Up till now I've digging over every year prior to planting veg plants.

However I've been advised that this upsets the natural layers of the soil and a more beneficial course of action would be to spread compost, perhaps with some manure added, over the surface late in the year and let the worms take compost down in to the soil during the winter. Shortly before planting veg, spike the soil with a fork to get air down into the depth.


Has anyone got an opinion on this?

On Mon, 21 Mar 2011 16:27:01 +0000, Vegegrower
wrote:


Up till now I've digging over every year prior to planting veg plants.

However I've been advised that this upsets the natural layers of the
soil and a more beneficial course of action would be to spread compost,
perhaps with some manure added, over the surface late in the year and
let the worms take compost down in to the soil during the winter.
Shortly before planting veg, spike the soil with a fork to get air down
into the depth.


Has anyone got an opinion on this?

I see everybody's a bit backward in coming forward, so I'll be the
fool who rushes in where angels fear to tread. If your soil is
reasonably good, you could try it on half the plot for three years and
see. You need a hell of a lot of compost, and I didn't have brilliant
success on a heavy clay, so I reverted to the annual forking over.
Once a no-digging plot is established, it should really aerate itself,
as the worms and things are supposed to keep the soil open. Arrange
the plot in narrow strips so you never, ever, have to walk on it: you
don't need raised beds, mind, just ones you can reach into easily.

--
Mike.

"Mike Lyle" wrote ...

Vegegrower wrote:


Up till now I've digging over every year prior to planting veg plants.

However I've been advised that this upsets the natural layers of the
soil and a more beneficial course of action would be to spread compost,
perhaps with some manure added, over the surface late in the year and
let the worms take compost down in to the soil during the winter.
Shortly before planting veg, spike the soil with a fork to get air down
into the depth.


Has anyone got an opinion on this?

I see everybody's a bit backward in coming forward, so I'll be the
fool who rushes in where angels fear to tread. If your soil is
reasonably good, you could try it on half the plot for three years and
see. You need a hell of a lot of compost, and I didn't have brilliant
success on a heavy clay, so I reverted to the annual forking over.
Once a no-digging plot is established, it should really aerate itself,
as the worms and things are supposed to keep the soil open. Arrange
the plot in narrow strips so you never, ever, have to walk on it: you
don't need raised beds, mind, just ones you can reach into easily.

...............................................

I also think it depends on your soil type. Last spring I was unable to dig
our potato plot (rain and operation) and just spread manure over it and
planted the spuds through that. Over the season the soil compacted into
concrete and when I did dig up the spuds I can't say I noticed any increase
in worms, slugs damage yes but worms no, and it was hard work.
This year, with this wonderful spring, I've now got all available soil dug
and the manure well rotovated in this year's potato bed so you can see where
my thoughts lie.
Can image if you grow on sandy loam then a no dig approach might be
beneficial but on clay you will get solid concrete which will not drain etc.
--
Regards
Bob Hobden
W.of London. UK

In article ,
"Bob Hobden" wrote:

"Mike Lyle" wrote ...

Vegegrower wrote:


Up till now I've digging over every year prior to planting veg plants.

However I've been advised that this upsets the natural layers of the
soil and a more beneficial course of action would be to spread compost,
perhaps with some manure added, over the surface late in the year and
let the worms take compost down in to the soil during the winter.
Shortly before planting veg, spike the soil with a fork to get air down
into the depth.


Has anyone got an opinion on this?

I see everybody's a bit backward in coming forward, so I'll be the
fool who rushes in where angels fear to tread. If your soil is
reasonably good, you could try it on half the plot for three years and
see. You need a hell of a lot of compost, and I didn't have brilliant
success on a heavy clay, so I reverted to the annual forking over.
Once a no-digging plot is established, it should really aerate itself,
as the worms and things are supposed to keep the soil open. Arrange
the plot in narrow strips so you never, ever, have to walk on it: you
don't need raised beds, mind, just ones you can reach into easily.

..............................................

I also think it depends on your soil type. Last spring I was unable to dig
our potato plot (rain and operation) and just spread manure over it and
planted the spuds through that. Over the season the soil compacted into
concrete and when I did dig up the spuds I can't say I noticed any increase
in worms, slugs damage yes but worms no, and it was hard work.
This year, with this wonderful spring, I've now got all available soil dug
and the manure well rotovated in this year's potato bed so you can see where
my thoughts lie.
Can image if you grow on sandy loam then a no dig approach might be
beneficial but on clay you will get solid concrete which will not drain etc.

Sorry to respond so late, but, in clay soil, it may be worth while, in
the first year, to dig in organic material, and sand, into the soil.
Good garden soil is 30% - 40% sand, 30% - 40% silt, 30% - 20% clay. If
you can take a cylindrical sample of you soil, down 12 in. - 18 in., and
shake with water in a glass jar, then the 1st material to settle out
will be the sand, then the silt, and then the clay. In a cylindrical
jar, the depth of a layer divided by the total depth of the sediment
will give its approximate percentage of the soil. Adjust accordingly.

I have clay soil, I've added sand (5%), and organic material (5%). I use
buckwheat, and rye as cover crops.

N: 18.37 lb. chicken manure/ 100 sq.ft. (2.88 oz/sq.ft.)

P: 3 lb. rock phosphate/ 100/sq.ft. (.48 oz/sq.ft.)
The first year you may want to use bone meal as well.

K: How much wood ash should you use in your garden? The late Bernard
G. Wesenberg, a former Washington State University Extension
horticulturist, recommended using one gallon of ashes per square
yard on loam to clay-loam soil, and half as much on sandier soils.

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Thank Reaganomics/Thatcherism, a.k.a. Voodoo economics :O(
--
- Billy

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Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. This is not a way of life at all in any true sense. Under the clouds of war, it is humanity hanging on a cross of iron.
- Dwight D. Eisenhower, 16 April 1953