By "pulling them out" I hope you mean till them under. Legumes are net consumers of N from the soil unless the plants are tilled under and allowed to decompose.

If you remove the plants you remove all the N. Also if you did not add inoculant to seed, you won't get much N.

[–] robocall 5 points 11 months ago

I'll have to check with my community garden members. Thanks!

[–] cheeseblintzes 2 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Thats a good idea!

I planted a winter garden and promptly forgot about it... all while still having the last of my summer plants still producing.

They're ALL sitting in my raised beds as corpses at the moment-- I'll pull them come time for the early radish/lettuce plantings.

Have you done the favas for nitrogen before or is this new for you this season?

[–] robocall 3 points 11 months ago (1 children)

I'm in a community garden where I've watched other people grow favas - for nitrogen and also for beans. But this is my first year doing it for myself. I'll add compost to the soil in the spring too. It's easy but also exciting. One of the gardeners in the community had snails eat all their sprouts but I got lucky with a different variety.

[–] cheeseblintzes 2 points 11 months ago

Thats awesome!! I'd love to see updates going forward