How to Fix Dry Soil to Make it Healthy and Productive

do you have soil in your garden or in any planters that looks like this dry dusty practically lifeless dry soil especially if it's low in organic matter will not produce good crops it can be lacking in life in nutrients and moisture and really needs to be fixed before you plant anything in it i'm going to show you how i'm fixing the soil in this planter today how i'm planting it up as well and what i'll be doing to keep it healthy and [Music] productive [Music] the soil is so dry i don't think i've worked with worse to be perfectly honest about three months ago we bought this new house and a lot of garden items had been left here including the greenhouse behind me the shed that we just recently renovated there's a lot of land here as well which will become more garden space but right now i'm focusing on creating more plantings around the kitchen because around the kitchen so just a few steps away from where you're cooking and preparing food is the best place to be growing things like salad leaves and culinary herbs and that's because of convenience just nipping outside and harvesting at will will really help you to start using and experimenting with flavors a lot more now alongside this lovely astro turf patio which was also left here is this concrete planter and up until yesterday it was planted well it was self-planted with doc and fox gloves which were lovely and i've been enjoying and the bees have been enjoying all summer and also a big clump of kracosmia and kracosmia is a garden plant i think it's from south africa originally but in any case it loves the climate here and it spreads everywhere it's one of my least favorite plants so i removed all of those plants and what i found is that they were all growing fairly shallowly the dog root was the exception because it does have long tap roots but the soil was just so compacted and dry and i was surprised that anything was really growing in here i guess only the hardiest types of wild and even cultivated plants could but i want to use this space for growing useful plants for growing things that we can eat and so i need to get it into much better nick before i plant the sage and thyme in here that i have planned for this space now they've been living in containers since the move and i want to give them a bit more space to spread out i'd also like to plant some more seeds so herb seeds around them see how they do but i can't do anything with this space until i fix this soil now fortunately fixing it is relatively quick and i'm going to do it just now and then i can plant in it and then take measures to keep the soil healthy and moist afterwards so first step was clearing it i've also made sure that the soil isn't compacted although it's dry you can see it's it's pretty loose now it was hard as a rock yesterday i was really excavating at it let's just say that it was difficult to even dig it so i was using a hand tool to kind of bust it up there are still some clumps in it i've got clay soil here at the house and there are some stones i'm not too concerned about the stones that the larger ones i'll all pick out as i spot them but the next step is adding a bit more moisture moisture is the bringer of life and as far as what i need to do now is i need to make sure that the soil is moist all the way through and i've just sprayed a little bit on right now and you think wow it looks wet it's sorted but if i just dig down here in the center you can see it's still really dry so that means when you are wetting the soil you need to be very thorough and soak it and dig it over and then soak it again and the amount of water that your you'll use will be different based on the planter or the garden bed and the size of your watering can just get it to the point where when you're digging it over and you can dig down to about a spade's depth like that it's all fairly moist or that you can incorporate it and get it to a nice moist texture we've added moisture but soil on its own doesn't hold on to moisture it dries out and it will go back to that same state in no time but adding compost will help to create a bulk within the soil this is like a sponge it hangs on to moisture and it's also filled with nutrients you can use homemade garden compost you can use mushroom compost from mushroom farms you can use bagged compost we've just moved into this house i don't have any homemade garden compost ready at the moment so i'm using bagged and this is a peat free mix and all i'm gonna do is push it into this bed and then dig it in it's important that we dig it into this soil because it needs it it needs that structure especially in a planter scenario if you are out in the garden and you want to improve your soil you don't have to dig it in you can just lay it on the top and worms will bring it down into the soil for you for this bed which is about i guess that's about two feet wide by what about six foot long that's just about a wheelbarrow load of compost and i'm just going to pull it out into all the corners and then i'm going to dig it in now this is really lovely stuff should be for the price and by mixing it with the soil you are essentially creating a really nice mix of that crushed rock which is what soil is and the organic matter so compost is made out of the remains of plants that have been broken down and wood food if you are composting at home and doing kitchen scraps other types of waste as well you can also use aged manure which is one of my favorite compost to use and then get that really worked in this is going to take me a few minutes so we're going to fast forward i'm pretty happy