An Advanced Guide to Building Soil from Scratch

About this course

Out of all the components that go into gardening and farming, soil is by far the most important and yet is often the most overlooked.  Soil is the critical foundation on which everything you wish to grow is built. Without the right balance of nutrients and minerals, your plants will face a variety of issues from a lack of healthy leaves that are spotted or discolored to stems that are always short to plants that won’t even grow at all! Early on in my gardening and flower farming days, I never gave much thought to soil and I was continually frustrated with my results at the end of the growing season. I thought if I just composted, that would be enough.  It wasn’t until I discovered Soil Testing that my gardens and fields really took off! But the whole process of getting your soil tested can be intimidating in itself. The first time I got my soil test back I didn’t know how to interpret the results but I slowly but surely learned to read those charts just like reading a recipe and that’s what I want to share with you. That when you learn to balance your soil, much like measuring out the ingredients to baking a cake, there’s no limit to the kind of garden you can grow!

Course objectives

• empower students to manage soil health effectively
• enable students to improve plant growth through better soil practices