These simple methods help you determine if you have a good spot to garden!

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I recommend Logan Labs for soil testing: https://loganlabs.com/

If you want to know if your soil is good for gardening and are ready to start gardening in a new spot, the first thing you should do is look around! How does the grass look? What about the trees? Once you learn to “read” the land, you have a rough idea of where a good spot to garden might be. This is just the beginning, of course, as it’s also useful to test the soil pH and mineral as well as organic matter content. However, it’s gotten so I can usually tell right away if a garden will do well, just by looking at what is already growing. If azaleas are doing great, blueberries will as well. If you have lots of deciduous tree species, changes are you’re in a good spot for planting an orchard. Wild grapes? Plant cultivated ones! It works well as a starting point. The more plant species and the denser and greener they are growing, the better your own gardening projects are likely to grow. Start a garden with these thoughts in mind.

20 Comments

  1. So, my suspicions were correct; we have crappy dirt. DtG, would you mind posting the link to your daughter's etsy store, please? for some reason, it doesn't come up when I search there. Probably a cockpit error. Thanks very much and I am still so excited about your new homestead it makes me giggle. ~ Lisa

  2. I knew when we moved into our home that the soil was awful because the weeds wouldn’t even grow and it was just barren dirt. When we started digging holes for the chicken cook posts, and we hit some pretty tough clay. So far we have mounded compost and woodchips on top for our garden and then started a new compost pile. I’d be very interested to test the still barren area and our garden to see the difference.

  3. I wouldn't rule out the train idea, the vibration of the train probably is micro tilling the dirt and stimulating the fungi. Plus the train horn sound is pretty close to plantgise for "I love you" which makes the plants work extra hard.

  4. here in NH we now have Asian jumping worms… it’s turned my garden soil that I built up over the years with compose to coffee grounds type soil with no life …it was so nice to grow in before these snake like worms got here. in one season these worms turned my wonderful rich soil into coffee grounds, it has no smell, no bugs, it’s doesn’t hold water, it’s lifeless. Whenever I plant something I have to dig a hole and fill it with new compose from the chicken run. I have to cover any space not growing something with black plastic in hopes of heating the soil up enough to kill the worm eggs. Sadly We also have a woods area, these worms will destroy that forest floor in short order. Im sad but praying permaculture methods will help restore it. I have comfrey and composting everything.

  5. Thank you for your time and advice at the Homestead Conference in Hannibal. Loved it all. ❤️🇺🇸❤️

  6. Thank you very much for the lesson kudos to you and your family for your beautiful new place hope you have many many years of enjoyment

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