Restoring Soil Nutrients

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Your garden will thrive with the right balance of soil nutrients. 
Your garden will thrive with the right balance of soil nutrients. 
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Manganese-deficient beet leaf on left, normal leaf on right.
Manganese-deficient beet leaf on left, normal leaf on right.
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Calcium deficiency, taking the form of blossom-end rot, in mature pepper fruits.
Calcium deficiency, taking the form of blossom-end rot, in mature pepper fruits.

Summer puts soil fertility to the test. Intensive plantings of warm-weather crops remove nutrients at a fast clip, and when plants hunger, you should be the first to know it’s feeding time. Replacing soil nutrients keeps plants happy right up to the harvest.

I keep a watchful eye on plants when the weather becomes hot. Anything less than vigorous, lush growth raises suspicion and when leaves become discolored or misshapen, I take action. A first step might be a general feeding by scratching leaf mold into the soil. Summer is a bit early for gathering leaf mold, but there’s usually some available and it’s loaded with earthworms that further enrich the soil. Then I gather all the compost I can spare, and encircle each plant with a few inches of mulch. Finally, I spray all leaf surfaces with a solution of fish emulsion and liquid seaweed. This general feeding often helps the plants through the summer, but if problems persist, I look for specific nutritional deficiencies.

The Big Six

“N-P-K”

Abundant nitrogen immediately comes to mind when thinking of fertile soil. It’s the green giant your plants need for lush, sturdy growth. It forms plant proteins and it’s probably the nutrient most familiar to gardeners. Nitrogen deficiencies cause leaves to lose their healthy, green color, and this chlorosis (yellowing) usually begins near the base of plants. As chlorosis works its way up, the plants appear weak and spindly.

  • Published on Oct 19, 2012
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