Soil Health Principles

When your soil is very degraded it’s in what is considered in the first successional stage. This is where soils start the restoration process on their own beginning with weeds. This process takes nature hundreds of years or more in our dry climate. We can push succession along using a specific methods and get the work done in a few seasons. The problems we are trying to solve are numerous. Compaction, weeds, and low moisture retention are the primary indicators that something is wrong. Disease tends follow.

The processes of soil restoration are the same whether you are trying to get to a vegetable garden, a lawn, a food forest or any other plantings.

In soil restoration I use a combination of things. The first is microbial rich compost. This is an important key in pushing succession from weeds to desired plants. It’s important to know that not all compost is created equally. It’s best to learn the compost process that gets the end result we are looking for and do it yourself. This ensures that you have control of all the ingredients and the process so that you don’t end up with putrified organic matter that sets your soils back in succession. I once had a neighbor buy a garden mix that was heavy in compost from a local garden materials supply company. Nothing would grow in it, not even weeds, for 4 years. We never found out what specifically was in it, but I suspect that it had a measurable amount of herbicide. This is why it is important to make your compost. There are many techniques involved with the compost making process. Once you try out a few you will find one that works for you. The internet is full of compost technique information, though I wouldn’t trust all of it. Thermophillic compost is the fastest with the highest learning curve, static compost is the easiest pile type compost but takes the longest, sheet mulching is layering in place and allowing the compost process to happen over a series of months (usually put down in fall and planted into in spring). Vermicompost is very appropriate when all you have to contribute to the compost process is food scraps and can be done indoors.

The second part of soil restoration is to follow the 5 tenets of soil health. These are an important reminder of what we should be adhering to to achieve optimal soil health. They are as follows:

1. Soil armor. — Our soils should be covered at all times. This means either a mulch cover or plant cover, always. This prevents evaporation, aids in soil cooling, and helps prevent compaction. Compaction is bad.

2. Minimize soil disturbance. — No tilling, ever. When we create disturbance we disrupt the microbial communities that create soil structure, cycle nutrients, and keep water in the soil. This sets back succession and weeds seeds get the signal to germinate. Tilling also creates compaction. Compaction is bad.

3. Plant diversity — Each plant family has a separate microbiome. When we plant many plant families together their separate microbiomes begin to cooperate. When we plant a high diversity of plants we see healthier plants, less disease and better seed and fruit production.

4. Continual live plant — We are feeding the microbiome. When we don’t have a living root in place there aren’t sugars going to the biology. The good and diverse biology either dies or goes dormant. This sets back succession to weeds.

5. Livestock/animal integration — This one can be challenging in an urban setting but is important nonetheless. Animals provide services. They graze, trample, and make nutrient deposits in our soils. These can be domestic or wild, though it’s easier to manage the domestic animals.  

The last part of this overview is no chemicals, organic or synthetic, ever. When we use biocides or artificial fertilizers we kill all the good things in our soils that give us the results we want. The use of these chemicals makes us addicted to them by requiring their use indefinitely.

As plant people we tend to look at our struggling plants and want to help them, we need to remember that if our plants are struggling we have a soil problem. Practicing the soil health principles alleviates the problems over time, allows us to do less work with fewer inputs and makes our gardens stronger.