Charles Dowding videos show his method of covering grass (and bindweed) with just cardboard & then compost over it. You can get free boxes from Dillons, Walmart etc. People get them from the produce departments for moving boxes. If the weeds still come up he’ll tuck another layer up to sometimes 3x over the weed. He plants right in the compost poured on top. It smothers, breaks down the weeds & loosens the soil. You can get truckloads from gravel & rock places that have piles of it they load for you & weigh it out instead of having to buy expensive store bags.
This is what we do! I gave up doing tilling last year. I did one season and got so frustrated by the weed pressure. Also, it’s amazing how well the cardboard and compost method works.
I did this too, and then found out that I'd now unfortunately introduced PFAS into my soil and damaged the dirt health. I used it for 3 huge food beds.
@@kellyklapp1232 I hear ya. Well I tried it myself & put compost over the cardboard to plant in. Unfortunately weeds planted themselves & took over in the compost. I’m going with heavy duty weed fabric next!
The weed fabric typically a) doesn't work the well or for that long and b) also contains pfas and microplastics. Visit the channel 'regenerative gardening with blossom and branch' she has lots of videos on how she low maintenance and earth friendly/ soil friendly fights the weeds. She has a cut flower and food farm. I believe she uses things like cover crops, mulch, and good ol' picking sometimes. Weeds will always find a way because seeds are dropped by critters, but there are ways to minimize them!
Im in awe that you did all these seedlings! I started flower farming last year and went straight to direct seeding. Sunflowers became my favorite for that reason. I have tried some transplants early spring but they just didn’t do as well. Also, that shirt is amazing!!
Also, here in SC the clay is awful 😣 and weed pressure is awful but layering has been helpful. That being said, the scale that you are is bigger. Another thing to consider is chickens. I’m not even kidding. We have our chickens go through our garden and they help dig up the rows and fertilize it.
Good luck with your experiment! I farm on a much smaller scale than y'all, in Zone 7b GA, and have started direct sowing this spring. I started my first succession in mid February inside to get those early blooms. After a while I decided to try the direct sowing and it's worked pretty well. Thank for your content.
New gardener here and its the first time i tried succession planting of sunflower, those i started inside have grown faster than my direct sown. Lesson learned! Hello from zone 5B ❤ PS, please don't mind my English, it is not my native language.
My seeds cost to much to direct sow because the seeders are never accurate it costs me $50 nz for 1000 seeds and I want the most out of those I can get plus it only took me 1hr to plant 200 sunflowers the other day it isn't that bad plus I get the exact spacing I need
You've probably considered this already but using a Paper Pot transplanter might be a good hybrid option for you. It would cut down the labor time of transplanting and the sunflowers could spend less time in their trays before transplanting since once they germinate you can plant at anytime because you're not waiting for the roots to fill out the cell. You get 264 cells for each paper tray, so also much more space efficient compared to a 72 cell tray. Johnny's & Paper Pot Co. sell the original transplanters, from Japan I believe, and Neversink Farm now manufactures and sells what they call an improved version. So just in case you haven't yet heard of this tool (primarily market garden vegetable farmers use it) I thought I would present it as an option #3? I haven't used the transplanter (for my size it doesn't make sense), but have used the paper cells as kind of a hybrid soil block and hand planted them and they're great! Long comment but hope this helps!
Once your sunflowers get a bit of height you can let the grass have its way. Aesthetically its not too bad. I planted Mammoth and titans about a foot apart and they were amazing. But yes it was a sunflower forest of a couple hundred stems. This year, I'm shooting for half giants and half less than 4 ft tall.
So excited for this experiment! I've been interested in getting a seeder as well, do you think the Jang would work planting into a thick layer of compost? Right now I'm just lightly hoeing rows and dropping seed in. I do the no dig method with about 6 - 8 inches of compost, that way I don't have to deal with as much weed pressure during the growing season. We have a neighbor with a dairy farm so we get composted steer manure by the truckload from them for cheap. If you could find an organic farm around you that could be game changer for your weed pressure! Anyways, crossing my fingers for your sunflower experiment! You guys are awesome. 😊
Thank you for watching! I am excited to see how it works too. Unfortunately all the ranchers around here treat their fields so I can’t their manure safely. We get mushroom compost though that I love. I don’t think the Jang could push through that deep of a layer but maybe if it stayed over top without sinking.
