Machine Tillers/Disrupting Soil/ETC!

I just read about a tiller that You Grow Girl was asked to review (read: review=free tiller). Must be nice to get things like tillers delivered to your door. She works hard for it, and has made herself a brand name, so good for her! How do I get this blog to take off like that?!

Anyway, there seems to be quite a bit of opinion concerning tillers, digging into the soil as opposed to amending it, etc. I guess I hadn't realized this was such an area of contention.

So far in my veggie garden career, I have used a tiller I borrowed from a neighbor in my garden (thanks, Kim!) in the spring and fall for the past two years. Without doing any scientific studies, I can tell you right now my soil is not the best.

*SIGH* I also added sand to my garden thinking that would be a good soil amendment, but that just makes concrete. This incredible garden maneuver should reveal to you how much I know and how I tend to learn.

Does the tiller have anything to do with my poor soil? I don't know. But I do really like this tool if you are going for the old-fashioned method:

So, soil is my new focus. This my new area of growth as a gardener. And from all of my research, it would appear that now is the time to build it for spring. Will I till? Not this year. I would like to get my soil tested though. Put that on my to-do list!