Double Digging Bed 1
This weekend I finished preparing the first garden bed. The chooks have been on it for a couple of weeks and they’ve cleared off the weeds, seeds and bugs. The approach I’m using to cultivate is known as ‘double-digging’, as used by the French Bio-intensive gardners and as described in the book How To Grow More Vegetables.
Essentially you dig out a narrow trench at one end of the bed, about 300mm wide. This soil goes in the wheelbarrow, and the soil at the bottom of the trench is loosened with a garden fork. Another trench is then dug and the soil goes in the first trench, and so on until you reach the end of the garden bed.
Here’s a picture half-way through digging the bed:
The result of double-digging is loose, friable soil to a depth of about two spades. This is great for my garden because I’m starting with solid clay, but if your soil is already in good condition there’s not much point double-digging. In this case ‘no dig’ techniques are better because there’s less disruption to the soil structure and worms, etc. I’m hoping a program of double-digging and adding lots of organic matter will increase the quality of my garden beds so that in a few years time they won’t need digging at all.
Finished digging:
The bed has been mulched with approx 50mm of barley straw and a thin layer of manure/mulch compost. The first crop of Tender Green beans, W.F. Massey peas and broad-beans have been planted and I’ll plant another 2 crops of each over the next month.