Organic Garden Soil
By Bruce Lee Deuley - 1/28/03

The secret to great-tasting vegetables, beautiful flowers, and healthy shrubs in your garden is healthy soil. Last week I gave you a basic soil amendment program. This week we will go a step further and "kick it up a notch" for those areas where you might want to put a vegetable garden or grow some really beautiful annual flowers.

To create a new bed area, scrape away all existing grass and weeds. Add 6 to 8 inches of a good organic compost along with 2 pounds of Texas greensand, 4 pounds of lava sand, and 3 pounds of whole ground yellow cornmeal per 100 square foot of garden area.

To this combination add 2 pounds of Organic fertilizer per 100 square foot of garden and till this whole combination into the top 3 inches of your native soil. Water and settle all of this in with a good bio-stimulant such as Medina Plus, Microsoil, or my homemade all purpose “Garrett Juice” made from Molasses, compost tea, liquid seaweed and apple cider vinegar.

Deep excavation of your native soil and ingredients such as peat moss, cement sand, or additional top soil are not necessary.

Broadcast a good organic fertilizer 2-3 times throughout the year and foliar feed once a month with Garret Juice or a good liquid organic fertilizer such as Medina Hasta-gro, Maxicrop or Bioform. Seaweed can be added to these mixtures and is good for helping to eliminate aphids and other pesky insects.

Put a layer of mulch around the seedlings when they are large enough and keep all soil covered with mulch throughout the year.

This organic approach will lessen the need for water so water only when necessary and not by the calendar. You will also find that problems such as insects, fungus, and other garden pests will be rare or nonexistent in a good organic program. Plants are usually attacked when they are not healthy or in the right environment. Hand pull weeds where possible and never use synthetic herbicides in you garden. If necessary you can spray or wick unwanted weeds with a mixture of 10-20% vinegar into which you have added 2 ounces of orange oil and a teaspoon of liquid dish soap. But be careful, any over spray could be bad for your desired plants. Vinegar is non-selective.

It’s a bit of hard work in the beginning but your garden area will give you years of service if you add organic material once a year. Greensand every 2 years and maintain your organic fertilizer and foliar spray program.

Good gardening and remember "feed the soil - let the soil feed your plants".

Next week: Transplants and seedlings