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Had a chat with my grandpa about his old farm and it's stuck with me
He said back in the 1950s they just rotated crops and let the soil rest, no chemicals or anything, and the yields were better than what he sees now from all this modern farming stuff... has anyone else talked to older folks who had simpler methods that worked just as well?
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logan6581mo ago
My grandpa said the same thing, just let the ground rest and it'll take care of itself.
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leo_black761mo ago
Yeah my old man used to say basically the same thing. Let the ground rest and it'll come back. I tried that one year when I was dealing with a patch of dirt that just wasn't growing anything. I left it alone for a whole season, no planting, no tilling, nothing. Just let the weeds do their thing and then mowed em down in the fall. Next spring that spot was way healthier than before. The soil was darker and softer and stuff actually grew. So I think there's something to that old school way of thinking. Sometimes you just gotta stop trying so hard and let nature do its job lol.
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nguyen.blake1mo ago
Actually what gets me is that nobody's mentioned the wild yeast angle. So my grandpa also had this old farm and he'd always talk about how the soil just smelled different after a good resting period. Like earthy and alive. I think the chemicals and stuff kill off all the natural microbes and fungi that plants actually need to pull nutrients. When you let the ground rest those little guys come back and do the work for you. My uncle experimented with this on a small patch of his garden. He stopped using fertilizer and just let the soil breathe for a season and the next year his tomatoes had this flavor you just can't buy in stores. It's like we forgot that soil is a living thing not just dirt to shove seeds into.
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