Till vs. No Till Gardening - Pros & Cons of Each

[Music] well hello everyone welcome to another very exciting episode right here on the Emma Gardiner channel I'm so excited for this episode because it is beautiful out it is so sunny and it's so warm and spring has finally sprung here in Michigan so I am I am so elated to see that because I I was I was beginning to think spring was never going to arrive but it it is here and I'm so happy about that so we're out here just doing some garden tours and I wanted to bring you all along to talk about till versus no-till gardening because it's a question that does come up quite a bit on this channel when we are filling up our beds because there's a lot of people that might have poorer soil that that till and they think that they're you're kind of going to be demonized by the no-till crowd and so I'm really going to just level the playing field and talk about pros and cons of both because I do think that gardening is a one-size is not a one-size-fits-all solution what works for me might not work for you and that's why I like to talk about pros and cons because then you can look at really your situation and what fits your situation so the method that we choose when it pertains to till vs no-till is we tend to go in more of a no-till approach no-till gardening is based off the premise that we are touching the soil structure as little as possible in a more natural soil column you'll have the soil that is that is more broken down below and you'll have your fresh organic layer on top that's really what we're doing here is we are taking we are taking the soil that is broken down below and we're leaving it you know we're not disturbing it we're actually taking fresh organic matter and putting it on top because we like to emulate more of a forest floor if you will the forest floor does not have things turning it up year after year and so it begins to have a very natural cycle where the organic matter breaks down it begins to compact a little bit and then it it makes room for new organic matter that that then will fall from from above obviously we don't have trees here falling so we're simulating that by using compost and that's that's really what we're what we're at here now the the benefits to this is it leaves the soil structure as intact as possible again you know that that natural settling process of Oh sand silt and clay will happen in a in a natural soil structure it allows for good drainage it allows for good bacteria good fungi to to live in the soil because when you till your garden one thing you are doing is you're sacrificing some of those some of those bacteria because I'm gonna simulate here if I were to take my my pitchfork and turn this over we are now exposing all those beneficial bacteria and fungi to sunlight which ends up it does end up killing them off at the soil at at the soil surface it'll kill them off on also what it does is it's turning in that houmous which is not naturally found below the broken down the broken down soil layer so the human should always be on top in a no-till method because the human it's job is to protect the soil it actually acts as a little insulated barrier when you turn that in yes you are affording yourself a little bit better soil structure if you don't already have it but if you have something like compost pure compost in your so in your beds or you already have very good rich you know well draining soil no-till should be the method that you're going for because you don't need to till that or that organic matter in you would be far better off to have a no-till garden because the benefits of this organic matter being on top of the soil is like I said you're going to provide a better home for those soil microbes you're going to insulate the soil so it's gonna be cooler in the summer it's going to allow for better moisture control so it's actually going to hold on to that moisture where the roots are and where the you know where the roots need the water and then also what it's going to do is it's going to actually begin to break down and it's going to actually feed the soil below it if you till your if you till your your garden you're actually going to be mixing up that that soil so we're going to take it just simulate a small little portion here all of that good nutrient-rich organic matter you just put on top is now below and or it's it's mixed in with that soil that was originally below it and now you have just kind of a homogeneous mixture of organic matter and you know maybe poorer soil or maybe broken-down soil and the broken-down soil poor quality soil is not as high in nutrients meaning that when the when the rains come and the organic matter begins breaking down in what you've just applied it's going to it's going to leave the soil it's going to actually leach out of the soil and be further down then plants can reach meaning you're going to have nutrient deficiencies far quicker so those are some of the reasons why we why we no-till and some of the benefits of no tilling so now let's talk about tilling because after all of that you might be wondering to yourself what good does you have to say about tilling because it pretty much sums it up that that tilling it ruins the soil structure that is only if you already have good quality soil many gardeners especially down south even places up here even in Michigan I know this places like our cottage garden you could honestly make pottery with some of the soil up there the soil quality is just very very very poor and so for those that live in a poor quality soil environment having a garden you know in ground or just by throwing compost on top really won't do a whole lot in fact it sometimes will end up leading to a worse garden because the the natural soil structure has not been built yet so you have clay and which it basically acts as almost like a bedrock layer and then you have soil or you have your your organic matter right on top of that when heavy rains come your organic matter is just going to wash right away and that's the main reason why there's not already good soil structure there because over time you'll find that grass will break down that grass breaks down and adds to the organic matter layer then over time trees will begin to grow up and then the trees will then drop their leaves that'll add more organically matter and that's what builds a that's what builds a well-established forest if the ground you're looking at has bare spots and it cracks and grass is hardly having it a good time growing that's because the soil has been degraded over time or was never built up in the first place leading to just basically dead soil and so by putting good soil on top is not going to just fix the problem overnight and you're not really going to have a plantable garden by telling that into the clay or the the poor quality soil you're going to basically Rhea mend that soil you're going to fix what was broken and you're going to prevent that that really good nutrient-rich soil from just washing away it's actually advantageous to do that for your first couple years if you have bad soil because it's going to kind of allow you to number one actually have something to plant in it might not be great your first year my name you great your second year but over time it will build up and then once your soil structure is built up to where you can stick your hand through without breaking a knuckle then you can slowly work towards a more no-till approach and that's fine there's nothing wrong with working towards a no-till approach because the end goal is a no-till garden that is really what I do want you all to achieve is more of a no-till garden because it is honestly the most natural and it's the most conducive to having a successful garden especially if you're an organic gardener because the the beneficial microbes and fungi found in an organic garden is what's so crucial to having a successful garden and those are only those only thrive when the soil structure is left untouched so I do really do hope that you understand that that you know there's nothing wrong with tilling but I do hope that you all understand that you know feeding the soil is crucial and building that soil is crucial and as long as you're doing that and working more towards a no-till approach it's fine and the final thing that I want to end on is that your a lot of times people correlate no-till with like back to eating woodchips tile gardening and that's just not the case you don't have to have a to eat in style garden and have no till I'm doing no-till in a traditional raised bed set up because that really works for me other people really like kind of the more permaculture style gardening where you grow in woodchips and and that's great too that's another no-till method that you can implement in your garden but you know you don't you don't have to either because this is clearly working just fine for us and again it's not a one-size-fits-all solutions so I do hope that you all enjoyed this episode I hope you all learned something new and I do hope that you get out there grow big or go home this year and we'll catch y'all on the next episode this is Luke from the mi Gardner channel reminding you to grow big or go home I'll catch y'all later see ya bye [Music] you [Music]

Channel: MIgardener

Views: 110,367

Rating: 4.9141107 out of 5

Keywords: no till, garden, migardener, versus, pros and cons, how to till, benefits of no till, back to eden, till, bte gardening, benefits of tilling, no till garden, tilling the garden, how to no till, Premiere_Elements_15, gardening, vs, positive and negative, gardener, gardening method

Id: o60Hunhs_Qs

Length: 10min 11sec (611 seconds)

Published: Thu Apr 26 2018