when most people think about planting
cover crops they think about farming or
bigger plots like this one but cover
crops are useful for everyone especially
the home Gardener and even if you have
raised beds in your garden like this and
even if you have a greenhouse with
raised beds like this so today we're
going to talk about five really big
benefits two cover crops no matter where
you plant them let's go
foreign
those benefits are that they enhance the
soil they heal the soil they feed the
soil they replenish the soil and they
protect the soil all of those things are
very very important if you've already
grown in your garden for the year it
doesn't matter if it's in a plot like
this or in a raised bed because that
soil that you have just grown in needs
to be replenished from what was taken
out of it by whatever crop you grew and
it also needs to be protected during the
winter time when you're not growing a
crop in there and it is very important
that we cover the soil with something
living while we are not cultivating it
for produce and our ultimate goal is to
build the healthiest soil that we
possibly can to produce later the
healthiest plants that we can so I want
to make sure you understand that this is
not a one-time process this isn't cover
this bed this winter with cover crops do
it once and then the bed is rejuvenated
for years to come that is certainly not
the case this is a long-term commitment
of rotating fall and spring cover crops
through your garden beds wherever they
may be Grays like this in the garden in
the greenhouse or tilled into the soil
itself so another benefit to leaving the
cover crops and letting them die or
decompose on the soil is that they feed
the soil they're a green manure and a
lot of the cover crop mixes that you buy
out there that's what they're called
Green manure you can just leave them
like this these beans will die when our
temperatures get low enough to kill them
off and that's what's called a winter
kill so a lot of cover crop mixes will
have legumes in them like this and we'll
just let them die off so most people
will just do a chop and drop where they
cut everything off at the top of the
soil and just leave it in place that's a
great method too that starts to feed the
soil in this area but it's very
important to always leave the roots
whether you're chopping them off here
and take taking them away for your
compost pile or chopping them and
dropping them you have to leave those
roots in the soil so what those
decomposing roots are doing is they are
leaving food for the microbes in the
soil to break down and once they're done
breaking them down they're going to
leave those air pockets in the soil like
we talked about earlier getting air down
into your soil is very beneficial now
the last thing people do to mix their
cover crops into the soil is tillet now
it's obviously not easy to till a raised
garden bed like this or even the ones in
our garden out there but tilling is a
perfectly good method to use unless you
want a no-till garden so here's one
thing to keep in mind when you are
killing off your cover crops whatever
they may be they tender stemmed plants
are only going to take about two to four
weeks to break down and decompose there
are other things that do take a long
time to do it so when you're thinking
about crop rotation and timing of of
your cover crop so that you can plant
your next season of crops be mindful of
that some things take a lot longer to
break down if you are doing the non-till
method of leaving things in the soil to
break down themselves and die off
themselves so what we're going to do is
rake our bed with a garden rake that's
going to give us some little furrows
once we have those we're just going to
broadcast our seed throughout the bed
now before I do that I want to talk
about what is in a cover crop or a cover
crop mix like this now each company is
going to be a little bit different this
one in particular has field P winter Rye
hairy vetch and crimson clover and it
also has an annual rye grass in it now
it's really important to get a seed mix
in my opinion because each one of those
different plants is going to give you a
different benefit most of the seeds that
they put into a cover crop mix are going
to fixed nitrogen that is basically the
biggest thing that they're trying to do
to heal the soil is fix that nitrogen
but there are other things like mustards
that can be planted that are
biofumigants what that means is they're
going to keep away pests something that
the plant produces helps to eliminate
pests and keep them away from the area
now we all know that a lot of our fruits
and vegetables in the garden use a ton
of nitrogen especially the tomatoes next
to me so that soil needs to be
replenished and replenishing that
nitrogen naturally with a cover crop is
much better than using any synthetic
fertilizer this is going to give you
other benefits besides just fixing those
nutrients back into the soil so a cover
crop is going to protect your soil in
two different ways it's going to protect
it from erosion which is a big concern
of a lot of larger Farmers I don't have
to worry about that too much with my
little garden beds like this but my new
plot over here I do because it's sloped
down toward the house but it's going to
protect it in another way and what that
is is covering the soil I know weird
right cover crop it covers up that soil
and protects it from weed seeds blowing
in all winter long and it's going to
shade it so that's going to help keep
moisture down in the soil now one of the
huge benefits of cover cropping is to
bring more moisture and also air down
into the soil so in your cover crop mix
within that mix each species of plant is
going to have a different root structure
it's going to have a different depth of
root a lot of these mixes do put like
daikon radish in there or some other
types of radish because that Taproot
goes down really deep it grows really
fast and it opens that soil up and that
helps moisture get down into the soil as
well
now you want to keep in mind that this
does not go on too thick when you're
broadcasting it this is a pound right
here and a pound and a half will do a
thousand square feet here's what ours
looks like you can see all the different
types of seeds contained within it and
you can see how lightly
I'm covering the soil with these so they
don't need to be covered with that much
soil just take your rake and go in the
opposite direction to what you
originally did so if I raked this way
rake it perpendicular that should be
plenty to cover those seeds then of
course
just water them in no need to drench
them just give the
soil a good soaking
and you should be good to go here's an
important point I don't want you to miss
those cover crops are going to grow out
in about four to eight weeks and some
will flower in that time period but
don't let them go to seed because if you
let them go to seed they're going to
drop that seed in place and then
continue to grow and you want to prepare
your bed for your produce crops soon
after you've done your cover crop so
friends there is absolutely no downside
to this there is only benefits to doing
a cover crop and if you're thinking well
it's expensive to buy at the beginning
it's not it's way less expensive than
trying to feed your soil in other ways
and what I mean by that is a it's a cost
of benefit ratio of course if you're
feeding your soil with leaves and things
like that that's awesome but the cover
crop is going to add so much more
benefit quicker than those leaves are
going to add so don't think cover
cropping is just for big farmers it is
not it is for everyone even even if
you've got small raised beds it's really
a win-win you can't go wrong with doing
this method I need to get back to doing
this bed right here which is one of our
new beds and we need to add to the soil
if you haven't seen our method on how to
prepare a new bed from a grassy area
like this please click on the video at
the top of the screen and now I want you
to go click on this playlist right here
which is our entire series about how we
built that Greenhouse by ourselves have
a beautiful blessed day and we will see
you on the next video bye
thank you
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