Stone ground what to do. How to make the soil loose, fertile, is there any benefit from green manure, interesting links

Happy owners of summer cottages are well aware that it is impossible to get rich land on a plot without effort. For this you need to work hard. But before proceeding with the transformation, it is important to determine its initial state. It depends on what additives and in what quantity to apply. How to make the soil loose and fertile will be discussed in our article.

How to make the soil loose and fertile

Ideally, if the natural land from the site can be taken to an agro-laboratory, where a complete analysis will be done. Its results will show exactly how to optimize the soil in the country. Unfortunately, for most owners, such testing is not available. No problem! Some characteristics can be determined independently, for example, mechanical composition. It is responsible for the content of air and moisture. You can recognize it yourself if you moisten a small amount of earth with water and make a ball out of it. As a result:

• the figurine crumbles - it means that the soil is sandy;
• the ball can be rolled into a cord and form a ring - the soil is considered clayey.

In the first case, additives are needed to retain moisture. You can loosen heavy soil with coarse sand or grassroots peat. For any type of land, nutritious top dressings will be needed, the best are organic fertilizers.

manure fertilizer

Animal waste products contain a full range of substances necessary for plants. That is why the application of organic fertilizers makes the soil fertile. Any type of manure is brought under garden and horticultural crops - cow, pig or horse. Attention! It is important to follow these rules:

1. Fresh fertilizers can only be applied in autumn to empty areas, where there are no plantings, for example, in a garden. Manure in this form is an aggressive substance that is dangerous for plants. Therefore, it must be added to the soil in advance, 5-6 months before planting. During this time, it will be converted to a safe state, and nutrients will become available to plants. The additive not only serves as top dressing, but also acts as a baking powder for the garden soil.
2. Decomposed fertilizers can be applied in the spring, during planting.

• horse - 5-6 kg;
• cow - 4-5 kg.

The amount of rotted manure is halved. Pig manure is not recommended to be applied fresh even in autumn due to the high content of aggressive nitrogen in the ammonia form. Fertilizer must be kept for at least a year before complete decay. It is better to mix with horse or cow or lay in compost.

Mulching with cut grass

Can be used from early spring to late autumn. This type of soil fertilization is referred to as MDU - slow-acting fertilizers. The use of mulch allows you to:

1. Make the earth loose and soft in the garden and in the garden.
2. Retain moisture by reducing evaporation.
3. Provide constant top dressing, thanks to the gradual decomposition of the mulch.

Mowed grass is an effective leavening agent for heavy clay soils.

Planting plants with long roots

Proponents of organic farming recommend improving soil quality with green manure. Sow plants that have nodule bacteria on their roots that capture and bind nitrogen from the air. Thus, a natural environmentally friendly fertilizer is obtained. Thanks to a powerful root system, siderats make the soil crumbly, aerate it. This is especially important for heavy or peaty soils. To improve the structure and fertility of the soil, leguminous plants are most often used, for example, lupine, peas, alfalfa, vetch or beans. Even if your site has fertile soil, it needs to be improved periodically. To make the chernozem loose, it is also sown with green manure. This is more environmentally friendly than adding bulk additives and digging.

Green manure

Soil improvement is not a one-time event. You need to maintain optimal condition regularly. For this, it is not necessary to purchase expensive top dressing. You can use the plant material that is on each site:

• mowed lawn grass;
• weed weeds;
• sheared shoots;
• withered flowers, etc.

In fact, this is garden waste, but you can make effective fertilizer from it. Experienced gardeners offer useful tips for preparing green dressings. Here is one of them:

• a large volume container, for example, a barrel, is filled with crushed plant residues by two-thirds;
• fill with water to the top;
• insist a week and a half, stirring daily.

Before feeding, the resulting concentrated solution is filtered and diluted in a ratio of 1:10.

other methods

To improve the structure of heavy soil, it is easiest to use coarse-grained washed river sand. To make light soil from medium loam, you need 21 kg / m 2. This is about one and a half buckets with a volume of 10 liters. The sand is evenly distributed over the surface and dug up to a depth of 20–25 cm, to a full shovel bayonet. When preparing a plant mixture for seedlings, sand is almost always used. It is mixed with peat and compost to form a light nutrient substrate. Fertilizers that contain calcium are good baking powder:

• slaked lime;
• dolomite flour;
• ash.

