Thanks to both of you for the advice & information. Very good stuff! Not dead set against tilling, but with good soil tilth & health, it seems uneccesary. Unless needed to incorporate the green manure. If I can realize the green manure benefits through other methods (cutting & mulching/composting), I'd rather leave the roots & worms to do their work in peace. If the dozen or so shovels full I turned up are any indicator, they're doing a better job of it that I could with a spade & fork anyway. I seed by hand, using a small trowel & dibble, so the winter pea remains shouldn't cause much trouble on that front. Raises another question though, since I'm growing some heat loving crops: Will the "mulch" delay warming of the soil? Sounds like alfalfa might be the ticket. Would this plan make sense- Grow the alfalfa for three years, mowing & mulching/composting along the way. Then convert the bed for vegetables, and grow the alfalfa in a different bed for three years. In other words, rotate the green manure bed with the vegetable beds.

To make an analogy -- This fixation on NITROGEN reminds me of the way some people consider meat-based proteins. I raised a family [3 boys on the wrestling team] on a WELL BALANCED vegetarian diet. When people would ask - "What do you eat?" I'd always reply "Everything"[except meat]. The point I want to make is that it is a mind-set that is difficult to change. Yes, the body needs protein - along with many other nutrients. Yes, plant life needs nitrogen- along with many other nutrients. And being anal about one nutrient above all others makes things harder than they need to be. Just as my sons became "mad scientists" in the kitchen [some of their concoctions got fed to the compost pile, but some became prized recipes], we can become soil scientists in our gardens.... adventurous and not up-tight about this or that nutrient. There will be failures and successes.... ooooh NEWS FLASH! Just like in every other part of our lives. Wow ... that's a bit of a rant. Sorry. Just seems a shame for people to get too wound-up in the minutia. Joyous New Year, guys.

You will need to play around a bit, because different plants behave differently in varying climates. When I grew Austrian winter pea in Z7, in partnership with hairy vetch, I found them easy to cut down at the base. The ideal application is, indeed, to simply let the foliage dry on the surface. Then make openings in the dried mulch for various plantings. It sounds like your soil looks like mine does, in a patch of alfalfa I seeded in Oct. and kept under a rowcover all winter to protect it from deer (gone now). I'm opening rows in it to plant brassicas, and transplanting some of the clumps to other parts of the garden. The tilth of that soil with live roots in it is amazing, isn't it? I've seen alfalfa interplanted with spring broccoli at a CSA and it worked well. By June I'll be able to see any differences between a couple of varieties grown in the alfalfa and elsewhere in the garden. I like working with winter wheat and crimson clover, too, and in summer buckwheat is always a delight. In my intensive garden, I'm much more likely to either mow and mulch a cover crop, or pull it up and compost it. The soil is easy to turn by hand, so at this point I have no need for a tiller, which is required equipment for efficient turning under of cover crops. In my opinion, turning under cover crops is a tek appropriate for farms or commercial organic growers, but not so much home gardeners. We can, however, make great use of climate-specific cover crops as soil builders, plants for permanent pathways, mulches, and plenty of green stuff for composting. Here is a link that might be useful: my website

From what I've read, there are usually problems with getting old produce at the grocery store - something about liability of giving away spoiled produce? I am making large new gardens in the back yard where I've had some trees removed, using the lasagne method. I started in Fall '06. First I lay down large sheets of cardboard (all plastic labels and tape removed) a layer or two. Then I spread about 1-2 inches of coffee grounds (with filters) I collect from the local convenience mart. I am still collecting these even with the snow, just piling the grounds in one spot and will spread them when the snow melts. After cardboard and coffee grounds, I then spread leaves and grass clippings - collected at the town composting site or the side of the road. I actually have over 30 bags sitting out there waiting to be used. On top of that goes anything - old pumpkins, debris from the garden, compost, weeds I've pulled (hopefully no seeds), ornamental grass clippings - anything! My lasagne beds are only about 6 inches deep - I have pretty good soil underneath already. But with the cardboard they are very effective at smothering and killing the Vinca minor and many other invasive weeds underneath - and adding lots of organic matter to the bed! Most of the work is lugging the materials around. To mix them up and make sure water penetrates, I usually turn over the beds a little using a garden fork after the weeds are killed, but they are easy to turn. I create the beds from Spring through Fall - and will plant them the following Spring. So I usually wait at least 6 months to plant, because I'm smothering weeds and prefer the cardboard and coffee grounds to be broken down. But you can make the beds anytime of the year and some people plant in them much sooner than that too.