Soil health isn’t just for agricultural fields, our home gardens can see improvements while doing our part to benefit our natural resources! Understanding what covers work well with each crop is important so unwanted consequences don’t happen. My first year of using oats in my garden proved to not be wise, my tomatoes were not happy growing next to it and I had severe blight issues all year. My brassicas had never looked better growing with the oats though! Luckily, people have experimented with covers in gardens and information is available. I have also notices that my brassicas growing in thick cover crop stands are healthier, have more vigor, and don’t show signs of water stress compared to the plants growing surrounded by dead residues. Legumes are great with tomatoes, beans are fine with grasses, onions can handle cover crop mixes, and squash will outcompete anything you through at it! Ann Marie Hendry wrote an article named Overwintering Cover Crops for Crop Rotation found here https://www.growveg.com/guides/overwintering-cover-crops-for-crop-rotation/ that provides great information on veggie and cover crop rotations to provide benefits and reduce potential issues. There are other articles on the GrowVeg website that have excellent information on incorporating cover crops into your garden. I should have read this before my oats and tomato incident but luckily information is readily available now that we can learn from!