They are applied to acidic soils to neutralize the pH level. Sometimes soil optimization on the site is a long and costly process. It is easier to take fertile land from manufacturers who mix all the necessary components in advance.

Improve the soil on the site yourself or add the finished mixture, everyone decides for himself. It depends on your financial capabilities and scope of work.

The development of a summer cottage, where nothing cultural has grown for a long time, is not a quick matter. How to make beds that will give a good harvest next year? The well-known gardener and gardener Nikolai Kurdyumov tells how to improve clay soil, sandy and how do-it-yourself beds differ from ordinary ones.

My friend in his youth lived in the famous village of Starocherkasskaya, the capital of the Don Cossacks. Don floodplain, meadow chernozems, two meters high, soft. And his garden was also on the site of the old regimental stables.

I remember he sincerely complained: well, it's a real torment to harvest! Potatoes in weeds - almost a bucket from a bush, beets - two pieces no longer fit into a bucket! Of course, to improve such soil is only to spoil it. It is enough for her to return as much organic matter as has grown on it. And digging it is a crime. But we have few such happy places. My friend is just lucky.

For us, simple clayey, in order to achieve good fertility, we need to work with the soil. And in order not to wait years, it is better to immediately improve the soil in the beds - the first and last time, but dramatically. Oh, how many times I regretted not doing it right away!

Soil improvement during site development: where to start

If your soil is heavy loam, then you need humus, sand, and, if possible, a fine screening of expanded clay. If it is poor sandy loam, clay and humus are needed. In both cases, a third of the new volume of the beds should be organic matter, which has rotted to varying degrees. And only a peat bog needs fresh nitrogenous organics: grass or hay, kitchen waste, unusable grain or spoiled feed. And also some clay and sand.

Renowned Austrian permaculturist and nature farmer Sepp Holzer uses his method to rapidly build up a humus reserve in extremely poor soils and harsh climates. A trench 40–50 cm deep and of the same width is dug in place of the beds. It is clogged with dry trunks, branches, rotten. This is the primary supply of slow organics and a "sponge" for moisture during the drought.

Then the trench is dug in, and in the Sepp version, the earth is thrown from the sides, fitting into a rampart 70–100 cm high. The meaning of the rampart is a huge difference in microclimate. Sunny windward side - hot and dry. Sunny lee - hot and humid, subtropics. Shady without wind - humid and not hot, shady with wind - not hot, but it blows out moisture.

On the shady side, the plants will climb up the ridge. In the sun - they will bush and fly, like on the beach. Given all this, Sepp sows the shaft with a mixture of different plants - cereals, pumpkins and squash, beans, corn and sunflowers - everything that has large seeds and quickly increases biomass.

By the way, the area of ​​the slopes of the rampart is one and a half of the area of ​​its base.

The finished shaft is covered with straw or hay, strengthened from the wind with branches, and the branches with longitudinal poles. The great dignity of the shaft - early and fast heating of the soil. A trench formed between the ridges - branches were also placed in it and covered with straw. The roots will reach here too.

Sowing is done directly into the straw using a pointed peg. Seeds germinate after rains. All plant residues remain on the ridge. A year later, potatoes are planted here, and various rutabaga with turnips, and pumpkins with zucchini, and on top - a wall of corn.

Beautiful, deep, natural! But to be honest, this is for the most enthusiastic permaculture and personally Sepp owners of a hectare. For my garden, three acres is not an option. We are not accustomed to climbing steep ramparts and unraveling freely mixed bushes. We do not know the behavior of different plants so much. I won't take it from the air. So I'm leaning towards more conventional methods.

In my early books - "according to John Jevons". In fact, all smart gardeners and growers do this. But it just so happened: Jevons wrote a bestseller, I read it in the late 90s and was impressed.

John is an American organ farmer and hard worker, the inventor of "bio-intensive mini-agriculture" (BIMZ). The yields from his beds were many times larger than traditional ones - you must admit, this is impressive.

