How To Improve Soil For Gardening

Figure out how to improve soil for gardening. Create a living web of microorganisms and use the best mulch for flower beds, add nitrogen and find soil pH.

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Figure out how to improve soil for gardening. Create a living web of microorganisms and use the best mulch for flower beds, add nitrogen and find soil pH.

Have you given due consideration to building your garden soil this season? What soil improvement techniques were you planning to use? Whether you’re filling new beds with bags of compost or tinkering with loam you’ve been nurturing for years, your first task may be to change the way you think. Sure, soil holds roots in place and helps them find moisture and nutrients. But truly superior soil goes beyond providing plants with a comfortable place to live and a seat at nature’s table. When it gets really good, soil does things we humans are just learning to appreciate.

Some gardeners think that building better soil is mostly a matter of adding the right amounts of the right organic amendments, and this is basically true. Above-average levels of organic matter are one key to developing soil that functions well as a nutrient storehouse and is a root-friendly place to be. But looking to compost or any other type of organic matter as the one thing your soil needs is like reading the first chapter of a book and saying you’re done. There is much more to the story.

Mulch More, Dig Less

Take microscopic fungi, for example. Some beneficial, soil-borne fungi help some plants take up phosphorus, and others manufacture nitrogen — two of the big three plant nutrients normally provided in a bag of fertilizer. In return, the plants provide nutrients and a habitat for these helpful mycorrhizae, a general term for micro-critters that live in, on, or alongside plant roots. We can’t see them, but they are down there, big time.

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