Planting veggies in clover

Discussion in 'Planting, growing, nurturing Plants' started by SueinWA, Jun 11, 2005.

  1. SueinWA

    SueinWA Junior Member

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    I would like to try Linda Woodrow's mandala system, but I can't afford to make the dome yet (just got laid off!), & only have 4 chickens until next spring. The garden area is mostly cleared of weeds, as last fall/winter I laid down cardboard and straw to kill off the field grass & dandelions, which worked VERY well. Most of the cardboard is gone, and I marked out the circles just by raking up the leftover straw into the paths for now.

    But I've got to plant it right away, or I'll just have more weeds. I've never really heard of anyone doing this, so please point out oversights if you see them.

    Suppose I plant the interior of the circles with white Dutch clover, and in the circles that I have seeds/plants for now, plant them amid the clover seed. If I don't plant a circle with anything except the clover, I'm thinking that I could plant stuff there amid the clover plants later, either for fall planting of some stuff, or even next spring. I'm not planning on removing the clover later, just planting amidst it.

    In the meantime, the clover will protect the soil, help prevent weeds (I'm hoping), raise the quality of the soil, and the plants themselves shouldn't interfere too much with the growing of soon and future plants.

    Does this sound reasonable? Has anyone ever tried it, or known anyone who did? Am I overlooking something incredibly obvious???

    Sue
     
  2. Richard on Maui

    Richard on Maui Junior Member

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    Firstly Sure, Congratulations or commiserations, whichever is more appropriate... At least you will have more time in the garden, right?

    Not sure what you are asking about in terms of planting straight away? Do you mean you have never planted straight into a sheet mulch? Or you've never planted into a cover crop of clover?
    One pitfall of planting into sheet mulch is slugs hiding in your mulch and devouring your tender seedlings. This can largely be overcome by raising the seedlings in pots until they are past the point of vulnerability. I think Linda's book recommends growing them on in milk cartons doesn't it?
    I would think that the clover thing would be fun. Of course there will be some competition from the clover, but if you give extra water and food everyone ought to be happy enough...

    Sorry if I have missed your point.
     
  3. sweetpea

    sweetpea Junior Member

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    Hi, Sue,

    Clovers and vetches are the perfect green manures. You can search on that term to learn more about the combinations. They are just what you want to plant to improve the soil and win over the weeds. As you probably know, they are nitrogen fixers that pull nitrogen from the air and store it in their roots, when they die in the winter, those roots break down and add nitrogen to the soil. They reseed themselves and are right back in the spring. If the clovers or vetches create shade over the plants you want, they are easily pulled by hand, just the part that is causing the shade, then compost what you've pulled.


    I use purple vetch which tumbles around, creating shade and wins over even the toughest of California weeds that get no water except from the fog.

    You can actually transplant patches of clover, like you would lawn sod, if you have a free source in the woods nearby, water them like a lawn, and they will expand and do wonderful things for your garden. Once established, just dig out a hole just big enough for your transplant in the middle of the clover to plant your vegetables or flowers. They won't compete with your plants, and they will attract wonderful bees and beneficial insects. Their seeds are tiny like poppy seeds, so they will be hard to see, but they are there!
     
  4. SueinWA

    SueinWA Junior Member

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    Richard, I have never planted into a living mulch. The cardboard and mulch that I used to kill the grass is mostly gone, so I just raked up the leftovers to mark the circles where the chook dome will go when I have one to put there. The soil is bare right now.

    I know that the clover (perennial) shouldn't compete with the seed/plants that I add, so I thought it might be safe to do this.

    Sue
     
  5. sweetpea

    sweetpea Junior Member

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    Sue, the thing I just found out was that the termites found my cardboard that I use to mulch with. Easy wood! It never occurred to me! So I store it very far away from the house and sheds now.
     
  6. SueinWA

    SueinWA Junior Member

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    Termites in California? Gadzooks and forsooth!

    My cardboard goes straight from the truck to the garden!

    Sue
     
  7. nobis77

    nobis77 Junior Member

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    On paper it seems like a great idea (don't they always). I had a place on our lawn where the clover is dominant (high foot traffic) even over crabgrass and bermuda which are just a few feet away. I must've been careless with a lettuce plant that had bolted and dropped it there on its way to the compost pile last year. This spring we had the most trouble free patch of volunteer lettuce there- about a two foot wide circle. The lettuce had no problem sprouting and growing up and over the humble little clover sod. In fact if.. err.. someone hadn't clumsily mowed it down it'd probably be setting seed of it's own now.

    I hope to try this myself in plots next year (establishing a low-growing white clover mulch and planting into it), but the establishing part looks to be problematic. I started some white dutch and ladino in test plots about a month ago and have been watering them and weeding religiously to see how they'd grow under ideal conditions. If these don't put on a surge of growth soon I don't see how I can get them ahead of my weeds. Best of luck to you.
     
  8. sweetpea

    sweetpea Junior Member

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    Nobis, if it's really hot where you are the clover will slow down, so don't get discouraged. Clover also wants full sun. Mine does its biggest growth in the spring and maintains in the summer. Do you know if your soil could be either alkaline or do you have dense clay soil? Things tend to grow in slow motion under those conditions. That's one reason I use vetch, it performs better than clover when there are marginal conditions.
     
  9. nobis77

    nobis77 Junior Member

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    Could you describe your vetch a little more, I only have experience with overwintered hairy vetch which does indeed grow very well? Does it get tangled amongst your crops?

