Fill beds now ( oct ) with Mels Mix ???

I have 2 beds ready to be filled, have all ingredients, along with wire and weed guard.
I would love to have everything ready to go in spring at the earliest moment.
What would you do ?


Small bed below will be primarily for growing shallots

Fill 'em now, one less thing to do in the spring and gives you something to do now.

What I'm going to do is let a bunch of horse manure overwinter in most of my beds, to take the sting out of it, then plant in spring. Stuff sure as heck seems to grow fine in it now, still fresh, in the compost pile I have out back. But I'll try to be extra safe, as I wouldn't want to blow the season. Come spring, I'll till it into the soil and plant.

But those are my neighbor's beds he lets me use, their soil needs a lot of improvement, and I'm not in a position to change all his soil out for MM.

If I had Mel's mix all ready, I think I would plant some kale, over-wintering brussels sprouts, maybe that kind of broccoli (flowering broccoli?) that keeps on sending up shoots after you cut the main head, some spinach, and garlic in it, then put row cover on it to keep out the cabbage worms and keep the temps a bit warmer. That's what I'm doing with almost all of my space at home, which is either MM or slowly evolving toward it ingredient by ingredient.

Fill it now. Top off with compost in thy spring.

Jimmy,

One consideration is after you fill the beds you can staple black plastic over the top until ready for use in the spring. This is what I did last year on my table top SFG, but looking back I really don't know why, just sounded good at the moment.  

When my beds have been cleaned up and ready to sleep I have always placed plastic lattice over them.
That keeps out the wild life during winter.
Not sure if I could comfortably cover them with a plastic cover.
Bnoles, I just have a concern about no air getting to the beds, just a gut feeling..