Potting, Digging and soil prep

Winter is a good time to work on getting your soil right. The old thought was to dig over any new border, or double dig if you are really old school.

The new ideas coming through are of 'no dig' where it is now thought it is better to not disturb the soil structure. When creating new border the advice is to cover the area in cardboard, which will break down and decompose and then cover this in compost. The card smothers the grass and any weeds and the lack of digging means soil stored seeds do not get the chance to come to the surface.

In my opinion they is a time and place for both. In creating my garden I have removed turf, rotavated and dug the soil, mainly to remove stones, brick and any other rubbish in the soil, then covering in compost and old horse manure. This has meant subsequent planting of trees, shrubs and bulbs has been easy and the soil is easy to work in.

I am trialling the no dig approach in my new cutting garden beds and at the moment I have areas covered in card, waiting for its compost covering. This will be great for seedlings as the can grow in the top layer of compost while the card decomposes. I am not sure yet how it would work for the initial growth of larger plants. I will keep you updated.