Prompted by the discussion in
@Emp_Fab’s rotivator thread I’ve been wondering what the No Dig method would mean in practice. Who here practices it?
My flower and herbaceous borders are effectively No Dig. They get weeded, and mulched with compost. Ditto soft fruit, rhubarb and asparagus beds.
This afternoon I’ve lifted the roots of our winter brassicas, and forked through the soil ready to plant beetroot. This has given me plenty of time to think about how I’d manage this without digging. Presumably mulching and hoeing to keep the weeds down.
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Just mulch and off you go pretty much. You need to feed the soil, rather than plants - that means understanding the soil you have, the needs of the plants and the mulch you provide.
There is an excellent YouTube channel about it - Charles Dowding. Check some videos I don't practice it as I'm container only at the moment (although in practice it could work, it simply isn't worth me purchasing worms and other insects)
This year after all the digging last year we have far more of those tiny annual weeds but I'm confident that once our bigger plants get established in their new spots we'll have fewer weeds overall. The hostas have come back and I've a few blue and silver leaf grassy type things that are starting to do well now the weather has warmed up.
I planted bamboo last year (first time I've tried to grow it) and it's putting up lots of shoots too. It's a Fargesia species though so non-invasive.
The one thing we're really plagued with though is mare's tail. It seems impossible to kill, all you can really hope for is to limit the growth in any given year. Anyone know how to get rid of it?
Also for gardening.
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Most years I have approx 1/4 acre under cultivation (not this year, with health issues it'll have to take a back seat) so no way I could dig all that.
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I bought a tilling machine for £100, and did some beds with that, basically loosening up the top 10-12 inches, then planted up and covered with membrane and slate
For my lawn removal project, I couldn't be bothered digging/tilling, we just covered with membrane and slate, and planted through it
Guess which one has the biggest shrubs now? The lawn.
Charles Dowding a good fellow to look up on YouTube.
As is Paul Gautschi, but the mistake people make with his method is planting in the chipping instead of digging into the existing soil.
Not only has it thrived, but it has genuinely improved all the plants around it, and gone some minor way to softening the soil a bit, I suspect through lost foliage and petals and the roots breaking the tight structure slightly. Hardly ready for delicate flowers or vegetables, but it just goes to show what is possible with a bit of thought.
Now we mulch with leaves (actually, the wind does that for us as it gathers them up) and it seems to be doing fine.