purpleinopp
I am going to assume that you are talking about Ruth Stout when you say "she". The answer is
yes, she did start convincing the farmer who owned the property next to hers who had always tilled her vegetable garden before she changed her gardening method to try no-tilling in his fields. I read her book years ago, but I do remember her commenting on this.
She advocated doing just what you described above about leaving prunings in place rather than hauling them off.
Her book that I referred to in my previous post was initially published in 1955 and reprinted in 1971. She gardened well into her 90s. Her books are out of print, so you will have to find them used. She was well ahead of her times.
The one adaptation I have made for the rose garden is that I put the rose prunings in an area where I am not growing roses. If they harbor rose diseases, those diseases will not necessarily infect other plants. I also throw ivy prunings and vinca prunings over the cliff across the road. They can decompose there and won't take root in my compost pile. The slope continues down from the base of the 7' cliff to a beautiful meadow. My guess is that is where all of the top soil that nature put on this slope landed.
Mrs. J. was able to afford to haul in dirt and sod for a small lawn in front of my home. I've gradually been making that disappear. There are two block tiers holding that part of the slope stable and then there is a four foot drop to the street level from the top of the tiers. I widened the top tier from 8" to three feet and hauled all of that soil and sod to the back of the house taking out a hunk of lawn. Then I dug out a bed that makes up about a forth of the lawn to plant a star magnolia tree. I have other beds planned, but I can weed eat that patch of lawn in about 10 minutes, so it is disappearing.
I do have gopher problems out in front, but none in back in the glacier slurry. Even they cannot tunnel through my stuff. The worms are there and doing their part. It's actually kind of an adventure to see dead soil come to life.
I have found that forest duff turns to soil quite quickly. In the forest, I have heard that it takes 100 years for the duff to turn into soil, but that is in pure shade. Once you take that material and put it out where the sun can cook it, it turns to dirt in about a month.
As I get older, it's going to be nice to just go up the road and get the OM I need from the compost bin my friend is making for me.
Smiles,
Lyn