with that mix it's about a one to one mix i would say this ratio at least here on the surface so it's one part compost to one part the soil that was already in this planter and right now i'm just leveling it out and trying to break up any of the last clumps that are here on the surface you can clearly see where the compost is and where the soil is because the soil here it is just such a dull brown color but that will change with time with moisture and nutrients in this bed worms will recolonize it and work it back into a really nice soil medium right the next step the exciting step we're going to put some plants in here and i just have them sat over here at the side a couple of time and a sage for now so let me just grab them and put them in situ i think this one here this one's been living in a in a pot for a while but this one has only been in the pot since i took down the herb spiral this was a time that was in the herb spiral but i'm gonna plant it here because i haven't quite decided what i'm going to do with the herb spiral just yet oh i think that will do perfectly now i'm not immediately planting them i'm putting them out here in their pots first just to make sure that the spacing is all right and i think that that's good if you planted one and then you bring the next one in and then the next one and you find you've run out of space you can understand why it's just easier just to set them out here and have a look first okay so i'm going to get these planted next and then we'll go into the next step [Music] that's looking really good i'm pleased with that sage in the middle a time on either side all of them will get quite a bit bigger especially the sage in the center it can get double that size in all directions pretty much so out to here provided that the soil is nutrient rich enough and it's getting enough moisture which hopefully it will and speaking of moisture what i'm going to do next is water it in again and this is just because i've turned over that soil when i've been digging these plants in it's starting to dry out already and these plants need a really good drink the final step is top dressing this bed with yet more compost now this is called mulching and i think that there's a lot of misunderstandings and misinterpretations as to what mulch is because i think in certain parts of the world people tend to refer to wood chip or bark as mulch as more of a decorative type element but mulch has a function it reduces weeds because it stops those weeds from germinating it's so it's a heavy weighted layer but if you use the right kind of mulch like compost it can hold moisture in it can also feed the soil underneath because of the nutrients that will be pulled down by worms and water and it just helps to keep the soil underneath moist and oftentimes when you see a vegetable garden that's really productive and there's lots of bare soil it'll look like it's bare soil but it's actually this it's just compost and without putting on this layer of compost so this is i'm going to try to get one and a half inches deep here without it that soil will just get really dry and lifeless all over again it's it's a quite sunny space here i've got these concrete blocks making up this planter so anything that i can do to help retain water is going to help my plants that are growing in this space and this will benefit your plants too so no matter where you're gardening in containers or out in the garden laying a layer of mulch on the soil is going to help retain that water now you can use compost like i'm using right now and this is great for my climate so in britain compost is the best mulch to use but if you live in a really arid climate then straw or even pine needles people use them and you can use those as mulch as well or in a pinch you can also use cardboard and newspaper although that doesn't last as long and it doesn't look as nice either compost is probably the best as far as nutrients retaining water looking nice and also if you're making it yourself then you can have a good supply on hand you know where it's come from and it will save you a lot of money i am so pleased with how this has turned out it is so rewarding taking a space that was pretty much unused and then just through the simple action of adding compost and water and a bit of time and effort transforming it into something that is going to be productive and useful for us the bees are going to love the time flowers so they're not missing out on anything and i will continue to water this as well to make sure that it stays in a really good state it's important to keep that soil hydrated so no matter whether you're growing in containers or large planters like this you do need to keep on top of watering rain isn't enough especially in the heat of summer and when i do water into this i will be watering straight through this mulch and it will be going down into the soil and get locked in now compost is the magic ingredient with fixing dry soil and revitalizing soil and if you want to save money you should make it yourself and i have a very easy method for making compost and i would recommend that you check out that video next if you would like to learn how you can transform kitchen scraps and garden waste and cardboard into black gold thank you so much for watching this video i'll see you next week for another here on lovelygreens bye for now [Music] you

Channel: Lovely Greens

Views: 21,770

Rating: 4.9337626 out of 5

Keywords: allotment, grow your own, vegetable gardening, allotment gardening, gardening tips, gardening, edible garden

Id: V0l437j7UVY

Length: 15min 14sec (914 seconds)

Published: Sun Jul 25 2021