Good grief!

[Lyds]

I have worn myself out digging a new veg patch. It's only 12x2' but its as hard as rock. I dont think it has ever been dug before and I'm wondering why I bothered. The ground is as hard as hell and I bent a prong on my big fork... it's also full of stone.
The reason I chose this bit of garden is that it looks ideal for runner beans next year - sun on both sides. BUT the soil seems dead - even the hens cant be bothered to scratch around as there isn't a single bug to be seen. All I can do now is get rid of all the stone - oooh my back - and start shovelling compost.
We have been in this house 20 years and I've never touched this bit, the house was built in 1902 and I guess it hasn't been dug since then.

Any ideas folks? Is there an organic wonder treatment or do I do it the hard way?

[Wombat]

G'Day Lyds,

Is the ground hard clay? If it is, applications of calcium carbonate (ag lime) or dolomite, or gypsum well watered in will help to start it breaking up. In any case perhaps start shallow, with shallow rooted veggies and incorporate lots and lots of organic matter and mulch heavily. That will attract worms and other soil life back into the area.

If you are going to grow beans in the area and, as you say, it has not been cultivated before, there may not be any rhyzobium bacteria in the soil and the beans won't thrive. So it is best to "seed" the area once dug up with some soil from other parts of your garden where then beans currently grow well. That will help these bacteria establish in the area. They invade the roots of the beans and form nodules where atmoshpheric nitrogen is "fixed" so it becomes available to the beans and subsequent vegetables.

Nev

[Millymollymandy]

Good to have a chemist on board!!

You didn't say if your soil is dry or wet, if it is dry that would account for no bugs or worms being around.

We dug a similar patch to yours in June for our pumpkins as there wasn't room in the veggie patch. It was bone dry dust with lumps of granite down about a foot and a half. No sign of any life. We just added shop bought compost and some fertiliser and the pumpkins are going great guns, although I have to give them two 11 litre watering cans between the 5 of them per day.

I'll be getting some proper compost in there next year but we didn't have any this spring.

So go for it! It can only get better.

[Lyds]

Thanks you guys!

We have no clay here, the south Devon coast is built on limestone. We have mostly red soil, lots of stone and being on a hill (all of Devon is on a hill) the ground drains well. In fact, being on a hill my front garden is being washed away each winter. The cultivated bits of my back garden have neutral soil ph 7.0 but i havn't been to the gdn center to buy a soil kit to test the new bit yet. I did think of planting green manure this winter if I ever get rid of all the stone, poss white clover

[flowers-v-spuds]

Hi Lyds, my sympathies with the stones., and your back! My garden was urbanised by the previous owner, he had deliveries of stones and coal to cover the garden as he hated gardening and when we were digging last year to have a part lawn it was horrendous! It was a case of look for the soil bit under the plastic bags he had laid to stop the weeds, which it didn't :o(
Eventually though after hard graft we ended up with soil and a huge pile of stones which is now needing to be put 'somewhere' and sunburn

[Sue]

my back comes from the digging is not a good idea if it can be avoided school of medicine
how about abandoning the digging and making some raised beds - whack a bit of timber round it - salvaged from local builders etc - then fill it up - there are plants that would then help to "dig" it over for you - and the worms would stand a chance too

[alcina]

The only organic wonder treatment is compost or manure! Sorry I can offer my experience of my front garden a couple of years ago....it was also very dry and very stony (it's still stony!) and quite compacted. Not a single worm was in sight. I watered it liberally then covered the whole area with old cardboard boxes (Tescos does come in useful sometimes!), which I thoroughly wetted again. Then on top of that (whilst stil all wet), I poured on a *load* of horse manure..more damping down, and finally covered the manure in cocoa shells to make it look nice. And then left it, only wetting it all again if there was no rain. The horse manure came with loads of little red wiggly worms and they did all the hard work of breaking up the soil. I did have to remove a positive pasture load of grass that sprug up from the horse manure but that was all the work I did (not too back breaking!). I got very worried about some strange fungus that quickly took over about two weeks after I put it all down, but I was told that it's fine and it's a natural fungus that grows on manure. It all died down and was reintegrated with the soil.

I did all this towards the end of summer and just left it all Autumn and Winter and then planted it in the Spring. Very little effort. The following summer (last summer) the front garden sprang into life and produced massive swaithes of flowers (it's a Cottage Garden...well...that's what it's supposed to be, it's all rather more Wild Garden than it technically should be I think!). Loads of worm activity, loads of wildlife. Lots of crumbly soil.

I can't remember exactly what green manures are recommended for growing on compacted soil but I think that clover is one - the idea is that their roots also break up the soil. The more work the worms and roots do, the less you have to do!

Alcina

[Magpie]

Spuds are good at breaking up compacted soil too, and then you can eat 'em! I do pretty much the same as you, Alcina, with the cardboard, compost/manure/whatever, then put some spuds in it. As the cardboard breaks down, the little spuds work their way down, then expand as they grow.