[Gleavo]

Anyone else subscribe to this?

Shallow cultivation- is it common?

Basically no constant digging/turning once you have established a bed. Top-soil cultivating only. Rotation and hoeing and adding lime/manure etc as needed/predicted.

Bloke next to my plot is an advocate and his beds look good and produce fine crops.

Anybody use this system and able to explain/link to theory-related sites?

Eager to learn as it's making sense at the mo but I am such a green newbie. Although I've listened to him a bit in the last few days and it's seen me right.

I should add to this that the "Alan Tichmarch System" was how another plot holder described my neighbour's system - in no way derogatory. It was just not his way. He is an advocate of deep-soil turning of beds and digging in of nitrates etc.

One way vs another but with the shallow/deep cultivation theories I would like to learn more.

Thanks in advance
G

[fatcat1955]

I think this is called , The no dig system. Basically you add a mulch and let the worms pull it down into the soil. Main benefit i can see is that you do not expose weed seeds to the light which triggers germination by constant digging. I read somewhere that a lot of german garderners only dig at night by torchlight for this reason.

[DD.]

The weed seeds will still see the light of day in the morning, surely?

Can't figure the logic out behind that one!

[mumofstig]

I think the 'Alan Titchmarsh System' may just be what some of the old boys call the bed system of growing, as apposed to their system of leaving the plot path free and digging all the plot each year.

With beds the idea is that once you have deeply dug the bed and put in enough manure/soil conditioner, you do not have to dig the beds deeply annually because you don't ever walk on the soil, so it doesn't get compacted.
It isn't completely no-dig IMO just not the annual winter digging that others do.

As already said the top will still need forking over periodically to mix in any fertilizer/manures/ lime etc  that you add as you need them.
Some people edge their beds with wood and then call them  raised beds but you don't have to

[Dirt Diver]

Hi

With this system, would it mean "with raised beds" which I have a lot, you would not have to re-fill each year, last year I took 50% out and re-newed.(It was a lot of work)

[mumofstig]

Unless your raised bed is over concrete.........I don't understand why you are refilling/renewing your beds :blink:

Please will you tell us how you have made them Dirt Diver?

[simpson-allen]

Hi

With this system, would it mean "with raised beds" which I have a lot, you would not have to re-fill each year, last year I took 50% out and re-newed.(It was a lot of work)

Good question. Why should there be a need to replace the earth? Just because you've contained it within wooden boards doesn't change the nature of the soil. I mean the soil on an open plot doesn't migrate does it and you dont feel the need to skim six inches off the top every year and replace it do you? So my answer would be just top it up with some organic manure or similar. Same should apply to potted plants and shrubs you might say,except here the reason why you replace the soil every few years is because you dont rotate the crop, so its the same plant taking out the same nutrients year after year. Hence the need to renew the soil occasionally.

[fatcat1955]

No the weed seeds do not see the light in the morning because once you have dug you then spread a 4in mulch.

[Dirt Diver]

Unless your raised bed is over concrete.........I don't understand why you are refilling/renewing your beds :blink:

Please will you tell us how you have made them Dirt Diver?

Used wood 3 inch by 6 inch and made them 8 feet by 3 feet. Sorry have not gone metric.

They are very strong and should last a long time.   They are not over concrete just very flinty land.

This cottage is called Gravel Dell for a reason

[mumofstig]

if you can get the fork into the stony soil at all and mix it a bit with your compost you won't have to keep buying more.
If you can't really dig it over and need more depth then add bags of soil rather than compost as this will not need replacing either

[Trillium]

In the no dig system, the beds aren't raised ones, they're mounded ones so that with progressive years of adding manure, straw, etc, there's somewhere for a slight overspill, whereas raised beds don't really allow for such unless they're truly raised beds (eg 12", etc). For true raised beds (not merely edged beds) the soil isn't at the top anyway and doesn't need any replacing as you're continually adding manure, compost, etc to feed the soil.

There is some aeration of the 'no dig' beds but by fork only, or a large U Bar type fork specifically made for this job. It's simply to aerate, never to turn over. By constant turning over, you keep bringing up weed seeds to the surface to germinate. By simply keeping the beds/mounds continually and thickly mulched, weeds are minimal and waiting seeds never see the light of day (until someone comes along with a rotovator).

Older gardeners are so ingrained by the old ways of doing things that they can't see the no dig system as viable and will heavily criticize it. Just like people did when organic growing became popular - all the die hard chemical users insisted organic growers were wasting their time and land. It took a while but they're not saying that now  And the same will happen with no dig - have patience.

[NASH]

I dont dig and I dont have a raised bed system either

[Trillium]

Some people are blessed with nicer soil than others. When you've got useless clay, you need to do more.

[Zippy]

I am no-dig and the one thing I notice is my earthworms are much larger than the ones on my fellow annual rotovator's and digger's plots. Soil is more moisture retentive and not compacted as it is never walked on.

I have taken to mulching my paths with spent rabbit hutch woodchippings from next door neighbour and this eventually rots down to make nice compost which can be thrown onto the beds. The poo and hay go in the composters.

[Junie]

There is a good book on this subject - called  Organic Gardening - the Natural No Dig way. 
It explains how it all works, the fact that you don't need raised beds - in fact the wood ona raised bed can slightly raise the temperature of the soil and dry it out a little more ( I think as it was a long time ago that I read it) It touches on many other organic principles including planting with the moon.
I was trying to use this method, but my soil will require much work as it used to have trees and loads of couch grass. Also we get very heavy rain which compacts the soil , which is quite clayey but improving slowly.
The book is not very expensive on Amazon and is interesting reading if you are looking at this method.