The Complete Guide to No-Dig Gardening: Grow beautiful vegetables, herbs, and flowers - the easy way! Layer Your Way to Healthy Soil-Eliminate tilling ... garden naturally-Reduce weeding and watering

What an excellent book! Attractive, informative, and quite persuasive. The “no-dig” idea has been around for a while, and not just among Ruth Stout’s followers. As Charlie shows, master gardeners in Japan, Australia, and England have contributed to a decades-old body of research and practice. There is no doubt that no-till methods work (they “build soil,” as Robert Frost put it). They take less work, too, once you have assembled what Charlie calls his lasagna of layered organic materials (the cover illustration goes overboard – Charlie’s own recipe on p. 40 is a lot simpler). Straw-bale gardening (one of his no-dig techniques) was new to me and I’m going to try it this year. The techniques that would best suit you would depend on your situation, but there are certainly ways to garden without digging. There are other benefits, too, including improved weed control. We in Vermont know Charlie Nardozzi from his wonderful weekly radio show and we know we can trust his advice. This book is not only clear and well-illustrated, it’s entertaining, too. You will enjoy reading about hügelkultur (create a planting mound on a base of logs) as you have a little hygge by your fireside this winter.

As gardening is enjoying a renaissance, so soil is experiencing a revolution! No more should we till, toil and turn, rather leave and layer garden beds with organic elements that will break down and nourish the soil rather rather than disrupt existing microorganisms. Charlie Nardozzi's No-Dig Gardening guides you in user-friendly terms how to turn your backyard spaces into easily managed healthy gardens that are less work with greater yield using no-dig techniques. This is a book that gets you right to work with practices you can incorporate now to ensure healthy gardens for years to come. It also covers succession planting, composting, and cover crops, and discusses various techniques of no-dig gardening, including straw bail gardening, hugelkultur, and keyhole gardening. This is another wonderful resource from one of Vermont's own. Check out Charlie's website for information, webinars and seasonal update on all things gardening.

If you're looking to learn how to "no-dig" garden, look no further. This book is super informational, with tons of tips and tricks about the process. Well written, very clear and organized. And the added bonus is that it's also beautiful.

Have listened to Charlie's radio show for years and he continually gives the best advice on all things gardening. This book looks at home gardening from a different perspective and will make home gardening even easier for me.

Everything about this book is well written by Charlie whom I enjoy on WCAX TV. He explains things so well. Photos are perfect. Thank you.

Great book!! Well written with practical guidelines for immediate use.

Mostly common sense advice. Not a lot of new info. Probably good for new gardeners.

When I first started gardening, the only advice I was given was to pick a sunny spot in my yard and rent a rototiller. Yes, it worked and I had my first garden, but it was labor-intensive and really didn’t teach me anything about one of the most critical aspects to being successful, having healthy soil. Every spring for four years, I would rent that rototiller again and wonder why I had so many weeds and why my plants weren’t as healthy as I expected. Turns out, rototilling exposes many dormant weed seeds to the sun, and if I was trying to grow weeds, I would have taken first prize. Each year, I wanted a little less lawn and a little more garden, and I started researching raised beds, which, to me, were a game-changer.As you can tell from the title, this book is all about having a productive garden, and that starts with having great soil. The book is divided into eight chapters: The Benefits of No-Dig Gardening, Soil Considerations in the No-Dig Garden, Building a No-Dig Garden From Scratch, Converting an Existing Garden to No-Dig, Variations on the No-Dig Concept, Containers – The Original No-Dig Garden, and Bringing It Indoors. Every chapter was full of useful information, and the steps and necessary tools and ingredients are spelled out clearly.The best tips for me: using seaweed in the garden( nutrient-rich and available where I live), trying a straw bale garden, and making your own soil mix that will work in containers or grow bags. There wasn’t one thing in this book that wasn’t a great suggestion. An experienced garden or a newbie would gain a lot from reading this book. This is the perfect time of year( at least in New York)to plan for next year, and I think this would make a great holiday gift.I received a DRC from Quarto Publishing Group - Cool Spring Press through NetGalley.

Would have given this book a full 5 stars for all the reasons in the other 5 star reviews until I saw the recommendation about peat. Shocking blind spot and taints the rest of the book in my view. He recommends authors such as Charles Dowding who emphasise that the use of peat is irresponsible. I hope a second edition removes this.