Perennial peanut as green manure

thonotorose

13 years ago

Looks like this may work well as a green manure that is plowed under a few times to enrich the soil.

Here is a link that might be useful: U of F study

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Comments (3)

pnbrown
13 years ago
IME it isn't easy to get established, and since it is a very valuable perennial living cover I would leave it in situ.

A bunch of it has spread out of my neighbor's vineyard into my right-of-way. I should plant some fruit trees there.
thonotorose
Original Author
13 years ago
So, as a living mulch? What would be the benefits of that practice?

Thanks for any ideas. I am getting started on preparing a much larger area for food and fruit in the back of our property and would like to do it as sustainably as possible.
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I'm sorry I forgot to say what's in the mixes. In the first picture for FALL: This mix is comprised of winter rye, field peas, ryegrass, crimson clover and hairy vetch. Vigorous late summer growth provides winter erosion control. The peas, clover and ryegrass will winter kill to provide organic matter and soil cover. The hairy vetch and winter rye will regrow in the spring to provide nutrients for crops to utilize. For the Spring Mix , in the second picture: Use as a green manure to enrich the garden with both nitrogen and organic matter. The mix contains 60% field peas, 25% oats, and 15% hairy vetch. Designed for spring sowing, but it may be sown anytime early spring through late summer. Our backyard is part of the Rocky Mountain , literally! And so to tame patches of it, since it is not level, our son weed-whacked the rag weeds and other unwanted last fall, and since my Fall mix didn't arrive until too late(didn't want it all eaten by the wild pheasants and other wild residents-might have to pellet the seeds with fine clay powder because of that), I will sow the Spring mix very early on patches maybe 10x20's on the South facing incline for additonal gardening places and let the mix do the weeding out and the fertilizing and the softening of the dirt, and the composting, to get them ready for vegetables and flowers for the year after. I am planning to always have a patch of the mixes growing for seeds, and to rotate them from one patch to the other, and intersperse their plantings with my regulars when ever possible. Bon, bref, I've been long winded,as usual. Chris
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Hi, sheet composting would work if you are not planting before fall. Sheet composting spreading Leaves, grass clipping & other compost materials in layers right on top of the soil. Then work it in the soil. Green manure crops: in fall perennial rye, cowpeas in spring & buckwheat in the summer. Buckwheat & clover will draw honeybees. Rows 9 feet apart sounds like dwarf tree,if so do not cover the graft dog leg (bent place in the tree trunk ) with soil. It could root & you would have full size tree to close to each other.If you mulch your tree,but want to put in green manure. Pull back the mulch, break the ground to plant the seeds, no more then one inch,some seeds do better on top of the soil. When the plants come up & have 3-4 leaves push the mulch down around them to hold down weeds. When the seasons change the green manure will die or you can cover it mulch 7-14 days before the next crop. It will rot, hold down weeds, add nitrogen to the soil without harming the tree roots. Also NEVER use black walnut leaves,bark or chips,dog,cat manure.
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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
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I am trying a new green manure next year. Here's what the catalog said about it: AC Greenfix PVP is a new annual legume in the USA, develped as a fertilizer atlernative to supply nitrogen for both organic and conventional growers. This plant is moisture efficient, resistant to many insects and diseases, suitable for a variety of climates and soil types. Other benefits of planting AC Greenfix PVP are; reduce fertilizer costs 75% or more, Increase yields (12% avarage), weed flush can reduce chemical use, benefits soil for 3-5 years, etc. PLANTING; In early spring or early fall, till up soil till fine and loose. Place seeds 1-3" deep at the rate of 50-60 lb per acre or 1 1/4 to 1 1/2 lb per 1,000 sq ft. At or before bloom stage can be tilled in as a green manure crop or cut for hay. Not recommended for horses.
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pnbrown
13 years ago
Well, as a legume of course there is the potential nitrogen fixation.

If you buy the little potted plants to start a bed it is highly advisable to get the cowpea type inoculant for them to sprinkle in the planting holes. The cowpea group are the rhizobia species - bacteria - that are symbiotic with peanut, cowpeas, pigeon peas, hairy indigo, and some other legume species. Legumes grow much better with the rhizobia, are more drought tolerant, and most importantly, without sufficient and correct rhizobia rather than being nitrogen-fixers they become net users of nitrogen like most other crop plants. That's why the florida gardeners are giving their beans lots of compost and fertilizer - florida sand generally is absent the rhizobia, and without them legumes require plenty of N to produce a crop. In richer soils the correct bacteria are more likely present - though it's still a very good idea to use the inoculant the first time around. If the soil is maintained in decent condition in years afterward the rhizobia will persist. Because tropical peanut doesn't produce a crop one could start out with little N in the soil.

For cropping legumes one must add N to begin with if it is low. Then if the rhizobia are present N will be fixed from the atmosphere in approximately the same amount as is taken out by harvest. The fixed N is in the roots so a common practice is to leave the plant roots -if not the whole plant -in the ground. As the roots decompose the accumulated N releases which can be used by a succeeding crop. So legumes are N-nuetral, or looked at another way, a nearly free high-quality food source.

Since tropical peanut is non-cropping for the most part - if it isn't grazed by animals - one will be storing all the accumulated N season after season. That's why it is so favored around fruit trees. Similar to white clover (clovers have their own group of rhizobias).

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Perennial peanut as green manure

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pnbrown

thonotorose
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Perennial peanut as green manure

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pnbrown

thonotoroseOriginal Author

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thonotorose
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