My First Garden - Soil Prep

Although I was fortunate enough to be able to tend someone else's garden last year, I have never created one of my own.  This year is my first attempt at a garden, start to finish (although it would have been nice if I had done a little more prep before winter ... i.e. planting in GARLIC!).  I intend to use this garden as an extension of my "Practice of Sustainable Agriculture" program at school.  I will endeavor to communicate agricultural (farming) and horticultural (gardening) techniques in tandem with the underlying science.

As a beginning gardener, and someone coming from a non-season eating background, I find I don't have a good feel for what should be going on in the garden at any given time throughout the year. Thankfully my landlord lent me a publication entitled "The Maritime Northwest Garden Guide: Planning Calendar for Year-Round Organic Gardening". It is location specific and provides succinct information on what plants you should be staring indoors, sowing outdoors and other seasonal preparations.

There are two things that I have been trying to keep in mind throughout this process to justify my decisions.
1.) There are about a MILLION and a half ways to garden
2.) Plants WANT to grow


First up? Soil Prep!


Soil preparation is very important for gardens, as intensive techniques and extensive use of annual plants can deplete the soil of vital micro-nutrients. Soil is a actually a very beautifully complicated thing .. not just dirt, but a vast ecosystem of micro and macro biota (e.g. fungus, worms, insects, bacteria).  If you take good care of your soil, it will take good care of your plants.

As most of the beds I have been allotted this year have been out of intensive cultivation for at least a season or two, I have a lot of work to do.  The front yard of my home has been a garden for 8 years, but much of it was just mulched over by previous tenants. Below are some before and after shots of my prep

The initial process involved raking back the mulch layers, loosening the soil with a cultivating fork to a depth of 15-25cm and pulling out the weeds and grasses. I use a garden fork instead of a roto-tiller to avoid subsoil compaction and to spare the precious soil life (there are TONS of worms in this ground!).

To ensure the best possible fertility, a soil test was done via Black Lake Organics, indicating nutrient levels in our loam soil were fairly good, but could use a little adjustment to the Boron, Phosphate and Magnesium. A custom organic soil amendment was made for us, utilizing sulfate compounds of the aforementioned elements to also reduce pH slightly (currently at neutral pH 7.0, should be slightly acidic at pH 6.5 though).  

The soil amendment is sprinkled on at a ratio of about 1 Kg for every 5 m^2.  Then I fork it in, then cover with compost to ensure lots of microbial activity!