Hello brothers from Steemchurch and Farms, I have been interested in investing a bit more about the issues related to farms, so today I bring you one related to agriculture , before starting to create the garden you have to know the kind of soil we have. To know it, we must bear in mind that the earth is a mixture of several elements. Depending on the percentages of each of these elements you will have some characteristics.
One of the main elements of any ecological garden or urban garden is, undoubtedly, the soil. But all soils are not the same and it is important to know what kind of soil is ours to ensure good development of our plants.
Knowing the type of soil we have we can improve it to make it a more fertile environment. The first thing is to learn the components that make it up. All soil is composed of five types of elements: water (which acts as a solvent), inorganic matter or mineral residues, air pockets (located in solid spaces where water does not reach), microorganisms that inhabit the soil and organic matter derived from these living beings.
When growing plants in our soil, the proportion of water, air and organic matter is modified. The most superficial layer is the most subject to variations and over which we can have more control. A quality surface layer must continuously provide nutrients, water and air to the roots of our crops.
The imbalances in the soil layers affect the plants a lot: an excess of water causes waterlogging and an excessively compact soil, which prevents the roots from developing. The lack of nutrients affects growth, as well as a shortage of air or water.
What types of soil are there?
We can talk about five main types:
1 The sandy soil: It is the result of fluvial deposits of rivers, sediments carried away by the wind or the erosion of sandstone rocks. They present the quality of heating easily with heat, being easy to work with and favoring the work of bacteria. However they have little water presence due to drainage and have few nutrients.
2 The silty soil: It is very similar to the sandy one since they originate from similar materials, but the silt has less drainage capacity and has more presence of water, producing puddles. They are soft and sticky soils, therefore, very easy to work.
3 The clay soil: Composed of clay particles that provide a degree of plasticity. Clay has a great capacity to store water and nutrients, but it is a material with little permeability and therefore prone to waterlogging. In the absence of water the clayey soil cracks. If they receive adequate treatment, they are very fertile and productive, although due to their high degree of compaction they are difficult to work.
4 La marga: It is a combination of sand, silt and clay particles. Because of this, they present most of the advantages of the previous soils, while, a good loam, has hardly any disadvantages. We can differentiate between compact marls (with a high presence of clay, around 30%) and light marls (with a minor clay presence, which does not reach 18%).
5 The humus: It is a superficial layer of soil, caused by organic remains of plants that are in a state of partial decomposition. It is characterized by its high level of nutrients and a very dark color that facilitates rapid heating. It is a highly recommended soil for cultivation and, therefore, a good option to mix with our garden soil and enrich it.
How can we know what kind of soil we have?
Find out our soil type is very simple, to start you just need a little soil.
There is a very simple manual method that will allow us to immediately find out what is the type of soil in our garden or orchard. We do not need any additional utensils and it is a precise method. This method consists of taking a handful of soil from our soil, moistening it with water (enough to make a paste that we can knead). Next we will try to mold the paste in the following way:
1 We will form a ball. If it is impossible to reach this form we can determine that the soil is sandy. In case of obtaining it we will proceed to the following form.
2 We will crush the ball. In case of breakage our soil will be limerorenoso. If it remains, we continue to mold.
3 We will continue to crush the ball until it is shaped like a sausage. At this point the soil will be loamy.
4 If we have a sausage so fine that we can give it the shape of a horseshoe, we will determine that our soil is clay.
