Iāve never figured out Fukuokaās no-tilling thing, but we donāt pesticides and only use organic fertizilers, including manure from our chickens. Chicken and ducks are allowed to visit gardens off-season. When the weeds get out of hand, however, we try not to speak aloud āFukuoka!ā
By his remark ā¦I am going to paraphrase ānatural farming is the perfection of human beingsā I understand that his āpathā if it may be called that, is an all or nothing venture, more of a meditation on what works in nature as it is already, before your eyesā¦and trying to fit yourself into that grove rather than bend nature to your own ways ( ie. tilling , monoculture, tinkering in any way, perhaps even planning) Kind of a Zen approach. It is all encompassing, and goes beyond what you do outdoors with plants end such, I must admit, I have dug gardens all my life and turned in manure etcā¦and aside from the initial ability for root crops such as carrots to make their way downward (before a few rains and it hardens up again into concrete) I have never really seen that much benefit to tillingā¦I have done some lasagna gardening over the past few years with great resultsā¦One year I had almost unbelievable resultsā¦I put down fresh (hot) manureā¦over top of that I put well composted manure and whatever other layers I donāt recallā¦but the rate of growth on the lettuce and other greens that I planted ā¦probably due to the extra heat was astounding