Soil CultivationSoil cultivation or tilling the soil is an important step to prepare the soil for our seeds or starter plants. The soil needs to be as “fine” as we can make it. It also needs to be loaded with nutrients the plants need to grow.
If you are going with an “in ground” garden instead of a raised garden bed, then you will need to pre-break up the soil. Depending on how large an area you will be using and the hardness of the soil will depend on how you go about this. If it is a large area you may want to find someone who has a tractor and plow who will do this for you. I say this because none of the tillers on market are good at pre-breaking the soil. Once it is loosened then tillers or cultivators are good at getting in there and tilling the ground into a good soil base for planting. If a tractor is not available for soil cultivation, then you will have to get out there with a pick and break it up. At this point, I would hire a couple of teens to do this. At my age, it would not be worth the risk to my back. I am currently breaking up my previous garden with a pick, the soil is hard but it is breaking up easy with the pick. Here is a video of my son Matthew doing some "picking for me." I had to offer him a few bucks for his help.
If you are using the enclosed raised garden method, then all you will need to do is buy your dirt, as discussed in soil preparation, and pour it into your raised garden. You will want to mix the soil with some organic compost as well. If you have added worms then they should provide all the soil cultivation you will ever need from this point. The pictures below are of garden soils from Home Depot. The Scotts is a premium brand. I have a feeling it is not much different then the soil below it.
If using bags of soil, then there is no need for soil cultivation. You may want to put some mulch and worms in it to keep it from getting hard later on down the line. When choosing your soil there is the premium soil like Scotts or just some regular soil as in the second picture. Either one will work just as good. Your deciding factor will depend on how large your budget is. I have seen some soils that have some sort of three month fertilizer in them. We want to stay away from anything that has any sort of fertilizer in it. Fertilizer can kill a new born plant. Once I break up the soil with a pick, I will use this Black and Decker Model GC 818, 18 volt, Garden Cultivator to break it up even more for soil cultivation. I am not sure how it will do but I am sure the grass is going to give me some problems. I would like to leave the grass in there since it is a good organic material, but chances are I will have to pull it out and use it on the yard.
As you can tell we are not professional filmmakers but I think you get the idea.
As you can see, my yard is going to need a lot of work as well. To help it along, I will be putting down some mulch on it to start helping it retain any moisture we may get between now and spring time.
Cultivation will also bring weed seeds to the surface, so be prepared for this. However, this should not be a problem when buying bagged soil. One last thing to remember. Too much soil cultivation can kill off our worms. I probably should have waited a little bit longer to buy the worms and put them in.
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