Should I dig in my mulch once finished?

[snowbunny]

OK, some real newbie questions.

I've struggled a bit with watering my veggies enough this year, so they've been hit and miss. I must be the only person in history to not have had a single courgette from eight plants!

I mulched far too late, as we've been busy building our house which seemed like the priority(!), but it made a difference when I did. I just used clippings of the long, coarse grass that my husband cleared from some of our land. It's quite hay-like. There were also plenty of olive leaves mixed in, some of which are decaying well. Our soil is very light in colour and very dry. I think it's loamy(?); it's certainly not clay, anyhow. It definitely needs plenty of organic matter to be added before next year.

So, here are my thoughts/questions.

I'm hoping to pick up a load of manure this weekend. I'm not sure of the age of this, but I guess it'll be quite new. Should I store it, covered, until the spring to let it mature, or should I spread it on my beds now as a mulch? Would you remove the existing mulch if you were to spread it now, and replace it on top, or just put the manure on top of the hay?

I was going to sow buckwheat once I pull out my veggies, to be dug in once grown. Is this a good idea to improve my soil, or will it be overkill with the manure?

Do I need to remove the dry hay mulch I've used before digging the beds over? I'm not sure if this will break down sufficiently in the soil over winter. It does rain quite a lot here in the winters, but I don't have any experience.

We've not got round to building a compost heap yet - getting a toilet in seemed more pressing - but hopefully I'll be adding this next spring.

Thanks for your help

[Penellype]

You don't say where you are, but the reference to olive leaves makes me think you are somewhere warm and probably dry.

Personally I wouldn't dig in the mulch, and I would spread the manure on top, but you will probably have several contradictory answers shortly!

My reasoning is as follows:
If your soil is dry, digging it will fluff it up more, making it more prone to drying out. Covering it with layers of organic matter will keep the moisture in and the worms will do the work for you over the winter, aerating the soil without drying it out. The manure will rot down naturally and will be fine to plant into in spring.

I don't know anything about growing buckwheat, but I wouldn't regard it as overkill. However, if the manure is very fresh I doubt that something like buckwheat would grow well in it. If it is dark brown and well rotted I would give it a try. Think of the layers of soil, hay mulch and manure as layers in a raised bed. If you were constructing a raised bed or hotbed containing fresh manure you would put some growing medium on top - some compost or used grow bags perhaps, rather than planting straight into fresh manure.

I hope this helps, and good luck with the house building - it sounds an exciting project.

[snowbunny]

You don't say where you are, but the reference to olive leaves makes me think you are somewhere warm and probably dry.

Ah, sorry, that would help! I'm in Spain, about two hours south of Barcelona. It's not rained in a long time, and we're off-grid, so we were collecting water in eight litre bottles, which was rather tiresome. We've just put some water tanks in, and have had 3000 litres of water delivered, which makes life a bit easier. We've only been in for a few months, so missed out on collecting rainwater last winter. We'll be prepared for this next one, though!

Thanks for your suggestions

[Penellype]

If you add your location to your profile it will show up in all your posts and make it easier for people to give appropriate answers to your questions

[Jay-ell]

If it's fresh manure you might want to store it for a year or more (depending on if there's wood in it or not) as it may be too strong for most plants - the only thing I plant in fresh manure is my pumpkins as squash love it rich. Even then I make an island of compost to plant them in so they don't start in rich manure. This year I had a 4-6 inch layer of manure with a thick mulch of pampas / straw on top of that. Haven't needed to water but then again had a fair bit of rain.

Once the buckwheat is ready to come up you can either dig it in or shred it and use it as a green mulch spreading it over the top of the soil - the worms will do the digging for you.

Water well just before you apply the mulch and it should hold it in for a while.

[snowbunny]

If you add your location to your profile it will show up in all your posts and make it easier for people to give appropriate answers to your questions

Tada! Done

[snowbunny]

If it's fresh manure you might want to store it for a year or more (depending on if there's wood in it or not) as it may be too strong for most plants

Thanks! I'd read that, as much as you want to mature it, storing it for a long time leeches the nutrients? I thought of covering it with a tarpaulin, would this be enough to prevent it turning useless?

