My 2 cents on Elementary Agriculture...

A lot of new farmers are attracted by the ideas of Elementary Agriculture (from Giancarlo Cappello, in my opinion a good storyteller). I myself have been duped into buying his book. His method is presented as the universal solution to farm in a natural way. The soil is not worked and a thick layer of hay is simply layed on top of existing grass (or other vegetation). Later on, the veggies are simply seeded or transplanted by moving the hay apart and just making holes for them in the ground. No groundwork, no weeding, no fertilization, no irrigation. Nothing.

There may be conditions and cultures where this method works. I hear reports of people in mountain areas using it successfully and I myself had great results on garlic last year. But it is by no means a panacea, on the contrary, following it blindly can be in my opinion a recipe for disaster.

First of all, if there's one thing I learned is this: soil compaction must be tackled if present (which normally is the case in when starting from permanent pastures/meadows). Annual veggies need a deep flowable soil to be able to develop their roots fast over their short life cycle. A compacted soil is not easily penetrated by roots and is much less aerated so the aerobic soil life (which is a great part of soil life) runs in slow motion. On longer timescale the roots of existing grasses and other vegetation are going to slowly improve the soil, but (a) you wanna harvest veggies from year 1 and (b) the layer of mulch on the grass stunts its photosynthesis and its ability to regenerate the soil anyway...

Second of all, rhizomatous grass (couch grass, bermuda grass..the so call "dog tooth grasses") heavily affects harvests of vegetables and it's not stoppable with a layer of hay. A thick layer of hay will simply start rotting underneath and the grass is going to grow through it. "Dog tooth grass" represents a potential problem like all other grasses because of its very fast life-cycle making it necessary to constantly intervene if one wants to control it. But it is much worse because it spreads via its rhyzomes forming a network that colonizes the whole plot of land until a depth of 40 centimeters. Last year I simply tried to control it with a thick layer of hay and in some part also cardboards, but nonetheless it managed to colonize the soil under the mulch and I had part of my plot literally infested by it. To get rid of it is tricky, but this year I've tried to do it methodically:

• I focused my efforts on one part of the garden, rather than spreading my forces too thin on all of it and ending up losing the battle (like last year)
• I worked the ground everywhere, including under the paths, because I noticed dog tooth grass can spread by making its way around paths
• I tried to work the soil deep and extract as many roots as possible. Fragmentation of roots by working the soil is a factor of couchgrass propagation so I tried to be somehow gentle and work at depth so that I could pull out roots without breaking them too much
• I've done a thorough removal of couchgrass before planting. Afterwards, once it intermigles with the roots of the veggies, it's going to be impossible to remove it without mayor damage to the crops.
• I've noticed that in thre areas of the garden where I seeded a cover crop last fall (a mix of stuff, but mostly barley came out) the couchgrass has been almost completely displaced. I will plant cover crops on most of my plot this year after harvesting the veggies.

I expect to have to continue the eradication work of such grass next year. Let's see how fast it can spread back.

So my conclusion is: work hard and soon on getting rid of "dogtooth" grass and avoid adding hay with couchgrass which has gone to seed to your garden!

One final positive note on dogtooth: I've observed with my eyes how in its rhyzosphere big pieces of woodbark turn into powder (looking like dark organic compost) in less than one year. It's such a powerful soil regenerator! Pity that it's uncontrollable and it does that for its own purposes rather than for helping our vegetables...

Other grasses spread mostly from seed and seem much more friendly. The "tufty" ones normally have a bunch of roots that clings to the soil like crazy when you try to remove them on wet soil (DON'T do that!), but if you remove them when the soil is dry enough they come easily enough...and voilà.. the root is all localized in one single place. Easy removal with minimal perturbation of the soil. At the moment I'm trying NOT to remove them unless they are in a place where I want to plant, at the very moment I want to plant. If they are at 30cm from my crop why bother? If they are exactly where I plan to put my crop but one month before planting why bother? Let them in the soil because their roots are constantly working to improve it. They convert CO2 into sugars that they pump in the soil to feed microbial life! They can be cut multiple times to produce mulch that you can then use around your veggies!

Nowadays I'm leaving strips of grass alongside my garden beds with the purpose to mow them periodically.

In conclusion, I find it much more meaningful and suited to my frame of mind to get to know my grasses and to interact with them in a mutually satisfactory way, rather than covering everything up with hay and closing my eyes to experimentation...