white clover will be as bad a weed as any you currently have, especially if you let it flower! but even w/o flowering, chopped up clover plants root themselves and once established will go anyplace that suits them, tho some folks do use it as a 'living mulch'

the way I plant pumpkins is in raised rows of very rich soil, like a month or more before planting, make a shallow trench by pulling aside the existing soil, fill it with a mound of your horse manure and cover that mound w/ the soil pulled aside - keep well watered and you can grow some real giants

composting the manure properly [controlled hot pile] may lessen the weed transmission, but really the only way to eliminate the weeds from the manure is to not let the horses eat those plants!! or bury the manure deep enough to prevent the weeds seeing the light of day - and clover seeds will go thru the horses too

Bill

Thanks so much for all the info, after doing a bit more research, you are exactly right! I contacted the county extension office and they agree with the no till and not planting the clover, wow, now that I know what I know about clover, it may be good to plant it in the areas of the yard where I need some kind of grass but having a hard time getting the grass to grow. I do love clover. Around the pond, the soil is very rocky, lots of shale and not many nutrients. Last years drought did not do it much good either.
Anyways thanks so much for your advice.

Organic citrus growers in South Texas found that when they let the nutgrass grow wild, their profits went way up. Once they stopped worrying about it, stopped mowing it, stopped spraying it, they found the citrus crop never knew the nutgrass was there.

Why would citrus growers worry about nutgrasses in the first place? I don't understand that.

barbwatkins,
I like to use "Soil Builder mix" as a cover crop. See Peaceful Valley link below. Its a nitrogen fixer, weed suppressor and lots of organic matter.
Hope this helps

Eric

Here is a link that might be useful: Peaceful Valley

Why would citrus growers worry about nutgrasses in the first place? I don't understand that.

Because it is there and it is not the target crop. Farmers are always worried about weeds sucking all the moisture out of the soil.

This is the time to sow a clover spring cover crop. Farmers in Michigan (and no doubt elsewhere) call it "frost sowing". One technique is to chop it and incororate it into the top 2 inches of soil when it is still very young. No use as a nitrogen source, of course, which only happens with mature clover. Regards, Peter.