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Tilling Your Garden
Preparing soil is easy with a rotary tiller or disc harrow
April showers may bring May flowers, but spring-time tilling will help improve plant performance all throughout the growing season. Tilling your flower or vegetable garden allows plant roots to grow healthy and strong. You can till your garden in no time using your tractor and a utility disc harrow or a rotary tiller.
An economical way to till is with a utility disc harrow. This easy-to-use tool works the garden by cutting the soil open with steel discs. As you pull the disc harrow across the garden, the concave shape of the disc blades mixes and turns the soil over.
For a thorough tilling of your garden, go with a rotary tiller. Rotary tillers use the power of your tractor and feature steel cutting blades attached to a revolving spindle. The blades are typically mounted in a spiral pattern. This pattern, combined with your tractor's PTO power, turns the rotary tiller into a blender for your soil. It efficiently breaks down clods and works in dead plant material, creating a suitable tilth for plant growth. Rotary tillers are better for breaking hard, compacted ground. They also provide a more uniform soil consistency.
When to till your garden
The best time to till your garden is in the early spring. Test your soil to see if it is ready: If a handful of soil forms a clump when squeezed, it is too wet to till. The soil is ready when it crumbles.
You can enrich the soil with nutrients when tilling. Spread an inch of composted material over the garden, wait a week or two, then till it in four to six inches deep.
Buying a garden tillage tool
When choosing a tillage tool for your garden, it is important to match your tractor with an appropriately sized tool. If you are going with a disc harrow, look for extra features such as being able to adjust the gang angle. On rotary tillers, check how easy it is to replace the cutting blades and what adjustments need to be made while working the soil.
Your local John Deere dealer can help you pick the right tillage tool for your garden and can show you how to adjust the tool to get the desired soil tilth you need.
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