    I haven't tested ph in a while, but the soil was from the garden (which was pretty close to neutral when I tested last). Yes indeed, heavy over-farmed clay is what I have, and everything but weedy pasture grasses seems to grow in slow motion.

    The clover here grows just about as you say: mostly in the spring, surviving through summer with a little rebound before the hardest frosts. But here it seems to be thickest and most dominant in the shade. The clovers I'm speaking of are also leftovers from the land's worn-out pasture days; white dutch with just a little red here and there. The red, crimson, and ladino types all are sun lovers, but the little white dutch seems content with the worst soils and most shaded places. Which is why it seems great in a vege garden.

    Great idea about transplanting clover sod, by the way, I hadn't thought of that.
     
  10. sweetpea

    sweetpea Junior Member

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    >Could you describe your vetch a little more, Does it get tangled >amongst your crops?

    I use purple vetch, which can get to about 18" if left unattended. It works well for me because the deer don't eat it. In the orchard I plant it around the base of the trees because I want those nitrogen nodules to break down within the dripline of the tree. I use a small hoe to encourage the vines away from the tree, and when they are at 8" or so, I set my field mower at 4" and mow, creating a layer of greens that will act as mulch that can stay where it falls. The vetch will keep growing for a while. I reseed the vetch when it starts to die back.

    Among vegetables if the vetch is creating shade it's easy to pull just the tops off, leaving 4-5", or I just let it grow in another direction. I compost big chunks of what I've pulled off, or just drop the short pieces as mulch.

    There are different kinds of clover that will fix different amounts of nitrogen and this site has good descriptions:

    https://www.groworganic.com/search.html

    Search on "clover" "any category", and do use innoculant.

    Clay soil is a whole 'nother creature unto itself, and clover alone won't fix it. The addition of organic matter (dead leaves, grass clippings, manure if you can find it) will add nutrients and also create the little necessary air pockets that make soil healthy.

    If you dig out a shovelful of your soil, do you see worms? Healthy soil will have at least 5 worms per shovelful. Does it smell earthy or does it smell stinky? If it's stinky, it's too compacted and needs more air and organic matter.

    Here's a soil test that will give you some pretty good information.

    Put your soil to a 4 inch level in a clear 1 quart jar, with a tight fillting lid. Fill that jar with water and replace the lid, tightly. Shake the jar vigorously and then let it it for 24 hours. Your soil will settle out according to soil particle size and weight. A good loam will have about 1-3/4 inch (about 45%) of sand on the bottom. about 1 inch (about 25%) of silt next, about 1 inch (25%) of clay above that, and about 1/4 inch (about 5%) of organic matter on the top.

    I think you'll find that you won't have anywhere near 45% sand. I have added granite sand to my soil, which is a slow release source of potassium, it also has smaller amounts of magnesium, iron, calcium and manganese. Regular river sand works well, too. You might explore what kinds of sands are in your areas and what minerals are in them that will help you.

    And while it may take a couple of tons (which is about 2 pickup truck beds full - don't put a whole ton in the truck unless it is capable of hauling that much) to change a good-sized garden, it's a one-time thing, and you never have to do it again, which in my book is just the right kind of soil amendment. Spread it out at about 1/2 inch thick.

    Then rely on thick 3-4" mulches of dead leaves and compost to improve it the rest of the way, constantly maintaining at least 3". If you don't have a source of dead leaves, then grow your own!! Either in the form of planting nitrogen fixing trees that will drop the leaves and improve the soil as well, or growing vetches and clovers that can be mowed and raked whereever you want.

    That's where the mandala design gets interesting. The nitrogen fixing trees are planted in the middle of a 30 foot circle, berries are planted around the perimeter, which is 95 feet. Inside that circle are 5-6 fruits trees near the berries and vegetables underneath the trees. Paths are in a keyhole shape which creates a low path-to-growing-space ratio. All things interact well with each other and the ingredients for mulches and soil improvement are right there and don't need to be hauled or even tilled into place. Worms will do the tilling for you if there's enough mulch. There is a diagram in Mollison's Permaculture book.
     
  11. sweetpea

    sweetpea Junior Member

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    P. S. I think the 45% sand is a bit high in that soil test, and mine still isn't that high, but it produces well and smells good, which I think is the ultimate test. And one of the great characteristics of clay soil is how it holds moisture and requires less watering, and too much sand would change this. Some sand and mostly organic matter seems to be the safest combination.
     
  12. nobis77

    nobis77 Junior Member

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    Thanks sweetpea. My soil passes the sniff test and the worm test with flying colors. The glass jar test will have to wait, but I remember doing it here when I was a kid for school; I think I had about 1/4" of sand, 1/8" of organic matter and the rest was a clay/silt layer where I couldn't determine a difference between the two. It'll be interesting to see what a decade or so of green-manure rotations, and compost has done for it. Organic matter just seems to disappear over the summer as fast as I can grow it.
     
  13. sweetpea

    sweetpea Junior Member

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    That all sounds like good news. :)

    Yet things are growing in slow motion? It might just be alkalinity or not enough nitrogen for the regular plants. Clover doesn't need nitrogen, but it will slow down if the soil is alkaline.
     
  14. SueinWA

    SueinWA Junior Member

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    If your soil leans toward alkaline and you want a nitrogen-fixing cover crop, try alfalfa (lucerne).

    Sue
     

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