SOIL CONDITIONING- PART 2

For those having clay & sandy soil, this is not an end to you. You still can do something to make them fertile. In my opinion, either you plant in raised bed method or do soil conditioning.

 Raised bed is much easier, but you have to invest on buying good soil mix. Or.. buy separate materials for your soil mix & start DIY them. DIY is much cheaper than buying a ready-mix. For long term use of your garden raised-beds, I personally suggest you don’t add any fibers in the soil mix to avoid “uncontrolled” decompositions of the fibers & this will make your soil acidity decrease & later you will having issues with soil fungus etc.. BUT, for pot/ planter box, you can add fibers in it, & no issues of having them.

So, just use standard soil mix: burnt soil, sand & organic fertaliser (or compose if you can get it). It is a laborious work to do your soil mix & frankly, mixing them manually makes me backache! Don’t believe me? You better try your own! Since we have constant request of soil mix from customers, Mizi bought a small mixer to help him. We at IPlant Page sell our soil mix at RM1.80/ kg.


So, once you get your soil mix ready, you just fill up your raised bed with the soil, let it rest for a week or two & you can start planting what you like. To encourage higher activity of soil microbes, keep using organic fertalisers & your MOL.. these 2 are perfect match !

As time flies, your basal soil condition under your raised bed will eventually “alive”. The soil microbes activities in your raised bed will go down & slowly will start to make them fertile. This will takes about a year or more… depending on what you supplies to your soil.


Now the soil conditioning. It is one of methods to make them become a better soil.






It just an easy methods where you only need to identify a spot/ corner on where you are going to plant & focus to that area only.

To condition your soil, you only need organic fertaliser or compose, and MOL. That’s all!

What you do is to dig that area about feet or two & throw your organic fertaliser & pour your MOL. Addition of organic fertiliser & MOL every week or 2 will slowly condition your soil. It will be ready in as early as 3 months or more depending on your effort to keep adding organic fertaliser & MOL to the soil.

OR, if you don’t want to do the job, just plant your garden with plants compatible with your soil type, keep feeding your plants with all sorts of fertalisers or MOL, & eventually, your garden soil will slowly become “alive” and able to plant anything you like after that..


So peeps, the choice is yours! Happy gardening!

SOIL CONDITIONING - PART 1

What is that? It is a method to improve your soil health.. to make your soil become “alive”

I am writing this since My husband & I often being asked. How to plant in their (our customers) barren land. Having big space but unfortunately the soil is not fertile

From my experience & observation, there is few ways to make your soil alive. It requires lots of work but most of the time it works

So, how to make your soil/ land become alive? I can only suggest you few ways

But before that, you must know your soil first! It is a must!

Generally there are 3 soil types: clay, sandy & loam soil

How to distinguish?

Loamy soil.. the best soil for planting

Loam will form a lump when you squeeze it and it will crumble easily into small clumps. Clay, when mixed with water will form a hard lump that won't break up, and wet sand won't lump at all.

Clay soil

 

Loamy soil is the best soil for planting. Loamy soil consist of small & large particles & ideally able to hold water for your plants & excess water will be easily drained-out.

Sandy soil

Clay soil, as they consist of small particles, water addition will makes them binds together & holds water from being drained properly. This makes water retention higher in soil & limit aeration in soil & make your plants' roots drown, & most of the cases, root formation become slow & affect your plant growth.

 

Apakah tu soil conditioning ?

Mengikut pemahaman saya, ia adalah satu kaedah untuk meningkatkan kesihatan tanah .. untuk membuat tanah kita menjadi "hidup"

Kami (suami & saya) sering ditanya pelanggan oleh pelanggan beliau (my hubby of course).. Bagaimana nak bercucuk tanam atas tanah mereka yg tandus. Ada ruang yang besar tetapi malangnya tanah tidak subur

Dari pengalaman saya, terdapat beberapa cara untuk menghidupkan semula tanah. Ia memerlukan banyak kerja tetapi kebanyakan masa ia berkesan.

Saya hanya boleh mencadangkan anda beberapa cara.

Tetapi sebelum itu, kita perlu kenali juga tanah yg kita pijak itu terlebih dahulu! Ia adalah satu kemestian!

Secara umumnya terdapat 3 jenis tanah: tanah liat, berpasir & tanah liat

Bagaimana untuk membezakan?

Tanah loam akan membentuk ketulan apabila dipicit dan akan terlerai dengan mudah kecil. Tanah liat, apabila bercampur dengan air akan mengeras , dan pasir pula terus lerai atau poros

tanah loam adalah tanah yang terbaik untuk penanaman. Tanah loam paling ideal dan dapat memegang air untuk pokok kita & air yang berlebihan pula dengan mudah disalir keluar.

Tanah liat,oleh sifatnya yg sebegitu, setiap kali aktiviti penyiraman akan membuatkan mereka semakin padat & menyukarkan air daripada disalir keluar. Takungan air akan berlaku dan pengudaraan dalam tanah menjadi rendah membuatkan akar pokok-pokok 'lemas. Kebiasaannya dalam kebanyakan kes, pembentukan akar menjadi perlahan & menjejaskan pertumbuhan tumbuhan anda.

Saya akan sambung dlm part 2 nanti ya… sorry… writing needs time & commitments. & now I have to write bi-language