When we first got our allotment, the neighbouring plot had the no dig bug. She insisted it was the way to go, so I have had one 16x5ft bed strictly for no dig over the past five seasons. The only crops that seem to benefit is lettuces, and other shallow rooted, quick maturing crops. They really do flourish, but they do everywhere else as well.
Long term crops, such as sprouts, leeks, parsnips etc etc always get off to a decent start, then slow down a fair bit in comparison with the other beds. To be honest, the no dig bed has probably had more organic matter added over the years than the dug beds, but still don't out perform them.
I have visited a garden charles dowding helped set up and mentor, and to be honest, although it's always nice to see veg growing, however it's being grown, it didn't strike me that anything was really growing super well.
Charles himself states on his site that the cropping differences between his dug and undug beds is negligible, so I always find it funny, when people who have been trying it out for a season or two, state the massive rise in crops they now get and the perfect way in which everything grows, as opposed to when they grew veg more traditionally.
Of course everyone has there own ways of doing things, I NEVER dig between November and march, real damage is always done to the soil during work at this time of year no matter how hard you try to be careful. Thick mulches of smashed up leaves, then well rotted farmyard manure is spread thickly over the soil during winter, thus protecting the soil surface from winter erosion. It's then turned roughly in, about early march time, so that all these ingredients are where the roots can get at them over a whole season.
This rough turning of the soil also opens the ground up so the birds can get at any unwanted soil Bourne pests.
I now earn my living by growing top quality veg for a busy hotel, and there is no way I could consider No Dig to do it. In the past five years, my experience is that well prepared soil, treated specifically for the crop that is to follow, will outperform any other methods I have had experience with. I'm not saying all this to put anyone off doing things one way or another, just to put a realistic spin, on a usually unrealistic thread....
Totty
Your experiences are really interesting Totty, thank you for sharing.If you grow for a hotel then you must have to really focus on quality of produce. I know what it is like when selecting stuff to take to market - has to look just right.
With all else the same, I, for one, certainly have never been under the impression that no-dig methods alone would out perform digging methods in terms of food yields. As you know there is so much more to growing food than just how the soil is cultivated - timing, light, heat, moisture, variety, etc etc.
I agree we all should work out our own way of doing things. And this thread shows how everyones experiences can be vastly different. You and I both have to produce top quality veg, we both have been doing it for a good few years, and have experimented with different methods, and we both have come to different conclusions as to the best methods to use. Its all the other variables that have caused us to come to these different conclusions.
I am guessing that we are in very different situations. My food growing area, all in all, is about half an acre. Its just not practical to dig it over by hand. I can give my plants lots of space, the whole plot gets loads of sunlight, and we live on a marsh so the water table is not far away but we never flood because of the surrounding drainage ditches. The sea is just a mile away which tempers extremes of temperature, and there are many sources of organic matter available to me all year round.
I feel very lucky.
Over the last 11 years I have come to a good balance in the garden between environmental impact, financial impact, physical impact, time use and yields. The methods I use are developing all the time, and are a compromise between all these things.
I think it is great that no-dig has become more popular. It gives an alternative method to use for those who don't get on with, or like the sound of the conventional way of growing crops by hand. It is also currently considered organic best practice.So better for life on the planet in the long run.(It is recommended by Dr. Anton Rosenfeld, an agronomist and researcher for GO, that organic matter is only incorporated into the top 3-5 centimetres of the soil.Its not the roots of the plants that consume the organic matter, its the aerobic life in the soil.) This isn't to say that this will produce the highest yields, just that it will release the least carbon into the atmosphere.
Having said all this I think growing food is a great thing to do whatever methods used.
Nick