Topic: Can ground be harmed by digging when frosty?

[brownowl23]

Today I went down to the allotment to do some digging. OK we dont have snow down here yet but it did frost last night.
I met with another plot holder who was picking some veg. I told him i'd come to dig and he said to me that it would ruin the ground if I dug it right now.

Ive never heard of there being a time when ground could be harmed by digging has anyone else?

[Unwashed]

You know that does ring some bells with me, but I can't for the life of me think why.  It might have to do with destroying the structure, which I'm sure would be a problem on clay, or it might just be because you'll bury the frost and the ground will stay colder longer, but I don't think that makes any sense.

[picman]

As long as the soil is firm and not soggy ( turning to mud ) you should be OK don't be tempted to break the sods, dig at least one spade depth, nothing better than frost on dug ground. ( The wife dug our two plots in October ).

[goodlife]

Yes it can be harmed..normally nothing drastic, but the rule apply in gardening situation more than on open ground. By standing and digging the frosty ground you do break the soil structure..soil start corrode..break/pulverize..which means that weather effects become more noticeable..if dry it doesn't hold the organic particles and wind will blow them away..soil may become compacted,,drainage problems,,loss of good creatures in it etc..I know this sound like horror story and bit extreme but it can happen. Broken soil structure may start behave differently than before.
In gardening situations amongst plants..you not only damage fibrous root by digging but you also break them just by standing on the soil..roots become brittle when frozen.
The harm you do when working on frozen soil is done to the small particles in the soil..you cannot really see it but you may notice the difference how things grow.

[saddad]

If you turn in frozen topsoil it will stay cold for longer... and you aren't doing soil structure any good either but it will all come right in the New Year....  :-\

[Digeroo]

I thought it was more to do with putting frozen soil further down and it taking longer to thaw.  I thought freezing the soil improved the structure.  Putting lumps of clay on the top they start to breakdown.  In a previous garden I had huge lumps of pale grey  almost perfect pot clay.  The frost was the only thing that broke it up. 

[goodlife]

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I thought freezing the soil improved the structure. Yes..it does..any clumps on surface will break down into smaller clumps. If you managed to do 'winter dig' before freeze, the cold weather will help finnishing it off for you by crumbling all lumps and eventually the soil will settle naturally into "level" surface..but when this happens naturally there is sort of spunge tructure in the soil..tiny air pockets which will help absorb moisture and release when needed.
If you work frozen soil or walk on it..it results even smaller particles..effect is like grinding a powder, that will not form spunge-like structure when it thaws..it behaves like wallpaper paste and results bad drainage and later on when it dry up some of the finer bits will be blown away by winds and quite lakely resulting into a hard crust on surface. So yes..frost is good but adding manual stress with it..too much. How much the effect will be depend the type of the soil..with some you can get away with not much harm done, but if one is unlucky...

[earlypea]

I think it can damage the structure.  My BIL decided to dig a new bed for me once the frost had set in and it was also pretty wet.  The first year it was very unproductive and had serious drainage problems; veering between desert and mouldy.

It's recovered now, but it's taken two years.

[pigeonseed]

This all sounds more like a problem of trampling the soil rather than digging.

Last winter, I needed to clear my plot which was still quite new, and I was there every weekend, in ice and snow, clearing brambles and couch grass and digging it over. The soil was fine this year as far as I can tell.

But I did try to work backwards ??? Maybe that's not phrasing it well... starting at the farthest point, and work backwards, so I wasn't walking on the soil, once it had been dug.

And I suppose I had nothing to lose, as it wasn't going to be productive with 6' high brambles or couch grass on it!

[gp.girl]

Had a go at digging today it's only the top that is frozen and the soil is dry so I hope it will be ok. Will cover in manure next weekend, at least if I can borrow a wheel barrow and the pile isn't frozen solid by then . Not much choice anyway as if it ain't cleared it ain't productive plus by early next year it will be too wet to dig. Tried that this year and it all went very wrong  :-[

Potatos, squash and sweetcorn next year  ;D and bindweed  :'(

[saddad]

Any reasonable sized muck heap... bigger than say half a dozen compost sacks won't freeze solid...  :-*

[laurieuk]

The only problem you will get by digging in frost is that the soil will be that much longer warming up in the spring. If it is frozrn hard when you walk on it how can you make it crumble. I dig in the spring myself because our soil is very light and if I dig now I will need to do it again later. The reason for autumn digging is to let the frost start to break up any clay.

[brownowl23]

Hi everyone, thanks for all your comments. It wasnt very frosty and was certainly dry underneath  so I kind of wish that I had continued as i'd intended.
It would probably have been the only good day we are likely to have now before Xmas, hey ho.

[plainleaf]

it is really to bad that most statements about the potential are old wives tails and bunk.
I would go though all the false statements but don't want get in into fights with those who don't know what they are talking about.

[tonybloke]

turning over frozen soil will do more harm than good. the soil is an insulating medium, and by burying the frozen top surface, you just increase the depth of frozen soil !! therefore increasing the time your soil will be frozen, and micro-life will be in stasis, not active.
for those who wish to use the action of frost to 'break up' heavy clay loam, it must be dug when not frozen.

rgds, Tony

[pigeonseed]

But if you dig frozen soil down into the warmer layer, won't it just melt? Over the next few months the temperatures will go up and down, before slowly starting to increase in spring. With all the natural forces at work, I don't understand how digging could be more than a drop in the temperature ocean.

[chriscross1966]

I think the fact I'm sticking 4-6" of manure over the dug bits will more than compensate for any structural damage.... and  I need to get the weeds out of plot 1 before chirstmas.... plot 2 can get the plastic mulch and squash/spuds trick, but I need #1 for beans and onions, and therefore I need shot of the weeds and to add a lot of manure....

[pigeonseed]

I agree that sounds like the best course of action.

If you get rid of the worst of it now, when the earth starts to warm up in spring you'll see the weed seedlings and bits of couch grass coming up and you can get rid of them before planting. If you leave the clearing till spring, you get that second flush while your crops are seedlings/small, and then it's hard to extricate the weeds, isn't it?

I always find that even by now, you can't spot the couch roots as well as you can before it gets cold - everything dies back and you think you've got a clear bed, then in spring - a lawn! 

[ipt8]

Ideally if you have a heavy soil (clay) you dig it before it gets frosty and the frost brakes it up. If you have a light soil (sandy or loamy) its best not to walk on it and compact it, this type of soil is better dug in the spring.
Better still Put your manure on and let the worms do the work. I just took on an allotment late this year and rotavated a fair area to about eight or ten inches deep, then had rotavator problems and loaned a small tractor and ploughed to about twelve inches deep. I now intend to try a no dig system. I have put on spent mushroom compost and if you turn a spade full over it is teaming with worms, the areas without have not.

[tonybloke]

But if you dig frozen soil down into the warmer layer, won't it just melt? Over the next few months the temperatures will go up and down, before slowly starting to increase in spring. With all the natural forces at work, I don't understand how digging could be more than a drop in the temperature ocean.

well, after living all my life in east anglia, I've never seen a farmer ploughing when soil is frozen !!