The Best Soil for Your Garden
March 6, 2009 by Guest Author
Filed under Family Articles
Soil is one of the most important parts of a successful, fruitful garden. If your soil is rocky, full of clay, or depleted of enough nutrients, you will not have healthy plants. Think about it, if a newborn baby was fed no nutrients from birth, would you expect it to be healthy? The same goes for plants. A seed will sprout with just water, but it wont get much bigger as time goes on if there are no nutrients.
When you sow the seeds in planter trays, use a good potting soil. You don’t need to add any fertilizer at this point because you will be transplanting the seedlings soon anyway.
When you are preparing your garden in your yard, you need to first break up your soil. Your garden plot cant be full of rocks and clumps. Use the proper tools to cultivate and till your soil. When you are just starting to break of the grass and tough topsoil, use a shovel and pickax if necessary.
As you get down further, use a hoe to chop it up and break it up even more. When youve done as much breaking up as you can, use a cultivator to break it up even further and scoop out rocks and other large clumps.
Once your garden plot is prepared, you need to fertilize the soil. You can mix in higher quality fertilizer or add cow manure. There are also many different types of fertilizer additives. Get an organic fertilizer and you can keep all your vegetables and fruits organic.
You could also use compost. A compost pile is a great idea. Use the leaves your rake up and add in food scraps, eggshells, and other biodegradable materials for your compost. This will break down and turn into nutrient rich soil.
If you arent sure if your soil is good enough for your garden, have it tested. You can get a soil tester and do it yourself and send it to a lab. By doing this, you dont have to worry if your soil has too little or too much of certain nutrients. When you find out your deficiencies and which nutrients you have too much of, you can adjust your soil accordingly.
You might be surprised how important your soil is in your garden. It can be the difference between thriving plants and shriveled dead ones. Dont overlook your soil, it is very important!