He began to invent on extremely bad, poor soil. Therefore, I improved it immediately, and then increased fertility not from scratch. The meaning is simple: you need to mix the soil with organic matter (and, if necessary, with sand or clay) to a depth of two bayonets of a shovel. Well, two bayonets - this is in hot California. One and a half (35-40 cm) is enough for us. And three or four spades wide.

Jevons suggests mixing the soil with the additives as you work your way up the bed: take off the top layer, mix the bottom with compost, put the top layer back on, mix it with the compost, move a little further... I keep it simple. Improving my clay bed with sand, I take out the most fertile top layer entirely and fold it from the edge. I mix additives into the bottom and return the top layer to its place, also mixing something.

The top, most organic layer is taken out, it is on the left. The bottom is mixed with sand. The top layer is returned in the same way with sand. This is the only way I have been able to drastically reduce the density of my clay soil. The comfort zone for the roots has almost doubled in depth. It remains to re-structure the soil - this will be done by worms and roots.

So let's take the best of both worlds. We take out the top 10–15 cm of the most fertile soil. We deepen the bottom with a trench deep into the bayonet of a shovel. In the trench - logs and thick branches, but not thick, so that the capillary connection with the subsoil is quickly restored.

It is harmless to lightly powder this windbreak with some kind of nitrogen fertilizer, moisten it with a dung mash or the contents of a dry closet - it will rot faster. It is useful to throw in some fresh weeds - the same nitrogen. In the dry south it is exceptionally harmless to pour hydrogel, circles per square meter.

We return down the subsoil from the trench, pushing it between the pieces of wood. We scatter the excess subsoil in the aisles or take it away. At the bottom we put one or two strips of immature compost or grass, flavored with EM, "Shine" or another bioactivator. Then we fill the bed with the top layer taken out, interspersed with additives (sand / clay) and humus.

It turns out a raised bed - a convex gentle shaft. The bulge adds a lot of space and light to the plants, and in the spring it better receives the sun's rays. For the damp Non-Black Earth Region and - an ideal option for do-it-yourself beds. In the steppe zone, you need and.

In the photo - beds-ridges on the site of Irina Kalmykova on Taman. They warm up much earlier and better. Here, in a very dry area, they are covered with a special mulch film, under which drip tapes lie.

The result of our sweating: the bed is ready to immediately give a decent harvest. The difference is visible in the first year. Look at the photo. Three cucumber bushes on the right are on improved soil, two on the left are on normal soil. Garden L. Lobanov, Ivanovo.

In the next photo, the soil on the right is also improved. Filling with organics and bioactivator at the same time added warmth to the soil. Eggplant yield is 9 times more than from the left control bush. Experience of A. Bushikhin, Yaroslavl.

Already a lot! But this is only the beginning. The soil is not yet inhabited by living creatures, not structured, not pierced by roots, not sown with coprolites of worms and other poop. Now we will improve it every year with natural forces: plants, worms, microbes and fungi. But it is already easy. Our main business is feed the soil workers and all kinds of organic matter. Another important work don't disturb them. The rest they will do themselves. And I assure you - they will make it as wonderful as you never dreamed of.

Comment on the article "How to improve the soil in a summer cottage? 2 ways"

Raised beds in winter. Arrangement of the site. Dacha, garden and vegetable garden. Dacha and country plots: purchase, improvement, planting trees and shrubs, seedlings, beds, vegetables, fruits, berries, harvest.

Who has stationary beds? On the beds. Dacha, garden and vegetable garden. Dacha and country plots: purchase, improvement, planting trees and Who has stationary beds? Please share your impressions, whether it is comfortable or not, what they are made of, how you take care of it, and so on. Thank you.

We make a "warm bed" in an empty area, we dig a large hole under the bed. The depth is about 30 cm, we put slate along (you can make a fence from boards) deepening a little into the ground. It turns out a hole and about 20 cm above the ground. We dump weeds, leftover food into this pit ...

Section: Arrangement of the site (optimal bed). Optimum bed width and material of manufacture. Please share your experience. What size garden bed is best for growing greens? And is it worth buying galvanizing or wood is better.

