We’ve been using buckwheat, but tried millet this summer and it’s growing faster, even.

Tilling twice in a row is very effective, maybe two weeks in between. Just when it’s looking strong growing back from the cut rhizome, till it again and seed the cover at the same time. Yeah, it’s damaging, but afterwards you can get to business and stop tilling.

We’ve been digging by hand and have moved to a regular digging fork instead of the grelinette, I recommend it. It’s just too hard to get that big fork in the ground and haul it around.

Also, you could hand weed around the trees when the couch is flowering, hopefully leaving the root with less life. Have you listened to John’s podcast with Klaas Martens? He talks about waiting to mow thistle until July, when it’s root is shrunken and there is air space around it. Mowing causes it to further shrink, and the conditions no longer favor it’s symbionts, and the thistle dies. I think that’s what he said it’s been a minute. I wonder if you could apply the right biological drench to bother the quack/twitch/couch?