Troy-Bilt Horse User Manual

your garden green and covered throughout the
winter and early spring with a cover crop. Cover
crops can also be grown in temporarily idle
parts
of your garden during the growing season
to provide nitrogen-rich matter.
It's
so easy for you with your Troy-Bilt to
shred and bury that good green matter back
into the ground when the cover crop has grown.
Growing and tilling under a cover crop is called
"green manuring." Its nitrogen-packed foliage
has great fertilizing value, perhaps more than
many animal manures from which elements
leach away.
Green manures are
generally cheaper than
animal manures and avoid
awkward transpor-
tation. Of course, a cover crop also performs
all of the same valuable jobs of heavy mulch;
preventing erosion from winds and storms,
keeping weeds
from going to seed in the fall,
retarding ground freezing. In addition, cover
crops hold topsoil together through spring
thaws and retrieve replacement minerals from
the subsoil.
"Green
manuring" is an outstanding way to
make sure that your garden gets enough or-
ganic matter. A cover crop produces green
manure by
the truck load. Compost piles only
do it by the wheelbarrow load. Photo 5/31 at
right illustrates a lush growth of rye grass that
was planted the previous fall. It was two feet
high in the spring. The annual rye grass, as
opposed to perennial rye grass, is especialy
good since
the root systems also die and de-
compose as plant food.
Your Troy-Bilt Roto Tiller-Power Com poster
can easily chop up and turn under a,cover crop
of kale such as the one shown in Photo 5/32.
This crop surprisingly survived the winter and
provided tasty early
spring eating.
After a cover crop is turned into the soil by
your Troy-Bilt Tiller, it is best to allow 10 days
for thorough decomposition and then till once
more before planting in a smooth seedbed.
Green manure
crops that grow too tall can also
be
mowed before tilling to yield a fresh supply
of mulch material. Many are grown just for that
, reason. After mowing the crop, till the remain-
ing
stubble and roots back into the soil.
(Photo 5/30) Rye grass cover crop.
(Photo 5/31) Tilling under rye grass.
(Photo 5/32) Kale is a good cover crop.
USE OF BUCKWHEAT TO PREPARE FOR A
NEW
GARDEN
Before you start a new garden area, use of
cover crops should be high on your list of prep-
arations and plans. Cover crops can do won-
ders for your soil by providing nutrients and
clearing
out weeds before you start your new
garden.
If you have a weed or grass problem, two suc-
cessive cover crops of buckwheat will elimi-
nate nearly all of the weeds while adding
69

Troy-Bilt Horse Specifications

General

Brand	Troy-Bilt
Model	Horse
Category	Lawn Mower
Language	English