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Gardening starts with good soil. Good soil is basically soil that has the proper fertility to satisfy a growing plant's needs. What does that mean? Well, I'll tell you.

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Great soil gives you the best chance to succeed as a gardener. Now that the planting season is upon us, it's a good time to consider the quality of your soil.

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Good gardens come from good soils and husbanding good soil is a key to sustainable organic gardening. It also keeps you out in the sun; playing in the dirt and getting a little more tan as you listen to your favorite gardening music …

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Hi everyone

Welcome to this edition of your Gardening Weekly, today's edition is entitled:

Understanding Soil

QUOTE: All the flowers of all the tomorrows are in the seeds of today.
- Indian Proverb

Understanding the role that soil plays in the garden is one of the best assets that you can have as a gardener.
It is this knowledge that will allow you to create a healthier environment for your plants and get the maximum benefits from them.

In doing so, you will also make your own life easier, as a garden that is well managed from the soil up, is a garden that is a lot easier to manage, from one day to the next.

A garden that has good soil that has been fed with good nutrition over time will make growing almost anything easy for even the least experienced gardener.

Website Of Interest. Check out the following:
http://blog.mygardeninghome.com/soil.html

So how to you get good soil?

First you need to consider how plants grow and how they get their nutrition and that is through their roots.
Therefore, in order for the plants to grow well, they need to be in soil that allows their roots to get to the nutrition.
Obviously compact ground with little water, little air and poor nutrition will not produce the best plants.

Plants need water and air and this requires soil that has spaces to hold this air and water.
Therefore soil that is aerated will generally produce a better garden.  Once again it is all about balance, as soil that is too crumbly might not hold the nutrients as well, where the water might wash them away.  The soil also needs to be firm enough to support the growth of the plant otherwise it will topple over at the first sign of a wind.

The soil needs to have suitable nutrients and if any of these nutrients are out of balance, the pH scale that measures whether the soil is acidic or alkaline, will show why they are having difficulty absorbing the nutrients.

Website Of Interest. Check out the following:
http://blog.mygardeninghome.com/soil.html

Thanks,
Annie
http://blog.mygardeninghome.com

Beyond the need for good water retention and good drainage, soils have to supply all the nutrients trees can’t get from the air or produce internally using sunlight for energy. Also, how much water retention is needed and specifically …

Source: Jennifer

After reading over and over again that potting soil is the best way to make sure our plants are happy in their potted homes, a gardening expert says it is not good enough. Carlo Balistreiri, the executive director of The Gardens at …

Source: Molly Day

Successful organic gardening begins and ends with good soil. At the beginning and end of every growing season, the organic gardener works with the soil to make sure it will produce abundant organic produce and flowers. …

Source: Jennifer

In container gardening, all that is up to you. In an outdoor garden, nature helps but you may have to give some assistance to achieve optimal results. Lavender, for example, likes dry, alkaline soil with good drainage. …

Source: Jennifer

For many years already I reuse my potting soil in one way or another. The reason is very simple: every time I buy new potting soil, I mix it with the soil conditioner TerraCottem, which is keeping its water and fertilizer stocking …

Source: willem van cotthem

And thankfully, by adding lots of the right kinds of organic matter, a clayey loam can be built up over time that is quite manageable and good for gardening. Some advice: don’t even think of enjoying gardening in this red clay …

Source: Joel