{"id":14484,"date":"2021-03-11T12:40:45","date_gmt":"2021-03-11T20:40:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.globalgarden.co\/?p=14484"},"modified":"2023-11-08T15:30:17","modified_gmt":"2023-11-08T23:30:17","slug":"how-to-improve-soil-health-for-your-garden","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.globalgarden.co\/knowledge\/how-to-improve-soil-health-for-your-garden\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Improve Soil Health for Your Garden"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Have you heard the saying, “You can’t build a great building on a weak foundation?” Well cultivating a thriving garden is the same way. It all starts with strong groundwork (pun intended). If you’re wondering how to improve soil health, then you’ve come to the right place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Soil is the foundation of your garden. It’s what nourishes your plants, allowing you to produce those crisp cucumbers and juicy tomatoes. Soil health boils down to three key factors which can be easily affected by your gardening practices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, how do you make sure that you’re maintaining and improving the health of your soil? The first step is understanding how each of the key components of healthy soil (nutrients, living organisms, and soil structure) play a role in supporting plant growth. Then we can work on managing them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Why Does Soil Health Matter?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Soil is a diverse ecosystem. It’s a complex food web and it helps control the supply of nutrients, air, and water to the plants in your garden. Healthy soil supports plant growth and is capable of sustaining agricultural production.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Whether you’re a cash-crop farmer, or just looking to improve the soil health for your backyard garden, you want to make sure that all of your hard work pays off at the end of the day. Imagine slaving away, planting, watering, weeding, day in and day out, only to produce a few small vegetables, when you know your garden has the potential to do so much more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you have a commercial growing operation, this is even more important. Product is profit, and healthy soil helps your growing operation with both. Healthy soil improves your productivity and therefore your profitability<\/a>. It can also reduce your inputs, reducing growing costs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And it’s not just about improving your soil health to boost productivity, it’s important to maintain<\/em> good quality soil as well. Proper soil management ensures that this dynamic system that you’re harnessing is sustainable, and that the valuable resources within your soil are preserved for future growing seasons.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What Are the Key Factors that You Need to Consider?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The key factors of soil health come down to three main categories: chemical, biological, and physical health. Soil that’s lacking in any of these areas will be limiting your garden from reaching its full potential. We’ll explain why each one of them is important, and how they interact and rely on one another.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Chemical Health: Nutrients<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

This one is usually pretty obvious for people. Ask any avid gardener what they need to provide for their plants, and they’ll tell you sunlight, water, and proper nutrients. But understanding what those nutrients are and how they’re stored in the soil, is vital to managing soil health.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The chemical health of your soil is always changing. Nutrients are constantly being added, consumed, removed, or changed within your soil. This is known as nutrient cycling<\/a>. But regardless of the dynamic nature of the nutrients, you always need both organic and inorganic nutrients in your soil to promote plant growth. How those nutrients are stored, determines when they will be available for your plants to use.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Organic nutrients are those carbon-containing compounds that are typically found in organic matter, like decomposing plant matter or manure. They might also be available to your plants dissolved in the water that they take up from the soil.<\/p>\n\n\n

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\"Compost
Compost is the “black gold” of farming. It is full of organic nutrients and beneficial microbes that can greatly improve the health of your soil. <\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

Organic matter in your soil can also store important inorganic compounds like nitrogen and phosphorus, which are very important to your plants. But it’s critical to understand that the nutrients in organic matter are not always immediately available to your plants. Most of them rely on soil organisms to convert that organic matter into different forms through decomposition and mineralization. These nutrients can be utilized by your plants in the near or distant future depending on the biological activity of the soil.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Inorganic compounds can also be dissolved in water or stored at cation exchange sites<\/a>. Cation exchange sites are negatively charged locations within the soil that attract and hold the positively charged compounds like calcium<\/a> and magnesium. Nutrients stored at cation exchange sites are readily available to plants in the near future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Soil minerals are another form of nutrient storage. But these nutrients are only available to your plants in the very distant future. They aren’t immediately accessible.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Biological Health: Living Organisms<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Soil contains a network of organisms that make up its biological health and create the living ecosystem that allows your plants to grow. These organisms are diverse and range from microbes like bacteria and fungi, to larger insects like millipedes, ants, and earthworms.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Earthworms and other little critters convert organic material into highly absorbable nutrients for your plant. This is nature’s way of fertilizing your garden.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

These organisms work together with the soil and form symbiotic relationships. Roots produce sugars that feed microbes, and in return those microbes give back nutrients to the soil. Soil organisms convert organic matter and other compounds into usable nutrients for your plants. They also naturally control pests.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Earthworms and other larger organisms in your soil help to create and maintain the physical characteristics of the soil. They can develop macropores within the soil as they move through it, basically like large tunnels which aid in root and nutrient distribution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Physical Health: Soil Structure<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The third and final factor of soil health to consider is soil structure. The physical structure of your soil is essential to your garden. Good soil structure promotes proper aeration, water distribution, and drainage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Larger macropores help regulate air movement through the soil, and the smaller micropores are necessary to retain water. Good soil structure also allows plant roots to grow freely though the soil pores, rather than restricting their movement. A strong physical network can withstand soil erosion and compaction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Aggregates within the soil, areas that stick together more firmly, can support chemical health too. They help regulate nutrient distribution by storing organic matter, and not allowing it to get depleted too quickly by the soil organisms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What Soil Management Strategies Can You Implement in Your Garden?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Add Nutrients<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

This soil management strategy is directly targeted at improving chemical health. To offset the consumption of nutrients by your plants, or the loss of those same nutrients to the environment, you can add nutrients<\/a> to your soil. These inputs also fall into the same categories of organic and inorganic matter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To add organic nutrients and organic matter to your soil, you can add compost or manure. Composting is an easy way to introduce decomposing living matter to your soil, that can be done in almost any garden or backyard. Adding organic matter not only adds nutrients, but it also adds moisture to your soil.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The addition of organic matter to your soil is a great way of increasing cation exchange sites<\/a>. So, it provides both readily accessible nutrients and the more sustained release nutrients from decomposition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fertilizers are the most common form of inorganic soil additions. They are a great source of nitrogen, phosphorous, and potassium for your soil. Liming agents can also help neutralize acidic soils, which can be detrimental to bacteria and cause some components to become toxic to plant roots. The right pH in your soil will improve the availability of nutrients.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nutrient addition should be well managed<\/a>. Fertilizer, or organic matter, should be added consciously, using the correct amount at the right time to achieve ideal plant growth. Additions should meet the needs of the plants, but avoid excess. Nutrient Stewardship recommends following the 4Rs<\/a>:<\/p>\n\n\n\n