I am glad that it is going well for your farm. I mean how could it not with those beautiful bouquets! I hope it works for you with the direct seeding. I was going to say that maybe netting them would help with the bug pressure or maybe even birds. I only have a garden but sometimes I think that the birds are more of a nuisance here when it comes to poor germination.
Sunflowers are the one crop I cannot direct seed. The chippies and the voles take out every direct seeded plant when it is in seedling stage. No amount of netting/barriers seem to deter them. That leaves me with starting them all in trays, and growing them in unti they are past the "tasty stage". It is a total pain, and expensive soil wise, as I too am organic. I'd love to be able to direct sow them. I basically have stopped growing them for the season because it has become super annoying.
I tried both methods of sowing and direct sow is the best. I had to do by hand, bending over in some version of yoga position. The seeder would have been great. 😆
Haha yes. They are done. Some of them got spider mites and I don’t feel like battling them so I am cutting them down. I’ve been cutting on our dahlias since June so I am ok with it
@@CoramDeoFarmoh wow! I’m in zone 6A and my dahlias just started last week! Our climate is fairly mild, though, and I’ve read that dahlias don’t like extreme heat.
@@kelleyforeman yeah I planted mine April 1 and got blooms in June bc we are so warm here. Then they typically get stressed in august and I loose patience. I will flip the bed and plant more sunnies ☺️
Makes me happy to see the “down and dirty” side of the operation 😂
love it!
Charles Dowding videos show his method of covering grass (and bindweed) with just cardboard & then compost over it. You can get free boxes from Dillons, Walmart etc. People get them from the produce departments for moving boxes. If the weeds still come up he’ll tuck another layer up to sometimes 3x over the weed. He plants right in the compost poured on top. It smothers, breaks down the weeds & loosens the soil. You can get truckloads from gravel & rock places that have piles of it they load for you & weigh it out instead of having to buy expensive store bags.
This is what we do! I gave up doing tilling last year. I did one season and got so frustrated by the weed pressure. Also, it’s amazing how well the cardboard and compost method works.
I did this too, and then found out that I'd now unfortunately introduced PFAS into my soil and damaged the dirt health. I used it for 3 huge food beds.
@@kellyklapp1232 I hear ya. Well I tried it myself & put compost over the cardboard to plant in. Unfortunately weeds planted themselves & took over in the compost. I’m going with heavy duty weed fabric next!
The weed fabric typically a) doesn't work the well or for that long and b) also contains pfas and microplastics. Visit the channel 'regenerative gardening with blossom and branch' she has lots of videos on how she low maintenance and earth friendly/ soil friendly fights the weeds. She has a cut flower and food farm.
I believe she uses things like cover crops, mulch, and good ol' picking sometimes. Weeds will always find a way because seeds are dropped by critters, but there are ways to minimize them!
Love your shirt, Alex!!!
Please show more of harvesting and ur making of beautiful bouquets ❤
It is on the list! :)
Im in awe that you did all these seedlings! I started flower farming last year and went straight to direct seeding. Sunflowers became my favorite for that reason. I have tried some transplants early spring but they just didn’t do as well.
Also, that shirt is amazing!!
Also, here in SC the clay is awful 😣 and weed pressure is awful but layering has been helpful. That being said, the scale that you are is bigger. Another thing to consider is chickens. I’m not even kidding. We have our chickens go through our garden and they help dig up the rows and fertilize it.
It was SO many transplants to do. Exhausting lol. Yes, love the shirt :) We are considering chickens next year!
Good luck with your experiment! I farm on a much smaller scale than y'all, in Zone 7b GA, and have started direct sowing this spring. I started my first succession in mid February inside to get those early blooms. After a while I decided to try the direct sowing and it's worked pretty well. Thank for your content.
oh that’s great!
New gardener here and its the first time i tried succession planting of sunflower, those i started inside have grown faster than my direct sown. Lesson learned! Hello from zone 5B ❤
PS, please don't mind my English, it is not my native language.
