Growing a NO DIG Garden from START TO FINISH - Growth and Harvests Over 5 Months

In today's video, I'll be setting up and starting a no dig garden and following along the process for several months, growing in it from start to finish, including all of the harvests we get from this garden in 5 months. In this no-dig, or no till garden, I'm growing with the 3 sisters method of interplanting corn, with beans, squash and pumpkins. This is a companion planting technique practiced by indigenous people of North America, and it's a great combination of plants to grow over the Summer. It's an excellent way to maximize space in the garden, and you can easily grow a lot of food. I've been using no dig garden methods for awhile now and have found it to be an easy way to garden with minimal effort and input, whilst having a fantastic output of vegetables that seem to thrive in this method, and build soil whilst doing so. Such a great way to garden to protect soil life.
You can layer a whole lot of organic materials like I did, which is also called a lasagna garden (as it's a whole lot of layers), or another easy method which I've also had great growing success with, is to lay cardboard onto the grass and then put a thick layer of compost over top of this, and plant directly into it. This is the no dig method that Charles Dowding also uses and advocates for and I'm definitely a huge fan of it after seeing the results first hand.

Varieties that I grew:
Sweetcorn, Long Island Cheese pumpkin, Butternut Squash, Grey Pumpkin, Small sugar pumpkin, Scarlet runner beans, Peans, Bottle gourds, Sunflower

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The Kiwi Grower is a channel featuring all sorts of unusual and exotic fruiting plants with tips of how to successfully grow them. I'm interested in all things gardening and love growing edible plants.
I live on a 2 acre piece of land in New Zealand where we are turning a grass paddock into and abundant, edible paradise! So come along on this journey with me as I experiment with growing, and try to push the limits of what I can grow in my area. I'll share with you my successes and failures so hopefully you'll learn from them and have a go yourself! Come learn with me and Subscribe!

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[TheKiwiGrower]

Thanks heaps for watching todays video and feel free to share it with a friend who might also enjoy 😁

[TimUckun]

I appreciate the effort it takes to record footage over the months and then edit them together to present a story at the end. Thanks for doing all of that us. You are a great story teller.

[antmanthegnome]

One day when I own a house with a proper yard, this is exactly what I want to do.

[gnomobarbudo]

This is one of the most useful and interesting farming videos I've seen.

[nicolasbertin]

I've been doing no dig in my urban shared garden for 3 years now, and I learned a lot. There's a lot of mistakes people make with no dig. The first mistake is usually to NEVER dig. It works in sandy and loamy soil : you put organic matter on, and it works. But with clay soil, no. You still have to dig it once in a while, coz it compacts itself with winter rains. Or the way that I do it now, is a powerful cover crop of rye, vech, winter peas and fava beans.
The second mistake is the type of organic matter. But that's not limited to no dig : people in America especially often put too much nitrogen rich matter and fertilizers. You don't need all those bone meals and fish meals and blood meals... One carbon based mulch is essential, like straw or wood chips, and you pair it with a nice nitrogen rich mulch, like compost, grass clippings, manure, or in my case spent barley from a local brewery (amazing product). But if you put too much nitrogen, you won't feed worms and mushroom enough, who love carbon, and you'll end up recompacting your soil if it's clay, or at the very least be invaded by nitrogen hungry weeds like quack grass or bindweed. But beyond that, no dig is easy, and SHOULD be the gardening and farming of the future. Whether it's cover crops or permanent mulch, it just works... Roots in the ground, worms, and some form of mulch, you won't need to dig anymore. And it's much more productive once all the soil life is booming. Your plants are less sick, your veggies taste better, and you don't have to break your back working the soil.

[megamanmadrid]

OMG I can't believe this, I am romanian and as a kid I always went to my family's corn plantation and it always had squash and beans growing along side each other. To see this growing technique on the other side of the planet is just mind blowing 🤯🤯🤯

[sidleeah]

Greetings from Texas. I'm retired and mostly confined to an apartment after a life filled with gardening, farming and working in horticulture.
I watch a lot of great TV, including your videos. Thank you for them. You do a great job on all fronts. They're interesting, informative, and beautifully shot. The things you choose to grow are compelling, from unusual fruits to indigenous American companions, all grown very well. And as the presenter you are well spoken, personable, and easy on the eyes.

I was in New Zealand once, stuck overnight on the plane with a brief visit into the airport 🤪. How nice it is now to visit your beautiful place and thrill to the pleasures of plants once more.
Thank you so much, sir!

