Using cover crops is an important part of regenerative agriculture, permaculture and organic gardening. Winter rye is an excellent cover crop this time of year, it loves the cold and will contunie to grow, even when temperatures reach below freezing. Its growth slows down considerably when the days get shorter, and goes into a hibernation mode, then picks right back up as the spring days get longer and warmer, completing its life cycle in time for market crops to be planted.

Rye has several advantages beyond its ability to grow in the cool fall and spring weather.  It creates considerable biomass, I always love the biomass, and mowed in the spring acts as a mulch, keeping in moisture and making it harder for weed seeds to germinate. Once the rye is mowed down the roots will start to decompose adding organic matter and nutrients right into the soil, where it is needed.  Rye can bind nitrogen, making it harder for market crops to access, but adding a legume with the rye helps that.  This year we aren’t set up to add clover or vetch, instead we will add blood meal or fish emulsion come spring to help with nitrogen deficiency, we will also sow clover this spring.

Rye can easily take over other, small seeded plants when planted at the same time.  This is one advantage to starting seeds separately. The kale shown at the top was planted before the carrots were harvested, able to grown nice and big and then given a week in the ground before the rye was planted.  That gave the kale three weeks head start before the rye needed to be sown and we didn’t have to rush the carrots. The kale will have no problem growing among the rye, where as if they had started as seeds at the same time the rye would have quickly over taken the smaller and slower rye.

A few years ago I bought carrots seeds and the strangest thing happened.  Instead of producing an edible root (well it may have been edible, but they certainly weren’t palatable) they went right to flower.  This is strange, in that clearly I didn’t get the correct seed and typically plants in the carrot family are biannual and flower on their second year.  It was a lovely mistake and I had a whole 50×4 foot row of beautiful Queen Ann’s Lace type flowers.  I soon discovered that they were even better than beautiful, the bugs LOVED them.  I had so many different types of pollinators that year that I decided they would always have a place in my garden. This has been quite easy in that they readily reseed themselves. In a permaculture garden it is very important to have plants that attract  pollinators, the term is usually coined “pollinator strips”.  We are preparing some new markets gardens from virgin land and will be adding perennial rows with bushes a few trees and flowers galore to attract pollinators. It is very easy to gather seeds from these flowers.  As the flowers mature and the seeds ripen the heads curl inward, almost making a cup, I just clip off the head and drop it into a paper sack for safe keeping over the winter.  This spring when its time to get our strips, or beds, of perennial plants ready those seeds will find a new home.

The kale bed after being gone over with a fork to carefully loosen the soil without turning it over

This bed had rainbow carrots growing in it this summer. Root vegetables take a lot out of the soil. They are great for aeration  and breaking up hard soils, allowing compost and nutrients to get down deep once the roots are harvested. It is always important to follow root crops with other crops that help build the soil. According to my gardening guru, Eliot Coleman, any plant in the brassica family is a very good follower of any root crop. Some of the plants in the brassica family include cabbage, broccoli, and kale, to name a few. I like to use Kale this time of the year, the season is a little too short for broccoli, cabbage or kohlrabi, but kale is a shorter season plant that loves the cold.

A handful of soil with a lot of organic matter and biodiversity, this is how to build healthy soil.

Another thing I love about kale as a succession plant is that is produces a lot of bio mass. Kale gets big and leafy and when it dies down or we choose to chop and drop it there is a lot of matter that will compost in place further enriching the bed it was planted in.
The little kale I had written about earlier are now big enough to go out into the garden. I prepared the bed, not with tilling, but using a fork I gently aerated, just lifting the fork a little, but not turning over the soil.  The less disturbed it is the better for the soil health.  I also added a nice layer or compost and gently raked it in.
The seedlings were spaced evenly and planted with great care.  I’m hoping to have some winter vegetables to add to the soup pot and perhaps have some to  sell at market.