High beds - share your experience. On the beds. Dacha, garden and vegetable garden. Dacha and dacha plots: purchase, landscaping, planting trees and Between the beds made a distance for the lawn mower to pass. The last two weeks since mid-May have not been at the dacha, they arrived ...

Dacha and dacha plots: purchase, landscaping, planting trees and shrubs, seedlings, beds You can’t burn them (it turns out that you can’t burn anything at all in the plots). What to do with oak leaf? Soil covered with organic fertilizers warms up faster in spring...

Dacha, garden and vegetable garden. Dacha and dacha plots: buying, landscaping, planting trees and shrubs, seedlings, beds, vegetables, fruits, berries, the question is something like this: how to build beds-boxes from this wealth? that is, is it possible without cultivating the soil at all ...

Made two beds (radish and lettuce). Both are covered with arches by Agrotex-30. The instructions for the material indicate that you can water without removing the material. On top of the material? PySy - I have been gardening for the first year.

Dacha, garden and vegetable garden. Dacha and country plots: purchase, landscaping, planting trees and Now I am digging up the cultivated areas - I remove the roots just in case, and I will not improve the soil. It just kills everything that has already grown green. That is, for weed seeds and ...

Arrangement of the site. Dacha, garden and vegetable garden. Dacha and country plots: purchase, improvement, planting trees and shrubs, seedlings, beds, vegetables, fruits, berries, harvest. Today, it is rare in which suburban area you will not see at least a small lawn or its likeness.

Dacha, garden and vegetable garden. Dacha and country plots: purchase, improvement, planting trees and shrubs, seedlings, beds, vegetables, fruits, berries, harvest. We dug grooves around the site so that all the rainwater from the site would drain into the pond. And she does not allow the soil to be empty.

overgrown area. Arrangement of the site. Dacha, garden and vegetable garden. Summer cottage and summer cottage plots: purchase, landscaping, planting Usually, along the perimeter fence, the area is easily overgrown with weeds, so we carefully monitor cleanliness Planting potatoes in a summer cottage ...

what to plant in the area? Arrangement of the site. Dacha, garden and vegetable garden. Dacha and country plots: purchase, landscaping, planting trees and Your advice is very needed! There is a plot of 6 acres. The ground is wet and swampy. We plan to bring in the soil in the spring. What can be planted on such a...

beds for the beginner. On the beds. Dacha, garden and vegetable garden. Dacha and country plots: purchase, improvement, planting trees and shrubs, seedlings, beds, vegetables, fruits, berries, harvest. Help the kettle, how to make beds, where to start, what to buy, what kind of land?

Arrangement of the site. Dacha, garden and vegetable garden. Cottage and country plots: purchase Advise what grows well on a site where the sun is around the clock and the soil is loam. Let's talk about how to improve soil fertility under the soil layer, especially on cold soils (clay...

Teach the fool to make beds!. Arrangement of the site. Dacha, garden and vegetable garden. Dacha and country plots: purchase, improvement, planting trees and shrubs, seedlings, beds, vegetables, fruits, berries, harvest.

Arrangement of the site. Dacha, garden and vegetable garden. Dacha and country plots: purchase, landscaping There is an uncultivated low area, about three acres is water even in summer. Soil acidity: how to determine and change the pH of the soil in a summer cottage, what is dangerous ...

Arrangement of the site. Dacha, garden and vegetable garden. Dacha and country plots: purchase, landscaping, planting trees and shrubs, seedlings Grass - why is it not growing? They did something wrong. We dug up the site, leveled it, sowed grass, sprinkled fertilizer, walked with a rake.

Technique for giving. Dacha, garden and vegetable garden. Dacha and country plots: purchase, improvement, planting trees and shrubs, seedlings, beds, vegetables, fruits, berries, harvest. 3 ways to deal with weeds in spring and summer. What to do in the country while it is snowing. Print version.

