4th September 2022
Soil care workshop
“A healthy soil breathes, recycles waste, promotes active growth, stores nutrient and cleans water. Soil enables basic life processes for all living things. When soils are damaged so is life as we know it.”
We spent the day mixing our own soil for use in the containers.
A healthy productive soil has a balance of:
Moisture
Gases
Mineral fractions
Micro organisms
Organic matter
Together these contribute to the main function of soil which is to break down large physical and organic compounds to simpler ones that are absorbed by plant roots and used by soil organisms. Each of these five main elements not only differs depending on the soil but also interacts with all the other elements.
As we’re container gardening we can choose the makeup of our soil. On the day we mixed these ingredients together:
Top soil - this is an existing soil, a mix of clay or sand, minerals, and organic matter
Coir - added to improve drainage and water retention, good for containers
Compost - decomposed organic matter, for extra nutrients
Biochar (charcoal) - improving water and nutrient retention, improved drainage, and aeration, providing a habitat for beneficial soil microbes
Powdered seaweed - contains useful plant nutrients, including nitrogen, potassium, phosphate, and magnesium
By Stephen Shiell, community gardener