My seeds cost to much to direct sow because the seeders are never accurate it costs me $50 nz for 1000 seeds and I want the most out of those I can get plus it only took me 1hr to plant 200 sunflowers the other day it isn't that bad plus I get the exact spacing I need
Awww…love the two of you at the end with your height difference. My husband is 13 inches taller than me, so that’s how we are too! 😂😅❤
so you know the struggle! And I am not even that short lol
❤
You've probably considered this already but using a Paper Pot transplanter might be a good hybrid option for you. It would cut down the labor time of transplanting and the sunflowers could spend less time in their trays before transplanting since once they germinate you can plant at anytime because you're not waiting for the roots to fill out the cell. You get 264 cells for each paper tray, so also much more space efficient compared to a 72 cell tray. Johnny's & Paper Pot Co. sell the original transplanters, from Japan I believe, and Neversink Farm now manufactures and sells what they call an improved version. So just in case you haven't yet heard of this tool (primarily market garden vegetable farmers use it) I thought I would present it as an option #3? I haven't used the transplanter (for my size it doesn't make sense), but have used the paper cells as kind of a hybrid soil block and hand planted them and they're great! Long comment but hope this helps!
Once your sunflowers get a bit of height you can let the grass have its way. Aesthetically its not too bad. I planted Mammoth and titans about a foot apart and they were amazing. But yes it was a sunflower forest of a couple hundred stems. This year, I'm shooting for half giants and half less than 4 ft tall.
Love your green theology matters T-shirt!!
Thank you Lydia!!
Perhaps you can use straw to keep the weeds down between the sunflowers once they have grown a bit.
So excited for this experiment! I've been interested in getting a seeder as well, do you think the Jang would work planting into a thick layer of compost? Right now I'm just lightly hoeing rows and dropping seed in.
I do the no dig method with about 6 - 8 inches of compost, that way I don't have to deal with as much weed pressure during the growing season. We have a neighbor with a dairy farm so we get composted steer manure by the truckload from them for cheap. If you could find an organic farm around you that could be game changer for your weed pressure!
Anyways, crossing my fingers for your sunflower experiment! You guys are awesome. 😊
Thank you for watching! I am excited to see how it works too. Unfortunately all the ranchers around here treat their fields so I can’t their manure safely. We get mushroom compost though that I love. I don’t think the Jang could push through that deep of a layer but maybe if it stayed over top without sinking.
love the shirt!
Thank you! :)
I am glad that it is going well for your farm. I mean how could it not with those beautiful bouquets! I hope it works for you with the direct seeding. I was going to say that maybe netting them would help with the bug pressure or maybe even birds. I only have a garden but sometimes I think that the birds are more of a nuisance here when it comes to poor germination.
Thankfully I think the birds are ok so far as they have lots of other places to find food
Sunflowers are the one crop I cannot direct seed. The chippies and the voles take out every direct seeded plant when it is in seedling stage. No amount of netting/barriers seem to deter them. That leaves me with starting them all in trays, and growing them in unti they are past the "tasty stage". It is a total pain, and expensive soil wise, as I too am organic.
I'd love to be able to direct sow them. I basically have stopped growing them for the season because it has become super annoying.
Ugh I know your pain! I really hope this will be an option for us because starting plugs is so much work.
What brand/model is your tiller?
How many liters or gallons are your favorite stainless buckets? Wondering what height I need to get for my cut flower bouquet display.
Idk maybe 2 gallons
I tried both methods of sowing and direct sow is the best. I had to do by hand, bending over in some version of yoga position. The seeder would have been great. 😆
Are your dahlias like done and dead bc mine have not even started .
Haha yes. They are done. Some of them got spider mites and I don’t feel like battling them so I am cutting them down. I’ve been cutting on our dahlias since June so I am ok with it
@@CoramDeoFarmoh wow! I’m in zone 6A and my dahlias just started last week! Our climate is fairly mild, though, and I’ve read that dahlias don’t like extreme heat.
@@kelleyforeman yeah I planted mine April 1 and got blooms in June bc we are so warm here. Then they typically get stressed in august and I loose patience. I will flip the bed and plant more sunnies ☺️
You need a sickle😄
We got one!
Labor intensive? Not my style.