If your site has heavy clay soil, then you should not despair. Heavy clays in the Kuban are not uncommon. It is possible to significantly improve clay soil, its condition, however, this will take a lot of time (perhaps several years), a lot of physical, material costs. How to do it? Such soils require a lot of effort during cultivation. The terms heavy or light soils characterize their granulometric or mechanical composition. It is determined by the relative content of particles of various sizes in it. In our country, the classification of soils according to the granulometric composition of N.A. Kachinsky (1943) is usually used. It is based on the ratio of physical clay (particles less than 0.01 mm) and physical sand (particles from 0.01 to 1 mm). Heavy clay soil contains over 80% clay and less than 20% sand.

Small particles of clay adhere tightly to each other, as a result of which such soil becomes impervious to water and air. Moreover, in the absence of oxygen in it, the process of decomposition of organic matter is greatly slowed down. Clay soils are rich in nutrients, but if it is too acidic or alkaline, then they will not be available to plants. Due to the high density, heavy clay soils are of little use for growing root crops (potatoes, beets, carrots). But roses, as well as many fruit trees, feel great on them.

Heavy soils with a high percentage of clay tend to contain more nutrients but warm slowly. Moisture that falls in the form of rain or snow does not penetrate well into the underlying horizons. Often it stagnates in relief depressions, forming the so-called saucers. Usually in such places acidification of the earth occurs.

After heavy rains, a strong crust forms on the surface of heavy clay soils, preventing the penetration of air into the lower soil horizons. And during drought - it is strongly compacted, cracking. At the same time, heavy clays are difficult to handle manually or mechanized. A distinctive feature is their acidic reaction, which adversely affects the growth and development of most cultivated plants.

How to improve clay soil? Where to begin?

You need to start with a revision of the layout of your site, eliminating all the uneven terrain in order to avoid stagnant water. When carrying out autumn digging of heavy soils, including clay ones, it is not recommended to break up large lumps. Winter frosts, moisture will destroy these lumps, significantly improving the structure of the upper horizon. To prevent clay soil from compacting further, autumn digging must be completed before the onset of rains. And in the spring everything needs to be dug up again.

To increase the number of large mineral particles in the ground, experts at the beginning of the last century recommended using crushed bricks sifted through a large-mesh sieve for digging. It should be scattered over the area of ​​\u200b\u200bthe plot with a thickness of 9-13 cm, and then plowed along with fertilizers. If you carry out such an operation for several years in a row, then the clay soil can be improved beyond recognition.

It is clear that not everyone may have such a large amount of broken bricks at hand. Therefore, you can resort to a more accessible method by using plant residues (weeds, branches, bark) burnt together with the ground. Plant residues are burned along with roots, adhering earth, and the ash obtained in this way is brought in during digging. Sand application gives good results - from 0.5 to 1 bucket per square meter. When introducing crushed brick, sand or ash burnt with the ground, one should not forget that the main influence on the granulometric composition of the soil is the introduction of organic matter. And brick, ash or sand only enhance the effect.

It is recommended to make annually at least 1.5-2 buckets per 1 sq. a meter of rotted manure (preferably horse or sheep) or compost, which are not recommended to be buried deeper than 10-12 cm. In the surface layer of clay soil, rotted manure quickly mineralizes, creates favorable conditions for the development of soil microflora, earthworms, which play a major role in increasing fertility, making it looser, as well as air and water permeable.

Peat or sawdust can be used as organic matter. At the same time, it is not recommended to add red-brown peat, as it contains a large amount of iron, which can adversely affect the growth and development of plants. As for sawdust, they are brought in no more than 1 bucket per square meter, moistened with a solution of urea. To do this, 150 g of urea is dissolved in 10 liters of water. Pour 3 buckets of sawdust with this solution.

Experts believe that over the course of five years, with the annual introduction of organic matter, sand, the top arable layer (15-18 cm) will turn from clay to loamy. An invaluable service when introducing organic matter into the soil (especially sawdust) will be provided by biological preparations based on the fungus tribatrichoderma (Trichoderma harzianum) - Gliocladin, Sternifag.

Finally, it should be noted that the use of green fertilizers (green manure) is very effective in increasing fertility. Green manure can significantly improve clay soil. They change and improve the granulometric composition of heavy soils. As green manure, you can use crops of peas, wikis, phacelia, rapeseed, mustard, and other crops.

Improve heavy soils.

