Just 'Fork it!

7-24-2023

(Left) Suzanne Eggleston broadforks weedy soil. Photo by LeaAnn McMillen.

To encourage soil health, function and stability, consider putting the rototiller aside and instead picking up a broadfork. This simple gardening tool efficiently loosens soil without flipping it upside down like a rototiller would. As a result the bacteria, fungi and earthworms working below the surface are minimally disturbed, and soil structure is maintained.

In one short but effective video, Ray Archulet,  retired NRCS soil scientist and founder of Understanding Ag and the Soil Health Academy, places two samples of the same soil type into water. The first sample has been tilled for 30 years and one hasn’t been tilled in more than 40 years.

As the tilled soil rapidly breaks apart in the water, Archulet says, “The biotic glues and organic matter have burned up by tillage. The soil pores have collapsed.” He then turns to the no-till soil which does not dissolve in the water. “The pore spaces are still intact.”

The broadfork has been used successfully in several weed-choked, compacted beds at Swan Farm.  After vegetation was first cut down, a crew member would stand on the crossbar with his or her full body weight, sink the tines deep into the bed, and then loosen the soil by working the long handlebars back and forth in a kind of rowing motion. The broadfork is then moved back about a foot, and sunk back into the soil again, starting the process again.

Weed roots were then easy to remove with a rake. After composting, new crops were planted.

Broadforking may not be the solution for all gardening situations. But it many settings, it can help reduce soil erosion, maintain root channels to better facilitate water infiltration and storage, and retain organic matter in the top several inches of the soil.

As Archulet says in many of his presentations, “Farmers and ranchers, it’s our job to work with nature…your soils, ladies and gentlemen, are alive!”

Submitted by Suzanne Eggleston