The one time that frost killed a stand of buckwheat I planted the stalks fell over and were fairly quickly digested by the Soil Food Web. The Stalks that Ma Nature uses to hold the soil in place in fallow fields stand upright for a long period of time, until a really heavy snow falls to knock them down and then the snow is a ground cover. In my perennial beds there will be things such as Echinacea, Phlox, etc. left standing to help hold the soil in place along with compost and shredded leaves, but the winter winds could easily blow the compost and shredded leaves off those beds if not for the plant stalks standing upright to stop that movement. The same thing will happen to your soil if not held in place.

Carolyn, it is interesting thought about soil being frozen to kill pathogens... but OTOH, the ever nasty C diff lives in the gut peacefully until opportunity arises... so if there is some small nasties that do overwinter in the soil but good guys prevail I will still come ahead? &&&&&& Being a retired infectious disease/immune response person, I don't think I'd go as far as saying that Clostridium difficile lives peacefully in the gut since not everyone has that bacterium as local flora. But as you know, certain antibiotics can cause it to multiply if it is there, and that's not a good situation.See the link at the bottom. What I'm thinking of as to critters and letting the soil freeze deeply are cutworms, which mainly pupate in the soil, and any imported Fusarium, etc.diseases that are killed where the soil freezes deeply. Has Fusarium and other fungal systemic diseases appeared here in my zone 5 area? Yes, but mainly from plants bought in southern areas. But once here, also are the moths that lay the eggs. Yes, you'll come out ahead if you know which critters are in your soil that are potential problems and know which ones are killed by freezing and which are not. ( smile) Carolyn Here is a link that might be useful: C.diff

I created a new garden plot 12' x 25' in area this spring. My native soil is clay loam. I wanted a deep root zone so I purchased a soil mix and covered the native soil about 4" deep with that. I immediately planted the entire thing with buckwheat. Once it began to flower I fenced it and let my chickens mow it down. After that I sowed a mixture of oats, tillage radish, and crimson clover in the fall. In the spring I'll let the chickens tear that up again and then sow some corn, squash, and cucumbers. There is some evidence that seed mixtures improve soil health better than monoculture plantings because they have higher net primary productivity as a result of greater light interception. Differing root architectures between the plants will also improve nutrient scavenging and mining. Grasses (e.g. rye and oats) are great for nitrogen scavenging, buckwheat can mine phosphorus, radish can break up plow pans, etc. My intention was to hopefully break up the native soil below the soil I imported. I don't have a tiller and it's been lawn since about 1972, so it was fairly compacted. We'll see how well it works. Here's a pic of one of the radishes. They're pretty incredible.

Last summer I tossed out 3-1# bags of black eyed peas to grow as a cover crop. Watered them in well and kept watering from time to time. They grew in just great. I harvested and used the peas for a nice batch of Hoppin' John on New Year's Day. Just chop the plant off, as you stated above, don't pull the roots. The legume adds nitrogen to the soil and the roots aerate. I now have some crimson clover just coming in for a winter crop. What island HGG? I live on Kauai for nearly 10 years, '93 to '01. Loved it but we were tired of renting and could not afford a home there. HTH.