I either mulch my garden beds or plant them to cover crops in the late fall before winter comes. Mulched beds are by far the easiest to prep. All I have to do is rake the straw mulch aside and the soil is usually weed-free and ready to go. Sometimes I have to do some shallow cultivation to take care of spring weed seedlings.
Taking care of cover crops in the garden is a little more complicated. Recently I’ve been using our hand sickle to cut the cover crops as close to the ground as I can, raking the cut tops aside, then using a stirrup hoe to turn up the roots. I’ll usually let the soil rest a few days before using a rake to remove large root debris before planting. Cover crops can also be tilled in, but you have to wait a good three weeks before planting to allow the cover crop residue to break down in the soil.
Spring crops that can be directly sown include peas, lettuce, greens, kale, Swiss chard, beets, turnips, radishes, and carrots. Some of these crops I choose to grow out in the greenhouse first to give myself a head start. When it comes to planting seeds in the garden I am all about efficiency. I use a garden trowel to make a shallow furrow to drop seeds in, taking note of the proper depth for the seed I am planting. Once the furrow is made, I just drop the seeds in at the proper spacing then drag the trowel back over the furrow to bury the seed. This really speeds up the process.
Some seed should be banded or broadcast instead of being sown in a straight row, including crops like salad mixes and arugula. In this case I have found the spring tine cultivator to be a great tool to shallowly scratch in the seed and barely bury them with soil. The trick with broadcasting seed is to make sure too much seed doesn’t come out at once and end up in clumps when the crop comes up. You can see I didn’t do a perfect job with the arugula below!
