How To Dig Up Your Garden The Easy Way

Last Updated on October 21, 2021 by Real Men Sow

Digging up a garden is a simple task that does not need any explanation other than digging your shovel down the ground and picking up as much soil as you can. To dig up a whole garden like a pro takes more than just conventional digging. There are some tips and tricks to elevate the hard work, so get ready to know how to dig up a garden the easy way.

How to Dig Up a Garden Without Feeling like a Hard Work

Dig Little and Often

Digging little and often is good for both body and mind. As I’m sure you’ll know only too well, digging causes aches and pains, especially if you’re not used to doing it. It is worth breaking up sessions if possible to ease the impact on the muscles.

Progress is always a morale booster too, so standing back and being able to admire regularly spruced-up sections rather than slogging through hours and hours to cultivate one big section is much better for the mind.

Get a Good Diggins Spade

It sounds obvious, but get as good and lightweight spade as possible. Old ones found in the corner of the shed are lovely and thrifty, but they’re also often very old, heavy, and cumbersome.

A nice, light spade will be much easier to turn and far better for the achy muscles.

Pick Your Weather You Dig Up the Garden

I did a digging session a couple of weekends ago, on a Saturday that just happened to be the hottest day of the year. It was hard work, and the heat made things twice as difficult. Digging when the ground is dry is also tough going, as getting the spade into the soil requires much more effort. The same goes for frosty weather too. And digging in the wet is a no-no, as the soil is heavy and sticky. Basically, you need an overcast day that isn’t too hot or too wet or too cold. Clear as mud.

Mind the Earthworms!

Watch out for the earthworms. They’re integral to the condition of the soil and do lots of hard work down there. I like to see plenty of earthworms as it’s a sign of good soil. However, I’m not murderous or anything, but I do like to also help out the local blackbird when digging. He can spot a vulnerable worm a mile of.

Pull Out the Weed Roots as You Go

This might be the best tip I’ve ever got. Another one that sounds obvious in principle, but I’ve often thought ‘oh, I pick them up later,’ and then realise that life is much easier if I do this whilst I go along. I miss half of them otherwise; either treading them back into the soil or being lazy after a hard morning’s digging.

Dig Up Garden with Keeping Your Self-Care in Mind

As a kid, I was a bather. As a lazy student, I was also a bather. It seems that having showers is a sign of growing up. When you no longer have time for a bath and have to shower instead because you’ve got to be at work, then you’re officially a grown-up. However, recently I’ve been making time for a long, relaxing bath, particularly on days when I’ve been digging. I have grown to love a long bath all over again, and I feel much better in the morning for a soak in the tub. A nice glug of Radox helps too.

Have a Blow at the End of Each Row

Digging is a marathon, not a sprint! I can often be found slumped over my spade, recharging the batteries before I get stuck into another row.