Ps… I got quite excited recording this episode and there’s a lot of ‘you knows’ and ‘ums’ and ‘sooo’ please do your best to ignore those,🙏 It's the 5th Dec so that means ‘ Happy World Soil Day!! Today is the day you get a pass to totally nerd out on your friends and talk all day about soil. Fun facts to share around with your non gardening friends. There is more living organisms in a tablespoon of healthy soil that there are humans on earth. The largest living organisms isn't a whale it’s a fungus that is found in Oregon USA and it’s the size of 1665 football fields, is estimated to be between 200-800 years old and is mostly made of carbon. Another fact is that is not so fun is that it is estimated that the world topsoil will be depleted within the next 60 years and some even say it's as little as 30 years. That shit is scary. So this week I was planning to do a super short episode because I spend the weekend doing a plant based bush survival course where for 2 whole days we learnt about edible wild plant, bush medicine, survival tactics, tracking, natural fibre rope making, fire starting and lots more. My body is battered and bruised but I am feeling a hugely renewed sense of connection to the earth. But because it’s World Soil Day I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to share a few things that can help you improve your soil. I am by no means a soil expert. I am learning from others and am still making a bunch of mistakes and learning from these as I go. I can share though that early next year we will have a really cool guest on to share her knowledge about soil and compost. This lady knows her shit… especially in compost. So make sure your episode notifications are on or you check in every few weeks so you don’t miss it. But for today you and I are going to chat about 5 ways you can support the soil web in your own patch by looking at 5 ways guaranteed to help you improve your solid health. Even if you just did one of these things you will see improvements. First one is Increase organic matter. Organic matter is anything that was once upon a time living or has come from a living thing. Another way to say it is anything that contains carbon compounds that were formed by living organisms. Parts of or whole plants, grass clippings, manures, dead bodies.. I’m not suggesting to bury someone in your backyard but the beloved pet you buried under the tree added to the organic matter. Feathers, wool, fur, hair, bones, kelp, paper, algae, fungi, all of these break down and add to the organic matter. Compost is a great way to decompose these so that the nutrients can become plant available and the compost adds overall structure to the soil allowing for moisture retention and oxygen to reach roots. It also helps maintain a stable PH level. Chop and drop is a great way to add organic matter right at the source. When you plants are spent don’t pull them out, instead chop them off at or slightly below ground level and chop them up into smaller bits and leave them to break down. You can also add mulch, leaves and aged manures to your garden directly. Depending on what manure you use you may need to go easy on it to keep a good balance. Second way is to stop using pesticides and herbicides. Yep. STOP. I know it’s disheartening when your hard work is getting eaten by bugs or it seems like you are forever battling weeds but I 1000% promise you if you are using pesticides and herbicides you are doing way more harm than good. Keep the bugs at bay through companion planting. Plant things that attract beneficial insects that eat the buggers that are attacking your plants. Plant other things that will either attract the pest and use these as sacrificial plants or plant deterrents. To give you an example, if you struggle with aphids (who doesn’t from time to time) then plant things that attract bugs that love to snack on aphids or plant things that aphids love to each away from your prized patch. Nasturtium and a range of other plants can act as an attractant drawing them away. This year my dandelions were covered in aphids and ladybugs were loving it. Yet there were zero on any other plants even the ones growing only 30 cms away. The episode on companion planting will give you a few more ideas too. You can also remove bugs by hand. Laborious but better than chemicals. Blasting them with water can be quite satisfying too. Remove weeds by hand. Grab a weeding tool that is suitable for your garden and weed types that will cause the least amount of disturbance. Or chop them off and use them for compost or weed tea. I would only chop and drop weeds without seeds otherwise you have just effectively planted the weed you are trying to remove. I learnt this the hard way. Another great way to suppress weeds is to plant green manure crops during garden downtime. This has loads of benefits like minimising erosion of bare soil from wind or rain, adding nutrients back into the soil through nitrogen ...
