soil prep

P1180042
Originally uploaded by Southeastern Horticultural Society

I've been looking at the huge patch of woodchips since we reorganized the garden this fall, moving all the blueberries and perennials to create some more usable space, dreading the thought of tilling the soil. Or, rather, clay with an icing of woodchips.

So last Monday, to celebrate MLK day, about 30 volunteers showed up at the garden to build new compost bins and do some tidying up. And instead of renting a tiller, we just dug up the clay, turning the woodchips into the red earth in hopes of attracting lots of big fat worms to break down the chips and build up the soil. No noisy, stinky, dangerous machine, and everyone could help. A two year old boy wielding a shovel half his size happily dug a little section while older boys swung their shovels seriously.

We turned the whole area, about 30'x30', in a little more than an hour, then seeded it with rye and red clover. The boys moved on to hammering in nails to finish off the compost bins afterwards.

At the end of the day, after working pretty hard for a few hours, the oldest boy who had been helping, a middle schooler, asked if I'd be there on Saturdays so he could come back and help some more. This on the heels of an Atlantic Monthly editorial eschoriating school gardens for putting kids to stoop-backed work in the hot sun, when perhaps their parents or recent ancestors had worked hard to avoid this very fate (http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/201001/school-yard-garden). Hmm. The school garden as a tool of oppression. Something rings false about that, but the accusation deserves some thought.

Agricultural labor is historically and currently poorly paid and brutal. Farm workers held as slaves in Florida last summer, locked in sheds after long days of work. Itinerant workers travelling across the country, following harvests, living in unsanitary conditions and getting exposed to agricultural chemicals. So do I support this oppression by extending the opportunity to dig up a patch of soil, preparing the ground for cover crops and eventually vegetables, to some young boys on a January morning? Should I rather be inside teaching them something on a computer?

There is a huge disconnect here. First of all, the oppressive nature of agricultural labor is a symptom of the larger problems of agribusiness and immigration policies, and really, free market capitalism. But it does not mean that agricultural labor is innately demeaning work. And most importantly, most kids who have the opportunity to work in a garden fight to maintain that opportunity.

What is the purpose of this garden? My goals with it are not to prepare children for a future in itinerant agricultural labor. No, we are working on imagining a new way of feeding ourselves. This garden is an opportunity to discover the natural world, a place to learn how to work together toward common goals, to share the resulting harvests, to test ideas, to create art, to make good dirt.

And good dirt starts with feeding the soil--digging in the woodchips and planting cover crops is the first step toward the rich tilth that will bear fruit. It's a slow process, as will be the creation of truly sustainable and fair agricutural systems. It's where we start. The worms will show us the way.