How to know if your soil is good for gardening
Gardening season is upon us and what you reap is often dependent upon the condition of the soil.
How do you know if you have good soil? And if you don’t, can you make it better?
Elizabeth Faires runs Humblebee Farm, a small market garden and nursery in Torbrook Mines and Middleton, with more than 30 years of experience gardening. She says the first step is knowing what you’re starting with.
Take a paper sheet or a garbage bag and a shovel out to your garden. Remove the grass and top couple of inches of soil from a patch where you want to plant, then dig down a shovel’s depth and put the soil on your bag or sheet, then repeat. You will have two piles of soil that are a cross-section of what is beneath your feet. Notice its characteristics: is it dark or pale, sandy, sticky? How does it smell? These are important things to note, says Faires.
Next, take a sample of soil: mix up the first section and put some in a Ziploc baggie, then refill the hole. Your sample can be tested to determine what your soil contains. In Nova Scotia, it can be sent for a soil test at the provincial lab, says Faires.
A cheaper way to check the basic chemical structure of the soil is using a soil test kit, available at feed stores and gardening centres for about $15. This gives gardeners information about the nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium and acidity but none of the micronutrients and you don’t have to wait for results.
The final way is in the look of your plants as you are growing them and your yields, but this isn’t always precise.
KNOW YOUR SOIL
Various soil types mean different things, she says.
Sandy soil, also known as light soil, dries quicker than other types and doesn’t hold nutrients as long as heavier soils. Roots penetrate sandy soil easily and it warms quicker in the spring.
Loamy soil is great for growing vegetables, as it holds moisture and nutrients well and drainage is good. It is rarely found in Nova Scotia as pure loam but is commonly mixed, so you have loamy clay or sandy loam, and is typically acidic because of the rainy climate.
The final type is clay soil. The particle sizes of these soils are small and when they get wet, they stick closely together and can form a layer that both holds water and stops penetration by roots. These are considered cold soils as they take longer to warm in spring, but they do retain nutrients better than sandy soils and are often more alkaline, explains Faires.
“Don’t panic too much if you’re starting out with less than ideal soil in your garden spot, as you can change it slowly over time and then keep fertility year after year,” she says.
In the Maritimes, soils are often acidic, and acid-loving plants like blueberries and potatoes do well, says Faires.
For other crops, you’ll see farmers and gardeners spreading lime to make the pH more neutral and allow more access to nutrients for plants. If you add lots of fertilizer to your soil and the plants don’t do any better, it’s likely the soil is acidic and the plants can’t use the nutrients.
SUNLIGHT, DRAINAGE AND DIGGING
Next, consider sunlight, drainage and digging.
Crops differ in light requirements but generally need at least six hours of direct sun every day.
“Keep a notebook and every year write down your observations and experiments,” Faires advises.
Drainage is rarely a problem in sandy soils and often an issue in clay soils. You can do permanent fixes, such as digging drainage channels, making raised beds or simply making garden beds that have the soil a few inches higher than the surrounding soil by digging walkways and putting the soil on the adjacent beds.
To dig or not to dig is a common question, and there are advantages to both, says Faires.
If you don’t have a lot of perennial weeds, initially putting down fertilizer or lime and digging it into the soil is a good way to start. You may have a lot of weeding, however.
If you like the idea of nodig, it works well on soil that’s not too heavy and clay-like. Simply start with decent soil structure and add compost to the top each year.
“Whichever method you use, your aim is to give the plants healthy soil with a structure that lets the roots go down to support the plants,” says Faires.
Keep it healthy by adding good quality compost annually made of well-rotted manure, fertilizer and lime occasionally if needed. Lime is always best added in the fall to prevent the roots from burning and to give it time to work. If your crop yields go down, retest your soil.
IMPROVING SOIL
“Whichever method you use, your aim is to give the plants healthy soil with a structure that lets the roots go down to support the plants.” Elizabeth Faires
Humblebee Farm
• Peat moss is acidic but adds water and nutrient-holding ability. Good for sandy or alkaline soil.
• Topsoil is usually not good quality but if you’re making a raised bed, you can mix it with peat moss and compost.
• Compost is only as good as what it’s made from. It can be bought or made at home.
• Manure can contain a lot of nitrogen and add bulk to the soil. The best compost is a couple of years old, smells like earth, is crumbly dark brown and has been stored covered.
• Coffee grounds can be great, but Faires adds them to her compost and not directly on the garden.
If you can only do one thing, learn to make good compost and add it to the top of your garden every spring. Worms will drag it down and mix it in for you, Faires adds.