Soil Health is the Foundation of Your Garden
Take a shovel and turn over the dirt in the area that you are planning on doing in-ground garden beds. You will probably see a mixture of different types of soil, some sand. If you dig up some worms in that shovel of dirt you are lucky. On my land, I see mostly clay.
Poor soil health is the norm. You are probably starting with compacted soil that is part fill dirt from somewhere else. That is OK.
Before you see $$ flash before your eyes and faint, realize that building and improving your soil is a long term event that will stretch over many seasons.
You can still have a good garden right where you are with as little inputs as possible. I will show you how.
What the heck is NPK?
A little background: Nitrogen (N), Phosphorus (P), and Potassium (K), are macronutrients that are required by plants to support their overall growth and development.
Each nutrient plays a unique role in the soil-plant system:
- Nitrogen is responsible for promoting leaf and stem growth.
- Phosphorus aids in root development and flowering.
- Potassium has a crucial role in enhancing overall plant health and vigor. Potassium is involved in numerous physiological processes within plants, including regulating water movement, improving drought tolerance, enhancing nutrient uptake, and supporting enzyme activation. It also contributes to disease resistance, stress tolerance, and fruit quality.
I have never done a soil test in my garden
Most sites and books recommend that you do a soil test and then amend the soil. But when should you test? Most of the advice I have seen says to add organic matter like compost, work it into the soil, and then do a soil test.
I have never done a soil test in my garden. This is because I have many in-ground and raised garden beds of various ages, stretching over the last 9 years I have lived here. The results would be different for each garden bed, or even five feet apart. Instead, I apply a general mix of layers of compost (nitrogen and potassium), and garden lime (which provides phosphorous and calcium), to each bed and then observe whether I see signs that it needs something more. I may add worm castings if I have some available. I am also experimenting with adding mycorrhizal soil inoculant to increase the good bacteria in the soil, especially to plant starts in pots or buckets (see below).
And I added mushroom compost – the used blocks of sawdust used as growing medium for a KC mushroom growing business. They give it away free. (Free is always good). It will increase water retention and inoculate the soil as well.
Organic Matter – It’s What Plants Crave
Since I have hard clay soil with very little worms, the first thing I do is break up the ground (in even an idle garden bed from last season) with my Meadow Creature broadfork. This breaks up the ground (but not too much). For a new bed I may completely turn it over. For an existing bed, which likely has wood chip mulch on it, I am just loosening and aerating the soil without turning it over.
Caution using outside sources of compost and manure
Next I add a layer of compost, which may include some well aged horse manure. My compost usually comes from Craigslist, the nursery, or the municipal compost site in the nearby small town.
Compost can be a gamble because of the tainted sources of even the most (supposedly) organic blends.
Most manure stock (the backbone of compost) comes from animals that are fed hay that is sprayed with herbicides that deter broadleaf plants in a hayfield. If you see a hayfield without weeds, it is sprayed. Some types of sprays (like Grazon) can pass through the horse or cow and end up in the manure. They are persistent herbicides that can last for years, even in well composted manure. If you put those on your garden it may stunt broadleaf plants like beans. If I use horse or cow manure, I try to get assurances (as much as possible) that the hay fed the animals was not sprayed. My horses generally eat non-sprayed hay so I use some of their manure in my compost.
Likewise, most compost comes from municipal sources, with grass clippings, leaves, and tree debris. Many city folks spray their yards with herbicides and that can end up in the municipal compost. One local nursery has compost that came from a large city like Kansas City. It tends to have more residual herbicides, and one year it killed my beans shortly after they came up.
I make my own compost, but not in sufficient quantities for all the beds. Even when using well composted horse manure from my own animals, some seeds can remain. I have a big problem with thorny horse nettle and poke weed that get in my garden either through horse manure or through the woodchips.
The key to building soil is to get as much organic matter in it as possible. In the Fall, I drive around and throw bags of leaves into the back of my truck. I layer these out in a bed, cover with some soil or compost, and woodchips. This Spring morning I turned over the soil in a bed and most of the leaves were composted (that’s a win).
I have also bought worms from Amazon and added those to my beds. One of my friends has a worm farm, creating worm castings. There are enough worm eggs in those castings that I can add them and increase the amount of worms in my soil.
Adding Amendments
I add a sprinkled layer of garden lime (which provides phosphorous and calcium) to the garden bed as a baseline. I may also add a thin layer of bone meal. If I have some molasses I will mix it with water and spread it on the bed. I cover this with woodchips that I get from the local tree service. Woodchips can also be a source of herbicide if the trees are sprayed. Usually only see that in trees from the city.
Micronutrients – Calcium, Magnesium
I usually do not add any other amendments. I may add some calcium or epsom salt to the hole when planting tomatoes and peppers, to cut down on blossom end rot, caused by a lack of calcium or the inability for the plant to uptake the calcium. I will write a separate article on adding micronutrients.
Why I don’t add chemical fertilizer
I usually do not add chemical fertilizer to my garden. It almost always has ammonia nitrate as a nitrogen source. Instead I will add fish emulsion fertilizer in a bucket of water, added periodically to tomatoes throughout the season for nitrogen.
Soil Health – Wrapping it up
Following these guidelines, you should be able to start a garden with a minimal amount of inputs. Bring it lots of woodchips. Chop and drop the weeds. All of this builds soil over the years. It can turn a garden with heavy clay soil into a deeper soil. It just takes time.
Good luck with your gardening!
This article is cross posted from AllGardenAdvice.com.
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- The Backyard Forest Garden e-book
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