"DigitalVinyl" wrote in message
...
"Doug Kanter" wrote:

I reworked the top 18"
of soil...

After this season, do not rework anything but the top 3". You only need to
go deeper for new garden areas, unless someone is walking on, and
compressing your rows, in which case, they should be pantsed and staked to
the ground near an ant hill.

The soil, in its natural state, has definite layers at which different types
of microorganisms exist. By turning it over deeply each year, you disturb
this stratification. In addition, you uncover many weed seeds which would
otherwise fail to sprout. So, cultivate the top 3" at the beginning of the
season, to break up any crust that has formed from snow and normal settling.
Cultivate even shallower during the season to cut new weeds off at the
ankles, and to keep the soil loose, which serves as a last-resort form of
water retention layer, in case you have not mulched. At the end of the
season, cultivate a little deeper again, to turn in any scrap vegetation,
and perhaps to work fertilizer into the soil.