Amending the soil

Now that we have the answers from our little experiment on soil testing, what do we do with the information?  Well, we need to prep the ground for planting; add what is missing.  Nitrogen needs to be added, blood meal is a nice organic answer.  I won't tell you what it is made from, but I bet you can guess.  It also will keep the wild chickens away (remember old farmland, now city).  We also need to till the ground to break up the compacted sand/clay soil.

The yard is covered in an unidentified grass that has been growing since the house was built.  It's never been watered either, thanks to my father.  He was a pioneer, and probably didn't even know it.  He said, "If it is meant to grow, it will grow.  Whether we water or not".  After looking into making a Florida friendly yard, that is exactly how it should be done.  The point is, the grass that is growing now is so tough, it has withstood months of very little rain.  To even get to the soil, you have to take a shovel and cut into the roots of the grass because it is so matted together and tightly bound to the earth.  So, my soil is going to get some sweat into it also.  It should be good for it.

There are many methods to amending the soil.  I really don't know if one is better than another.  They all create the same effect.  We chose our method because we are limited on resources, but have plenty of sweat to add.

All of our yard is pretty well flat and devoid of rocks and shrubs.  We didn't need to remove any of that.  We have some compost/manure bags on hand.  So, we dig out the area that the new garden is going to go into, to a depth of six to eight inches.  We add what amendment are needed.  In our case, organic matter and nitrogen.  Most Florida gardens would need nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium.  The fertilizer grade that is most recommended is 6-6-6.  That is 6% of each element to add.

Visit http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/vh025 Fertilizing the Garden, for more information.

Now that amendments are added, we replace the soil we removed and cover the ground with weed tarp or heavy plastic.  The weed tarp/heavy plastic will kill off the grass that was disturbed and let the fertilizer settle into the soil.  We are going to give this two months.  Waiting this time period is good for two reasons:

     1. It is the start of summer, and boy does it get hot here!
     2. It is the start of rainy season, and what good would adding nutrients to the soil be if they just run off with the rain?