Green Manure is a valuable, natural fertiliser and soil conditioner and has an important part to play in organic gardening. It is a balanced mixture of silage grains which when sprinkled on your soil from spring to late summer very quickly grows into a lush dense green mass of young plants (takes only 3-6 weeks depending on the season). These plants when dug in will rot down quickly to add valuable nutrients and vegetable matter to your soil, both feeding it and improving its structure. Useful too if you practice rotation. Instead of leaving part of your ground fallow for a time, you can put it down to green manure to add nutrients and organic matter to tired soil.

Sow any time from late winter, as soon as the ground can be worked, to early autumn. First clear the ground of all weeds, dig it over and work the soil to a fine tilth with a rake. Scatter the Green Manure lightly over the surface at a rate of 51g per sq metre, (1½oz per sq. yard), and firm by patting lightly with the back of a spade. As well as an early spring or autumn sowing, it can be fitted in after most vegetable crops.

It can be dug in 4 weeks after sowing, although it is at its best if rotavated or dug in 8-10 weeks after sowing, before the first flowers start to form. At this stage the plants are sappy and rot down quickly. Green Manure adds valuable nitrogen and organic matter to the soil. Autumn sown green manure can be left over winter and dug in in early spring. Depending on how tough the growth is. Green Manure will need 1-4 weeks to rot down thoroughly before the land is used. Don't dig in too deeply, roughly 15cm (6in) on heavy soil and 30cm (12in) on light soil is quite adequate. This Green Manure contains no members of the Brassica family and can therefore be used in ground where there is a Clubroot problem.