Gardening is a little like making love. You don the right attire, you make sure your bed is perfect, you enjoy the process and you absolutely love the results!
Showering your garden with love is easy, right? You can trundle through the nursery, fill your trolley, bring a mass of plants home and put them into the ground. Easy… but what are you feeding them? Like us, they need food. “Well, there are all those boxes and cans of fertilizers and...” Yes, indeed there are, but let’s get down to basics...down to the soil itself.
Soil is a combination of many things: mineral particles, chemicals, water, a myriad of microscopic creatures, air, partly decomposed organic matter (leaves, petals, for instance), and humus, which is organic matter so thoroughly decomposed, its original state is unrecognizable; it has become a very fine soil.
If your property was built upon what was once sandstone, then its basic ingredient now is sand, and if limestone, then it will have become something acidic and fine textured (and very fertile). Granite, over time, will have produced an acidic and somewhat gritty, sandy texture. Check the structure of your soil and see if the clay needs to be amended with something that will provide better drainage. Sandy soil will need help to retain moisture.
Finding out the pH of your soil is of great importance. This means measuring the acidity and alkalinity content. Identifying this will help you to create and maintain a perfect balance, and a well balanced mix will do more for the health and profusion of plants than any commercial fertilizer. You can have this done professionally - check with your local nursery for contacts. Or, you can buy a pH meter and do it yourself. An even cheaper method is to buy some litmus paper for this purpose and follow the instructions on the packet.
Plants need a steady diet of nutrients, just as we do. Those required in larger portions are: nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium, calcium, magnesium and sulphur. They also need iron, zinc, copper, manganese, molybdenum and boron in tiny quantities. Commercial fertilizers can certainly be used on established plants and the numbering on the packet will indicate the amount of the three major nutrients: ‘N’ for nitrogen, ‘P’ for phosphorus, and ‘K’ for potassium, but be aware that the word ‘organic’ doesn’t necessarily mean that all the ingredients are obtained from natural animal, plant or mineral sources. The best way to get the right diet is to add organic matter to the soil, and that which has been properly composted is far better than leaving leaves or fallen fruit on the ground, turning over weeds and dead plants, or scattering scraps of kitchen waste to decompose themselves. I shall be writing a column about composting in due course but, for the moment, put everything in tightly lidded plastic bins, or open-topped wire enclosures, or even large heaps in a corner, regularly turned, and allow it to break down.
Well rotted animal manures are available in bags at most nurseries and these should be dug into the soil, not scattered over. Fish emulsion, bone meal, and liquid seaweed will add greatly to the strength and wellbeing of your plants when applied correctly. When I redid my garden in California, I bought many bags of treated sewage from the local water company and that was tilled into the earth and, together with everything else and mixed with topsoil, the result was magical.
Earthworms perform miracles; they, other small creatures, microscopic bacteria and burrowing animals, improve the structure, nutrition and aeration of the soil as they eat, excrete and tunnel. Provide good conditions for them by keeping the soil evenly moist and well drained. If you’re just starting a garden and the compost hasn’t had time to break down yet, chew up kitchen waste in your food mixer and dig that into the soil here and there. Dig small holes and bury a few handfuls of leaves in different places - anything to start adding organic matter, but get it down into the earth. Suppliers of earthworms can be found through fish bait services, or can be sent by mail - check the advertisements in your garden magazines, or with your local nursery. I’ll be talking about red wiggly worms that are suitable for worm farms in my composting article.
Love your garden! Give it this banquet to digest and watch everything grow like a jungle.
