Cover Crops and biofumigation at the chicken garden

After growing out Fava beans in the winter of 2018-2019, I decided that coming into 2020, I should try growing out a different cover crop. I had read a lot of literature concerning the benefits of biofumigation, so I decided to give it a try. My thought was that I would try some deep radish as well as some mustard greens. I planted everything and waited.

The seed (from Territorial Seed Company) germinated quickly and everything grew quite well. After incorporating chopped up mustard greens to the soil I used a piece of black plastic to cover a section of the garden with. This enabled the mustard greens to break down and release biofumigants to eliminate any disease in the soil.

Everything grew quite well and was reasonably easy to mow down. A word to the wise though: for a home gardener it is much easier to chop up plants when they are small and still green, prior to the main stock becoming more hard and woody.