Ok, now that I have made some raised rows I have a question for all you knowledgeable folks. To maintain, do I just keep throwing dirt on the rows ( not onions ) or just cultivate between rows as usual with cultivator/tiller ?
I use an ASC (Agri-Supply) hiller furrower for the initial pass (it's hard with my large tractors but doable (after I till the garden) and then keep the hills (for the spuds) improved by tilling between the rows with the rear tine and hoeing the loose soil up into the established hill.
Kind of getting away from hilling at all as Last year I tried planting spuds in straw bales with excellent results because the spuds are free to grown and not hindered at all by soil so they get quite large and very vigorous, plus the harvesting is super easy by breaking the bales apart and getting them out and it's also super easy to remove 'new potatoes' from the bale by digging in and grabbing them. I'll do that again this spring.
I tried carrots and beets with mixed results but the tomato plants did excellent as did the cukes, but I plant them both from established plants. I might try cabbage this year as well. On the fence with that because I get all the cabbage I ever need for free. Probably try zucchini as well.
Nice thing about straw bale gardens is, you can compost the straw bales into the soil when spring rolls around.
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