Prepare Your Soil

Once you've测试并修改了您的土壤，是时候准备好种植了。有了许多不同的耕作方法或在土壤中工作，您怎么知道哪一种适合您的需求和原材料？

一般规则是使用您可以使用的最不密集的耕作方法。尽可能多地打扰土壤，以产生一个充气的细床为您的农作物。这将有助于最大程度地减少对土地的影响以及由于风或水的侵蚀。

手耕

如果你是homesteader寻求种植素食花园来养家糊口，您可能不需要拖拉机或较重的耕作方法。取而代之的是，通过双重挖掘或另一种方法可以为您提供最佳服务。

Double digging is an effective method of improving the soil in the garden with a spade and a lot of hard work.要使双胆含量，您首先将堆肥散布在土壤上。然后，挖一个10英寸深的沟渠和铲子的宽度，将铲土的土壤沉积在沟渠旁边的地面上。将第二个沟渠与第一个沟渠一起挖掘，将铲子的土壤铲用于第一个沟渠。继续以这种方式进行，直到整个区域被手工拆除为止。

Other options includeraised bedsor sheet mulching methods such as lasagna gardening. With these methods, you don't have to work your soil at all - you simply build on top of it.

Rototilling

A旋转耕种, commonly known as a rototiller, is a motorized cultivator with tines or blades that rotate through the soil, pulverizing it and breaking up clumps into a finer texture.

Rototillers can be walk-behind, where you literally walk behind it as it pushes through the soil, or ride-on, such as those found as an attachment to a lawn or compact tractor.

如果您从SOD开始，则可能需要雇用某人在旋转草皮之前耕种。如果您这样做，请考虑简单地雇用农民为您旋转情节。这将变得容易得多，一年您拥有建立的情节，您可以在明年进行Rototill。或者，双挖。

No-Till Methods

No-till is a newer method of tillage that doesn't disturb the soil like conventional methods.它的优势包括减少侵蚀，降低设备需求以及没有土壤的种植。无耕种农民仍然必须购买无耕作钻头来种植作物，而无耕作方法可能涉及很多反复试验。

There are two types of no-till: conventional and organic. In conventional no-till, herbicides are used to kill weeds and any crop residue before planting. For organic no-till,a cover crop用于窒息杂草，然后将割草或卷下来，然后将农作物直接种植在覆盖物遗迹之间的土壤中。

浅或减少耕作

在常规耕作和无耕作之间的某个地方是各种浅层种植土壤以准备种植农作物的方法。农民的浅耕作方法可能会因其地理，设备和特定土壤而异。共享的目标是：最大程度地减少土壤干扰的同时preventing weed从表面播种的种子。 Reducing use of fossil fuels and minimizing the amount of equipment needed are other goals of shallow tillage.

其中一个方法是受欢迎的在小农场is the use of a chisel plow, also called a spring harrow. The chisel plow is a three-point-hitch implement with springy steel tines with sharp tips that loosen and aerate the soil before planting. We have a 24-hp Ford 1720 tractor that we attached a chisel plow to and dragged through our rocky, heavy clay soil. We found that it worked very well to break up the clumps of soil without catching on the large and small rocks in our mountainous soil. We'd then stop and dig those out with the front bucket. After using the chisel plow, we went over the plot with a 48" rototiller attachment for our Simplicity ride-onlawn tractor.

如果您打算在您的小农场上放下或已经拥有马匹，使用马拉设备来耕种土壤是另一种可能性。但是，您必须致力于饲养，训练和喂食马匹涉及的一切，因此，请仔细考虑，然后跳入马拉农业。但是对于那些真正想减少或消除化石燃料使用的人来说，这可能是必经之路。

Conventional Tillage

Traditionally, farmers begin with the moldboard plow (a curved iron plate that turns the soil). After plowing, the soil is worked with disks, a series of round plates attached to one axle that rotates and breaks up the soil more finely. Depending on your soil, you may be able to skip the moldboard plow and go right to the disks. Alternatively, try a chisel plow and then a disking.

可能需要使用圆盘的几次通行证才能使苗床足够细，以供种植作物。传统耕作的关注点之一是，发生的深层土壤层的干扰对诸如earth之类的土壤生物不利。另外，关注水和风侵蚀新侵蚀的土壤。

Only you can determine which tillage method matches your soil, geography, climate and available resources. Any of these methods or a combination may be the best choice for yoursmall farm或宅基地。