Soil analysis

Soil Testing

Limestone, clay or humic acid, or alkali ... All garden soils are different, and their characteristics depend strongly crops that succeed without effort, or those that require some improvements to the ground.  To know your soil, your soil!

   
    The levy
Part of the soil you need to analyze is one in which most plants will draw for their growth, ie a layer of soil between 20 and 30 cm deep, called topsoil.

Make sure you have glass jars (jam type) and a scoop (or trowel ).  Take the so-called small shovel depth at different locations in your yard so that the soil sample is representative. 

 Of course, if part of your garden is very sandy, and a streak of clay underlies your garden, the common sense to conduct two separate reviews! 

     Mixing and sample 

Open a newspaper or a plastic sheet; mix your different levies for something homogeneous.  You get like your "average soil", logically enough, representative of the ground of your garden. 

    

    Test Kit

Where to buy?

This kit is available at garden centers.  Looking good!  Its packaging makes it look like any other fertilizer or treatment ...  Sometimes it is stored near organic products.  Its cost is modest (about 8 €).

What does it? 

This kit can measure the pH of soil.  This is not a complete analysis, but at least you know the acidity of your soil and are valuable information.

Gardening ...  with the earth of her garden! 

Once the characteristics of the land better known, is it with gardening or against it?  In other words, the gardener should look at it by with his land, confining well suited to crops, or should it seek at all costs to change the structure of the soil to grow plants that it would appeal not without it? 

We are looking today for the first approach.  By with nature.  So if your site is really chalky, do-not have it

Composition 

The cardboard box contains strips, a bottle of distilled water and a test tube.
The procedure is very simple.  Simply, using a spoon, fill halfway up the test tube with the mixture made earlier.  Then fill with deionized water before shaking the tube vigorously after clogged. 

It remains only to let the land to settle, and dip a dipstick in the tube. The color taken by the paper then provides information on the acidity or alkalinity of the soil

    A full analysis?You can also fill a small plastic bag of 500 grams to 1 kg of the mixture, and give it to your garden, which will provide a laboratory equipped for soil analysis.  The information obtained will be much broader and comprehensive, but it's more expensive ...

Come calcifuges plants (azaleas, camellias, rhododendrons etc. ...),  If it is still possible to improve the long land, for example by rewarding with green manure land too poor, or reducing force leaf mold and ... 

Working clay soil, minimize chemical fixes. On the whole field a beautiful garden is possible: respect what nature gives us.