My first challenge is the soil. The area in which we live is very dry, the soil is composed of mostly sand.
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| The "East Garden" area. Untilled, mostly dead grass. |
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| The "South Garden" area. We will probably till from the edge of the house all the way to the end of the sidewalk. |
Our plan so far is to add horse, cow, rabbit, and chicken manure, wood fire ash, and hopefully some grass clippings or pine needles.We have just started a compost pile, so, unfortunately, this will not be ready for the spring garden. Perhaps we will be able to use it in the fall :-) I have found many articles discussing various things that can be added in order to improve the sandy soil. (Pinterest is also an endless source of ideas)
http://agverra.com/blog/sandy-soil/ This article has a lot of great advice including adding a good amount of organic material, watering frequently (or using soaker hoses), and adding mulch.
http://homeguides.sfgate.com/plant-vegetable-garden-sandy-soil-40703.html This article includes steps to preparing your sandy soil.The recommendation is to cover the soil with three inches of organic matter, then till it into the soil to about a foot and a half. Seeds also need to be planted about twice as deep in sandy soil. This article recommends mulching only after the plants are six inches tall.
We will be tilling this weekend and adding as much manure and wood ash as we can get a hold of. We are also going to measure the soil pH to see what we need to do to get it between 6.0 and 7.5. Here is a table I found that shows the optimum pH for some vegetables:
So we will see what our soil pH is on Saturday. Hopefully, it will be close to the appropriate range. Adding manure will help us to acidify it. We'll make a measurement before tilling or adding anything, then after, and with each new addition of organic material.
Looking forward to this weekend when we will start to prepare our soil!
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