This is a three strip trial
Which we started in
2014 it's now the 8th of September 2019
So this is the sixth year of doing this comparison could call it a trial could call it an experiment
but it's it's not a scientific experiment as such you know, it's
It's comparing things and the comparison is
The three strips are strip one here
this line of six beds going up from apple trees to
the compost bay so the last bed there is the runner beans and borlottis
and this strip
every
Autumn or winter. We put a fork in the ground and
Lever it to loosen the soil
Like say broad forking to just see what difference that makes to growth
compared to no dig
And these two strips strip one strip two have the same
amount of compost put on at the same time the same plants are planted at the same time in each of the
Strips what all of the three strips will see strip three in a minute
So it's just comparing
Saying you know, what effect does that forking if any have on growth?
Over the the first five years
The pattern is pretty consistently 5% less harvest where the beds have been forked
It's different differences according to each vegetable you sow. See there's six different vegetables growing at any one time
within each strip comparison
So, you know, there's a fair amount of variety to get an idea within, at the moment we got kale, chicory, leeks, cabbage, spinach and
Climbing beans and in the winter months its spinach lettuce
Potatoes when I say winter spring really broad beans
squash winter squash and winter salad
so there's double cropping going on here and
Consistently between winter and summer slightly higher yields, No dig for the same compost and
Then this is where it gets also interesting comparing compost
The two strip comparison here is stripped two has
Like strip one has green waste compost and mushroom compost purchased compost
We've put on about a half barrel load of each
well, actually no, more like a third of a barrel load of each on each bed of this one and
we put on the same amount of compost on this one, but the compost I use here on strip three is
Well rotted cow manure
so for seven years now this
Strip has had well rotted cow manure as its source of soil food
applied once a year in both cases usually in November/December where there's the gap between
Finishing these summer crop and planting the winter crop to follow
and
At the moment, it's quite often
I find it fascinating because you look at the strip three and the crops often look bigger than strip two
Like the cabbage quite noticeably bigger, I'd say the leeks a little bit
Chicories a little bit
but some of that is
offset by
How we seem to get more Well, we get more pest damage here
often slugs
not all the time, but that's just what I've observed so far and that means that, the weights I'm recording as
the total weight for
Harvest weight is trimmed when we're recording weight that you would want to eat or that I could sell even
Which is not the same as just say with case of a cabbage, you know
We don't weigh all the outer leaves that normally you don't eat so were just trimming it off until we get a nice
Heart or whatever it might be or trimming off the outer
leaves of the leek to get a nice leek
Obviously doing the same process for all of the different strips
But using that method we are finding often a bit more damage maybe
More leaf discards in strip 3, but I would I would say it's not a strong
Pattern but that's the main reason I think why the yields are slightly lower here than is strip to so over
Five and a half years so far I've doing this trial
The highest yield is strip two, the second highest is strip 3 both no dig. That's
fine and compost if you like and slightly more lumpy compost and
The lowest yield of 3 but not a huge margin is where we forked
So yeah
Yes ongoing interest really making these comparisons and if you want more details on my website
there are tables of all the harvests of each year so you can see
What each strip gave each year and within that what each vegetable gave each year
So it's lots to study there if this interests you. I want to get them analyzed actually by a statistician
I think that would be interesting too
so thanks for watching and if you want to see an
Earlier take on this trial. We made a video about it two years ago September
2017 and
You know, if you look at that would be interesting actually just to see how these crops looked in comparison. I would say this year
they're some of the best because we've had particularly favorable conditions and
Maybe I'm getting better at growing even
in my old age and
Yeah, I'm really pleased actually, it's all looking good