Sid

[ahabthecrab]

The stripy butternut looks to be a cross with a calabaza pumpkin and a butternut. These two types of squash can easily cross pollinate since they are very closely related.

[Neuralatrophy]

But, even though you didn't get a massive harvest from the beans, you actually did get a massive harvest BECAUSE of the beans... The nitrogen fixing from the legumes may have directly affected the health and size of your other plants, the squash in particular and you got enough back to plant beans in again next round. Would be awesome if industrial farming picked up this kind of tactic rather than fertilizing the crap out of everything.

[thelaudd]

never really had an interest in gardening/growing things but saw a video on my recommended by you and ive gotta say everything ive seen so far is extremely informational and easy to understand for someone not very knowledgeable about this art. loving the high quality videos, keep up the phenomenal work!

[michaelyciano]

He is soooo attractive with all his farmer knowledge.

[TobyJin]

Definitely will give this a go myself when spring hits, you managed to get so much out of a patch of land with not that much effort. Hoping this technique of growing things will also help recover the health of the soil as well.

[dominicanwar]

I think your show is great btw. Re. 3 sisters (squash, corn, beans). I tried it here in Malta (North African climate). Just like you, I noticed that the beans didn't do well but the squash and corn did OK. I think I know what is going on! Despite the 'hype' my experience is that beans need as much N as anything else to grow here. HOWEVER, once they have grown and start to die back, the N is released (from the root nodules) to the soil. I did an experiment this spring planting tomatoes next to peas but towards the end of the pea season (March / April here).
Sure enough, the tomatoes have gone crazy as the peas die back (it is also very useful that the tomatoes cling and climb to the pea stalks, so removing any additional need to support them).
I suspect that the 'finer details' of the very ancient 3 sisters method have been lost over time and the key to making it work is to grow the beans 1st. Then plant the corn approx. 1 Month before the beans will die back. As the corn grows (and needs more N), you can tie the bean vine to the corn of course, thus freeing up the understory to plant squash. Then, as the beans die and release mineralized N to the soil, both the squash and the corn benefit with the double whamy that the ground cover reduces evaporation so requires less water. Tah dah!
i.e. the missing part that makes the 3 sisters work is timing.

Also, (because you clearly enjoy the unusual) may I reccomend (if you haven't already) that you try to grow 'yard long' or 'Asparagus' beans (USA) or 'snake beans' (Asia)? I have found that they will grow in our 30+ C summer heat when most other beans fail and they are amazing in stir fry dishes (obvs. not a good choice for 3 sisters). You may be very surprised at the taste.
Keep the videos comming (so sad that I cannot grow feijoa here (3 attempts at both seeds and saplings all failed) I am very envious).

[dallastehuna]

Bro your video quality is 10/10. If only you had the time to pump out a video every week haha.

[TheGreenBean]

Great video! I switched over to no dig also and it has been a real game changer! I pulled 18 pumpkins this year. Everything seemed to grow better with no dig.

[Marcus_Postma]

About a year ago I got a bit of a surprise to find a pumpkin patch growing in my back yard. Mind you I have various plants that grow wild there (mostly along my fence lines), including grapes, various peppers, black berries and a couple vegetables I don't recognize. I also have cherry trees in my front yard, and pine trees in both the front and back yards. Turns out my neighbor was disappointed because he thought he didn't grow any of the pumpkins he planted, when in reality they just all grew in my yard. But we can't see each others yards with all the vines and small trees along our fence, so he didn't know that until I mentioned there were pumpkins growing in my yard (12 of them). By the way I live in Lower Michigan, so the weather isn't the most predictable.

[iri]

Wowww!! Awesome Harvest indeed !! Thanks for sharing👌

[KhanCrete]

something that i've learned from growing up in the american midwest is that corn tends to draw up nitrogen from the soil without returning it, and beans tends to replace nitrogen in the soil. that's why we have a crop rotation in my area of corn one year, soybeans the next, and so on. i feel like that's another reason why the three sisters method is so great (aside from making great use of the land and providing some great, multi-use crops), it helps to manage the health of the soil more than any one crop would. loved the video

[Samandcolbygirls.]

Hey Brother, love your channel i live in Western Sydney penrith to be exact in a warm Temperate climate with winter morning 0 to 8 deg and 35 to 44 deg summers day i love your no bullshit approach to grow give your subscribers ever bit of information you can without the fluff dont change mate your doing a great job

[jamieevans]

I think this is my favorite video so far!