas more this winter as the buckets can be moved when the bed is needed.

The bed next to the apple tree tends to get compost and then left alone, as the only access is via the lawn, which can get very wet. Its also the first to get the sun, so a good candidate for buckets of early potatoes in the spring.

Elsewhere I will try to make use of the soil if I can, if only to prevent it from becoming a cat toilet. Last year I grew brassicas with varying success, and I am trying these again in places, some of them in pots so I can move them about. My thought is that pots will protect the soil from the worst of the weather and stop the cat digging, and will also make another use of the mountains of 2nd hand compost I have from various pots of potatoes, carrots and other veg. I might cover some of the buckets with plastic cloches, although I'm not sure these would cope if we get any quantity of snow.

So all a bit flexible really.

[Elfeda]

P, if you put all those buckets on to a soil, doesn't it compact?

Edit: If I want to do so, I would prefer removing bottom of those bucckets , that wouldn't be compacting the soil but improves, come spring I would carefully move all those buckets by inserting a plank at the bottom.

[skeggijon]

Vacant beds? what are they??? I'm still waiting for space to plant more winter crops

[Penellype]

P, if you put all those buckets on to a soil, doesn't it compact?

Edit: If I want to do so, I would prefer removing bottom of those bucckets , that wouldn't be compacting the soil but improves, come spring I would carefully move all those buckets by inserting a plank at the bottom.

It might compact a bit, although the bit I am thinking of putting them on is quite sandy and easy to dig. I put buckets of potatoes onto the bed next to the hotbin this spring and didn't find it too compacted afterwards - the huge courgette plants didn't seen to mind anyway!

I don't want to cut the bottoms out of the buckets, even if I had the equipment, which I don't. The whole point of the buckets is that they are easy to move around. They have 2 handles both of which need using to lift them (they are quite heavy) so inserting a plank under would not work, as I have nobody to help me.

Almost everything I do is experimental, and it is likely that some of the things I try will not work. That won't stop me trying though

[Penellype]

Vacant beds? what are they??? I'm still waiting for space to plant more winter crops

Same here - I'm just thinking forward to when the courgettes and tomatoes come out.

[Twinsane]

I do various things too. Some of my beds are still being used. Last (this) year's potato beds have been limed and had a green manure with added mustard to try to reduce the eelworm. Next year's potato beds will have a thick mulch of horse/cow muck spread on and left over winter. The remainder (apart from roots) will have a layer of as much compost as I've got spread on them and again, left over winter.

Normally I cover half of the half plot (the other half is fruit) with black plastic over winter to kill off any weeds, warm up the soil and reduce the workload in spring but I read recently (on RHS somewhere but can't find the blooming page now) not to cover over winter to allow the winter rains to rehydrate the soil so that's left uncovered this year.

[sparrow100]

Vacant beds? what are they??? I'm still waiting for space to plant more winter crops

Same here - garlic needs to go in yet. Plus broad beans and peas. How did i think an extra quarter plot would be enough?!

[skeggijon]

I'm just debating taking a plot thats become vacant next to mine

[Elfeda]

all my vacant beds have weeds half cleared, wating for otherhalf to help me in clearing that other half load of weeds

[Twinsane]

I'm just debating taking a plot thats become vacant next to mine

That's what I did. I love it Plenty of space for fruit trees etc. I'm putting a pond in soon too.

[Greenleaves]

I shall dig mine over and leave it exposed for a month or so then cover with HM, then will re-dig in the spring before planting

[PyreneesPlot]

A bit of everything, I expect.
I have a supply of free horse manure for the first time so that'll go on beds as they come free. The bed destined for roots will get a plastic cover, apart from the garlic bit. I've green manure (phacelia) should the horses stop producing, or compost, although it would be nice to have that for the flowers and fruit.
No beds get left open to the elements - the plot is sloping clay and when it rains (not enough in 2015) it pelts down and erodes the beds.

[bramble]

Half my raised bed is now vacent i have dug it over, raked in some growmore and chicken pellets and covered it with a couple of layers of chicken wire to keep the cat out.
The other part has my onion sets, garlic and tomatoes.
My red onion sets which i have started of in modules will go in when the tomatoes come out.
I still have a few rows of lettuce and spring oniond growing but will leave the covered part for my first early potatoes.