No Till Gardening

In my constant search for gardening help and how to's, I came across Ruth Stout. She came to gardening a little later in life, in her 50s. She worked hard at it and followed all the typical advice, tilling, planting, fertilizing, pesticides, watering, weeding, until one day she discovered that there was an easier way. She noticed that weeds seed themselves and sprout without any help. Perhaps vegetable gardening could be almost that simple. In 1944, she was waiting impatiently, again, for the plowman to come and prepare her gardening space, and decided..... not to.

She provided for her own food needs for several years, with year round gardening, without tilling or using pesticides or even watering. She mulched with hay throughout the garden, which released nitrogen into the soil, and maintained moisture.

The thought of not tilling or watering, honestly, baffles me. But, watching this video, I can hardly argue with the results. I certainly think a section of my garden will have to be a 'Stout' test run. I certainly have plenty of hay to start with after my haybale gardening this year.

She wrote numerous books on her gardening methods, and spoke to many gardening clubs and magazines.

For more information about Ruth Stout - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_Stout