Green Manure 'General Mix'

Green Manure “General Mix” is designed to provide a short term mix for use throughout the year. It can be used over winter to help prevent soil erosion and nutrient leaching. It is also a good choice for short-term green manuring.
Consisting of Forage Rye, Minerva Maple Peas and English Early Common Vetch. The plants have nitrogen fixing properties and provide a mix of bulky foliage that add organic matter.
It is a good all round green manure especially for those who are new to green manuring and are a little unsure which one to use.

Sowing Period: For use throughout the year.
Soil: Most soil types, including heavy soil
Growing Period: 2 to 6 months
Coverage: 3kg per acre - 50gm covers 17 square metres

Forage Rye (Secale cereal)
Forage Rye is one of the best manures for winter use, as it gives good crop cover to help prevent nutrient leaching. It is a hardy annual and is deep rooting, it copes well with heavier soils. When planted in the winter, it actually grows during any warmer days, when sunlight temporarily brings the plant to above freezing, even while there is still general snow cover. It is sometimes used in winter gardens and is a very common nurse crop.

Minerva Maple Peas (Pisum sativum arvensis)
The ‘Field Pea’ Minerva Maple is a valuable commodity. It is a purple flowered brown skinned pea that produces high yields and is regularly used in quality green forage and arable silage mixtures and is the preferred variety for feeding to pigeons. Its popularity has increased steadily over recent years due to its value to organic farmers as green manure or as a deep-rooting full-foliage legume. It has nitrogen fixing properties.

English Early Common Vetch (Vicia sativa)
Also known as ‘Tare’ or simply ‘the vetch’ it produces a lot of bulky foliage that improves the soils fertility as it fixes nitrogen and helps add organic matter, improving the texture of the soil and suppressing weeds.

Sowing: Sow at any time of year
Prepare the soil by removing weeds, digging over if it hasn't been recently cultivated and raking level.
Scatter seeds over the surface of the soil.
Make sure the seed is in firm contact with the soil by gently tapping over the surface with the back of a spade.
Water in well.

Bare patches should be covered within two to three weeks and plants will do the most good if they are left for around eight weeks before digging in.
If plants start to flower before this, cut off the tops and dig in. Leave the green manure to decompose in the soil for up to four weeks before growing vegetables.

Don’t forget !
Rotate green manures as you would any other crop. For example - Rotate Vicia, and Alfalfa, with Peas/Beans, Mustard and Fodder Radish with Brassicas
There's something about growing cover crops makes a person feel like a farmer. Just the sowing of a few handfuls of the green manure seed and digging in with the most basic of tools, a spade and old fashioned elbow grease!