So, my fascination with gut health has led me – maybe inevitably? – to an equal fascination with soil health. Because they’re not just connected; they’re the SAME.

Gut health and soil health work the same way—both thrive on diversity, minimal disturbance, and natural feeding. The global expert on healthy soil is Charles Dowding, whose no dig method has been revolutionising gardening for the past four decades by showing that less disturbance creates more abundance.

By feeding the soil with compost instead of digging, Charles builds a thriving soil biome: boosting plant health, reducing weeds, and increasing harvests. It’s a simple, natural system that works with nature rather than against it—just like the process of nurturing a healthy gut.

Charles’ no dig method keeps soil teeming with microbes, just as consuming kefir and prebiotics creates a healthy gut microbiome. And the connection between soil health and gut health isn’t just theoretical; when you build rich, living soil with compost, you grow stronger plants—and eating them fresh passes that microbial vitality straight to your gut. Healthy soil, healthy you!

I was recently privileged to spend a weekend at Homeacres, Charles’ teaching farm in Somerset. He gave me some of his very special soil to take away, to serve as a baseline for our upcoming soil microbiome test (testing pending at Cambridge at this very moment!).

While we’re waiting for the test results to come back, I asked Charles if he would guest-write a blog post, about how he creates healthy soil. And guess what – he DID! So here are his suggestions for you, about how to create the healthiest soil possible, in your own garden.

I hope you enjoy! And get in touch to let me know what you think about all this – are you ready to put the spade down and start making your soil – and your gut – as healthy as it can possibly be?

Hugs, Shann.x

Most Iconic Female Personality to Watch in 2025, CIO Look Magazine

How I grow soil health, what is soil health and how to increase it?

by Charles Dowding July 2025

Plants tell you when they are healthy. They have a glow to the leaves and look happy to be there. That’s the best indication of soil health, because it means there’s a great biome of active life in the soil.

Some of this biome is present on and in roots and leaves which we harvest to eat, especially when freshly harvested. The microbes are amazingly similar to the biome in our guts, so it’s really worth creating extra healthy soil in your garden, to improve your own health.

The no dig method I use and advocate is a fantastic way to accomplish this.

The tenets of no dig are minimal disturbance of soil, and feed soil life through mulches of organic matter on the surface. I say minimal disturbance because sometimes we grow vegetables which involve moving soil around to harvest them, such as potatoes, as in my video. (And to plant a tree, you need to dig a hole!)

For planting vegetables, I mostly use a wooden dibber to make a precise hole, slightly larger than plug plants which then pop in easily. For larger transplants such as tomatoes, use a trowel to cut a precisely shaped hole for the rootball.

Surface mulches can be any kind of organic matter, and the best for vegetables is compost, which need not be perfect. Even use compost 3/4 decomposed, because its own decomposition process happening at the surface, feeds a biome of microbes which enhances life and health below the surface.

For example the mycelial network, extensively present in undisturbed soil. It’s like an existing root network, but it needs food from the roots to function, a process called mycorrhizal association. All the energy for that process comes from sunlight enabling photosynthesis, which translates to carbon compounds or sugars excreted by roots as food for mycelia. Bacteria have a role too in finding nutrients for roots, in a different process called rhizophagy.

To start no dig, I recommend using a reasonably large amount of compost to boost your soils health and fertility right from the beginning. Then going forwards, you just need to apply a 3 cm mulch of compost, once a year usually. All the while you are building and enhancing soil structure, which means a stable network of air spaces in soil. This results in oxygen to feed the life in there, also water can drain freely. At the same time, the increased amount of carbon in soil results in more moisture being held there. Organic
matter is like a sponge, which can hold more water than soil itself.

I run a two bed trial, since 2013, to compare the differences between digging and no dig. One is how the dug soil has 14% carbon after 12 years of digging, while the no dig soil has 18% carbon. Both beds receive the same amount of compost / carbon every year. The dig bed requires the extra work of digging and levelling, yet harvests from it are 11% reduced compared to the no dig bed, through the last 12 years. And that’s for the same amount of input. It shows how economical no dig is, giving more for less.

To discover more about how to start and then continue no dig, have a look at the beginners course I wrote in 2025. I explain the simple and straightforward principles, because it’s all about working with nature’s own processes, rather than fighting them. To grow vegetables, which are quite complicated plants(!), I explain the most effective methods. Once underway with no dig, you will find it easier to grow healthy plants with glossy leaves. Plus, you save much time, because weeds grow less.

Charles Dowding

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