I want to dig a few trenches, that will be around 1ft width x 10ft length (1-2ft deep) for homegrown fruit and veg.

The current earth is crap, rocky and extremly tough to dig, what would be the best way of replacing this soil? Is now the best time to do it? Would manure work?

do people usually dig holes and fill with new stuff? are you allowed to take soil for free?

If you are going to try and improve the quality of the soil then digging in some manure might be a good idea. I would have thought the autumn would be the best time to do that. For spring planting.

I have a large compost heap and put all my grow room trimmings and old composts in it, aswell as some kitchen waste. Digging this in (once it's well rotted down) can be helpful. You can also just spread it around as a mulch which washes down into the soil when it rains etc....

My own garden soil is really just clay and looks to be very poor quality but you would be suprised, clay soils do contain enough nutrients to make stuff grow well.

You can always go for some topsoil too, but tbh I would try and work with what you've got. Once you have initially dug it and turned it to aerate it a bit and removed the stones the quality might not be as bad as you think. It improves year on year if you add homemade compost to it.

Good luck with the veggies

edit to add, you shouldn't have to dig down as far as 2 feet either, all the goodness is in the top 6 inches or so. (I think)

you can dig in some well rotted manure now and as enigmatic mentions if you are not already composting your kitchen green waste then if you want to grow delicous veg start doing so now .. in fact a wormery would suit you down to the ground .. there are threads about wormerys on uk420 if you put it in the search engine .. i have an allotment and the soil is poor however by planned crop rotation and proper compost/manure application the output of the allotment is astounding after omnly three years!! .. you will need to sieve out the larger stones but its all good for the soul ..

Thank you so much both Eo & smeagol, sorry I didn't reply sooner, totally forgot i posted this thread

Yeah, last year was fun growing. we used growbags for strawberrys, tomatoes, and a small trench for spring onions and a few carrots... Was a bit of fun, nothing serious, but now i want to grow veg properly, in the ground with the help of my gramps he loves the garden too.

I will dig out my square then, de-rock it as much as i can. I do have a big spare mound of earth (from a years worth growing, biobizz it is as well), so I'll add that. I will get some manure too.

Cheers for helping

Try breaking up the soil as deep as you can with a fork or pickaxe and make raised beds - it will drain well, warm up quickly and you don't need to worry about digging. If you add a lot of manure on top of the broken soil in the autumn then the worms should help you out and do a lot of the digging for you

Respect to the worms Cheers for the info Jo.

Thank you all