This topic contains 25 replies, has 10 voices, and was last updated by Don Foley 8 years, 5 months ago.
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digWinstanley – it wasn’t all directed at you, just the part I wrote in reply to your comment that it would be difficult to maintain no dig and work full time, as I do both 🙂
Interesting to read about your name!
I do see your point but there is also the old saying that the shoemaker’s children go unshod!
So after gardening/other work all day for other people and then having the whole children/home/housework thing to do, quite often the last thing one feels like is gardening! I often feel more zonked out than zeroed in!
I haven’t a clue what it must be like to be able to manage land full time, I have so much different work to do.
I am puzzled why you think it takes more time when in my experience, at home/my allotment and also at work (the gardens I have created and run) it takes incredibly less time than digging. I am dealing with significantly fewer weeds than my allotment neighbours, for example. It took two of us one afternoon to do a big mulch of my allotment 6 or 7 years ago, that is a lot less time than it would have taken to dig it over and the cost was a one-off of around £120, then the subsequent £30 p.a. for the allotment and my gardens.
I watch the diggers on my allotment every year, it is a serious commitment to do all of that and then there are so many weeds to sort out… So I absolutely agree that dug allotments take a huge amount of commitment.
I think you (quite understandably) may misunderstand my situation, it is quite different from Charles in some respects (who incidentally has loads of different work, it isn’t all outside gardening) – I’m a single mum and have been raising three children on my own whilst working for the past decade, on a pretty low income, scarily low sometimes … so I totally understand how much £120 is to most people these days – however I certainly recouped that in savings to my domestic budget feeding these three children with hollow legs during that year and beyond! And the amount of time it saves is incredible.
When I converted the allotment I had been working as a gardener for little more than 6 months, so was not experienced by any means. Before that I was making and selling arts and crafts, my qualifications are in English literature and education, not garden-related at all although I’d always enjoyed it as a hobby.
When I talk with other working parents, they are thrilled by how much time no dig saves and how their domestic budget benefits.
My closest friends have two young children, and a 2/3 acre plot in which their house sits. They both have jobs. They are pretty much self sufficient in vegetables including potatoes and onions. They did say they usually buy seedlings in rather than grow from seeds, except for things like carrots where you have to plant seed, as they do not have the time to faff around looking after delicate seedlings.
I grow vegetables in my modest garden and have been self sufficient in most apart from rice and potatoes, for many months now, with minimal effort. If you only have to walk into your garden, you can spend half an hour pottering about and achieve a lot. I was busiest in March and April. To be fair I did have to do a lot of work to prepare the beds (serious digging to remove perennials and fill two disused septic tanks with flints, then completely re-landscape the lawn. But if you care about it looking smart, I’m sure you can just pile on compost, and wait for it to sink in. But once that was all done, there was not much to do. Spreading compost takes one weekend. Planting seeds takes a few hours. They need a bit of watering till they sprout. Raising module plants does take a bit more effort. It’s also working out cheaper than shop bought veg, which surprised me, and the quality is far superior.
I think the problem with an allotment is that you have to drive/walk to the place, and back, which takes maybe an hour of your time, along with transporting stuff, or locking it away in a shed, then clearing weeds cos many are endemic on allotments as are pests. I grew carrots last year without nets and got no carrot fly. And you might have to do huge amounts of work to prepare it for use. and you perhaps can’t leave out anything expensive cos it might get nicked.
DigWinstanley
We are back to the original differences of opinion on this. I really can’t understand how the second statement is logical after the first.
Yes, no dig is a much more sympathetic and easier method of growing produce. It is less intensive and in the long run requires less input of time and money, and the results are fantastic.
not everyone has the time and resources to even contemplate switching
If we are dealing with like for like, say a weed free plot in good order, then it is no more resource/cost intensive to put minimal amounts of compost on the surface rather than digging it in. Charles prefers to use more than the minimum so that he can double crop but he and others in this thread and the ‘Cost of no-dig’ thread have discussed success with minimum inputs of compost/muck/resources. As for time, not digging takes no time at all while digging, particularly if turning in the compost placed on the surface, is time consuming.
If we assume a very weedy plot then digging is one way to get it up to a weed free standard, but this is often very time consuming and hard work, and often not successful as it is difficult to remove all weed roots. There are no-dig alternatives and they can be immediate and expensive (15cm or more of compost), almost immediate and less expensive using mypex/plastic mulch and planting through holes, or cheap/free using cardboard as a mulch which, at this time of year, will get rid of annuals and weaken perennials. Charles has examples of these three methods at Homeacres but it the immediate and expensive method that people latch on to, ignoring the other cheaper/free possibilities.
Now is a good time to transfer to no-dig as there are several months before the main planting season, a good time for covering the weeds using the method most appropriate to one’s financial situation.
My main point is that moving to no-dig can be expensive but it NEED NOT BE and the general consensus is that no-dig is time saving . I know that Steph converted her plot to no-dig as a total unit, but Charles at Homeacres has developed extra areas over several years. Plots can be converted gradually.
I think that saying that no-dig is ‘very very expensive’ or that ‘not everyone has the time and resources to even contemplate switching’ is misleading and such perpetuated myths do no-dig no favours.
I have read what you posted of course as I have been responding to some of your points, in particular that no dig is expensive and time consuming, and that far from being zeroed into managing land full time, my life is as full of other commitments as those whom you rightly suggest don’t have much time, DigW.
You said:
However most people do it in addition to a seperate full time job, bringing up children, etc.
whereas I do all of that too and I am on a low income.
As John says above, your posts seem to be perpetuating the myth that no dig is time consuming and expensive, where as the contrary is actually true in my experience.
Hi All,
Reading this thread makes me realise how lucky I/we are here in Ireland.
I get Horse Manure for free – as much as I want of it, and the Stables are only to happy for me to take it away.
Of course I then store it for a least 12 months just to be sure it is well decomposed.
Ok you have to get a suitable trailer and do all the transporting yourself but its free.
I would have thought the same would be true of the UK?Don.
Don. Apparently it is true here, but you need a means to transport the poop. I have a modest hatchback, though I could get a good amount of bags inside the rear. Friends bought 4 or more builders bags of poop from a local farmer for a song, £30 perhaps, but it had some chloropyralids or similar weedkiller in, which damaged some plants, despite having been left for a year to rot down. I think if you leave it for two years it is okay.
Hi Leif
The weedkiller contamination is the reason I go for Horse Manure.
I collect from racing stables so I know that where the Horses graze and what they are fed etc is very strictly controlled.
I still leave it for a minimum of 12 months though before using it on the veg beds in particular and I have never had a problem, thankfully.Don.
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