Tuesday 13 April 2021
After my last harvest of the season, I find there is nothing more satisfying than pressing reset. I do this by digging over my vegetable plot to prepare the soil for the year ahead. I feel good about myself for incorporating nutritious compost and enjoying the workout. I then leave the frost to help break down the clods into a beautiful crumb; my vegetables will thank me for this with abundant yields in the year ahead. The time and effort will be totally worth it, or at least, that is what I used to think.
Of course, I had heard of no-dig gardening, championed by Bob Flowerdew on Gardener’s Question Time (along with the importance of regularly urinating on the compost heap), but I needed more convincing. What ever happened to digging for victory? My heavy clay soil needs aeration doesn’t it? I know many organic gardeners who swear by an annual digging routine and produce fantastic results, but there is more and more research these days that unearths the im