Dig? No-Dig?

[veggiechicken]

I don't dig either - just to remove deep rooted weeds or harvest. Here's an interesting link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q1OShZZUt0k

[Two_Sheds]

It's been a bit better since i started leaving everything to compost where it fell before the winter... I chop down the comfrey and nettels ... to lay on top of the beds

Yes, it's good isn't it?
ftp://ftp-fc.sc.egov.usda.gov/ID/tec...revolution.pdf

do you place a layer of straw on top of the home made compost? Is any old straw ok to use?

I grow my own "straw" ... I leave plants to stand over winter (I don't pull them up and compost them), then in spring I chop them up with secateurs, and leave the choppings on the soil. All plants, veggies & flowers

If you are thinking of covering your soil with one or two inches of mulch, forget it

No, I disagree. Some of my mulches are only millimetres deep: it's better than nothing

I have always found the obtaining of sufficient mulch the biggest problem

Do you include living mulches? I allow low flowers to self-seed around the veg plot, only pulling them up as I need the space. Then they are chopped & dropped
I do this with all 5 of my gardens

Make sure the straw doesn't have seeds in it!

Good point, but what you had wasn't straw, it was hay. Straw is just the stalks of a plant, without the seed heads

I'm not doing compost in heaps, but on the beds themselves.

Chop & drop, that's the way to go. So much easier, so much more effective. I've noticed a huge improvement in my soil just in the last 12 months of "one straw" (read Fukuoka’s book One Straw Revolution, also Sepp Holzer)

[Newton]

Wow.....hay v Straw......I didn't know that about the stalks......cheers TS!