Loosening and aeration of heavy soils has a beneficial effect on the crop, so clay soils need our help and thanks to this very help we will turn it into fertile.

In general, heavy soils are soils with a high content of clay, feel a little greasy to the touch and form a shiny surface if you run your finger over it. From it you can form various figures and they will not fall apart. Congratulations, you have clay soil. Although it is rich in nutrients, it unfortunately cannot boast of moisture and breathability. In rainy weather, it is better not to walk on it, and even more so not to process it, since it is sticky and heavy when wet and still forms dense clods. And, on the contrary, in a dry form it is just a nightmare - it can be hard as a stone and with manifestations of cracks.

But it does not matter, the main thing is the land and it can be improved. Due to poor air permeability, the biological activity of these soils is very low. Microorganisms in this soil are not only lacking air, and sometimes they also lack heat. This whole picture can be improved in two ways:

Mechanically - by loosening and adding sand. This gives the soil more air and thus it will be better heated.

Organically - by adding organic substances, which also improves breathability and enriches with nutrients.

The first way is good in the fall - when digging and loosening the soil (yes, I know how hard it is), add additives such as a mature beam, compost, sand or synthetic substances (they can be purchased at specialized stores). It is also recommended to sow green fertilizers. (see Art. Green Manure) with deep roots, such as clover, lupine s or a mixture of legumes and herbs. Leave green fertilizers for the winter so that they freeze, and in the spring dig it all up. This will give us not only aeration of the soil but also fill it with organic matter.

Nothing works better for improving heavy soils than crumbly compost (see compost) that is prepared from garden waste, and not mature compost can be used as mulch (see ref. mulch). Spread the mature compost over the surface and bring it into the soil by digging. This will give us loosening, aeration and fertilizer for the soil.

So it is best to improve the soil - in the fall. Tidy up the beds and flower beds where we will improve the soil with you. We remove all weeds, loosen the soil with a pitchfork at least 20 cm, then scatter or distribute compost 10 cm thick on the surface and sprinkle flour from rocks on top with a thin layer. Then for the winter we cover with a thick layer of leaf mulch. Next year we plant potatoes in these places, it will loosen the soil for us, and as soon as we harvest, we plant green manure.

Or you can produce an alternative way to improve the soil:

Applying sand, lava granules or synthetic flake mixes in the fall improves breathability. Lupins, used as green manure, will provide the soil with deep loosening and enrich it. In the meantime, your soil is preparing and has not yet become fertile enough - plant vegetables in high beds.

Well, since I said nothing about additives to heavy soils, let's briefly explain what's what:

Leaf compost is an organic supplement; slightly sour; when using, add flour from rocks, carbonic lime, horn flour; aerates the soil.

Compost is an organomineral additive; fertilizes the soil, makes it more loose and crumbly; it needs to be spread out in a layer of 1-5 cm, superficially applied to the soil; suitable for mulching.

Ripe navoi - organic additive; decayed cow or horse dung; straw and flour from rocks should be added to fresh manure, left for a year and only then used.

Peat is an organic additive; slow growing natural product; loosens and oxidizes the soil; In order to protect the environment, it is better not to use this additive.

Chaff or pods - organic additive; breakdown product of spelled, rice or oats; quickly decomposes in the soil; loosens and aerates; contains few nutrients; put into the soil.

Lava granules - mineral supplement; crushed volcanic rock; rich in nutrients and trace elements; fertilizes, loosens; apply to soil or mulch.

Flour from rocks - a mineral supplement; rock, ground to a dusty state; rich in nutrients and trace elements; fertilizes; apply in a thin layer.

Coarse-grained sand - mineral additive; improves water permeability; additional organic matter is always required; do not use fine sand as it compacts the soil.

Lime is a mineral additive; fertilizer, which facilitates the supply of nutrients to plants; increases the acid balance of the soil, neutralizes acidic soils and activates the microflora.

I hope this information will be more than enough to get you started. Therefore, you can safely start fighting. The main thing to remember is that it is best to do it in the spring mulching m of soil and loosening in the fall. And in your gardens, heavy soils will be light and fertile. Good luck to you.