wrote in message news:0b27fed2-e802-4496-90a0-
It was always a lot of work for me too until I read Ruth Stout No-Work
Garden Book 30 years ago, what an eye opener. I just planted this
years crop, took about 5 minutes , just push aside the leaves and
planted the seed and covered it up. No tilling, fertilizing, I didn't
even bother to water, rain is expected soon. (for yield I get about 25
pounds of beans from a 4x8 size area, don't know if that is good or
not). I don't stake tomatoes either.


Amen. The first year I tried to do a garden here, it was tons of work with
the tiller, and then the clayey soil compacted and left me with stunted
vegetables that became progressively more hidden in a sea of persistent
weeds.

Then my husband piled that fall's leaves on one area, and when I went to
plant some tomatoes there, I found the soil deep, black, crumbly, and full
of earthworms! Got an incredible tomato crop in a plot that was barely ten
feet square.

Since then I have put more work into it by making raised wooden beds, laying
down paper in the fall and piling the leaves and grass on top of that. But
yeah, in the spring, the work to prepare the garden is so light. I just pop
transplants right into the beds, no tilling or mixing or measuring. For
small-seeded beds, I make little furrows in the old leaves and throw some
compost in there to plant the seeds in. I can't believe I used to mess
around with a tiller and waste all that time and gasoline.
--S.