[Jay-ell]

I'd you have a permanent place for a manure /compost pile you can plant comfrey around it which will soak up any of the goodness that leeches out.

The comfrey can then be cut down up to 4 times a year and used as a mulch, added to the compost or used to make tomato feed.

Be aware that once planted comfrey will grow back from bits of roots so it's in the bed for good. I use Bocking 14 as the seeds are sterile.

Even after any leeching has occurred with the manure the composted manure is still usually richer that home made compost. It is a good idea to cover it though as it let's you control the moisture if DOES rain or keeps it humid if it doesn't.

[roitelet]

We are very dry here too in summer. I wouldn't dig in the mulch but try to build up a layer of organic matter on the surface. I use the 'chop and drop' method and no dig and the difference it has made to my clay soil is amazingand very few weeds. In spring just push apart the mulch and plant directly in to the soil. A lot less work than composting then having to move it. Let the worms do the job for you. If you rotate the potatoes then the soil gets dug every 3-4 years.

[rary]

I no longer dig the garden nor have a compost bin for anything other than kitchen waste, everything else gets mowed or shredded and put onto the garden soil then I plant through it, I think I would spread fresh manure over the garden also as that way the nutrients stay where you want them

[ESBkevin]

Logical rules.
Cover compost and manuar piles to keep the moisture level right and prevent leaching due to rain.
If you will have more mulch available next year then dig in this years with the manure, otherwise let it sit and accrue on top.
The idea of buckwheat and other green manures is to cover the ground and surpress weeds whilst stopping soil erosion and rainwater runoff, recycle the nutrients back to the surface for reuse in the next crop.
You should also start gathering any and all suitable free local resources for mulching or composting. Local parks/church yards/municiple gardeners/tree surgeons/industrial estates etc. Brown cardboard (as in boxes without fancy colour printint) make great sheet mulch and the worms love them. You can cover the soil in cardboard, then cover that in compost/mulch, then make a hole and plant through to get weed suppression and moisture retention.

[snowbunny]

Thanks for the replies! I don't have a shortage of stuff for mulching because we're on a seven hectare olive and almond farm, which is somewhat overgrown at the moment. So, there's a lot of long grass which will need cutting every year - we've bought a tractor with a heavy duty mowing attachment for that. We also have a decent chipper, so will be shredding any of the smaller shoots and branches we cut from the trees. And, since we're buying furniture, kitchen etc, there's also a lot of cardboard!!
I've found a lady twenty minutes away who says she has all the manure I could want from her horses, and I have plenty of space for storing it until it's good to use.

Next spring, I was intending to use the tractor with a heavy duty cultivator to prepare my beds; they are on a slight slope at the moment, so I want to start again after flattening the land. The cultivator should make light work of this, and will also mix anything on top into the earth. It's also rather pebbly underneath, so needs stone-picking.

In light of this, do you think it makes sense to proceed as:
1. Get the manure this weekend, spread it over the existing mulch.
2. Once everything has finished, cover the garden with cardboard, weighed down so it doesn't blow away over winter.
3. Early next spring, use the cultivator to organise the plots, stone pick and lay out beds.
4. Lay more cardboard over the beds, cover with manure and chippings and/or hay mulch and plant through.

[ESBkevin]

Whilst rotators are very efficient there is a danger of chopping worms up. Alsothe soil web of life exists differently at various depths and some argue that mixing that upsets the natural balance.
That said people dig all the time. A school of thought is that just heavy mulch and plant leaving the soil to naturally organise itself.
Often called the no dig garden which saves your efforts.

[snowbunny]

Will we definitely have worms? I've never seen one here!

[ESBkevin]

I can't answer for sure without being on your soil, but I suspect if you build the soil with mulch/compost for a year or two any worms will find the spot and multiply. they tend to like composting organic material and moisture so may be a bit deeper in your hot climate.

You could introduce worms by buying a pound of them and starting a worm farm, the products being worm castings and lots more worms.