How best to improve my soil?

[Tom2006]

My boarders really suffered this year due to bug attacks. They are full of a variety of plants and I would like to mulch and improve the soil. What should I use to do this? Happy to spend a bit doing it and a good mulch is worth it but I'm not sure what to use.

[fern Rob]

I always use bark mulch on all my boarders, I have one boarder that is going to get dug out refreshed and re planted as it looks a little worn.

[grub]

Gentlemen, if you please... A public forum isn't really the place for discussing which bugs you've obtained from people you have lodging with you

[flounder]

Sorry to hear the people living with you have problems. (Had to be done before Coni gets in there)
For my borders, I use home made compost. You can buy bags of soil conditioner but I don't have any experience with that.
I've also used well rotted horse manure from a nearby stable although some will say there's too much risk of any medicines the horses have received getting in the soil.
Mushroom compost is another option, personally I think it's just a load of old manure you have to pay for.
If your soil is heavy and clay like, adding coarse sand or grit will assist with drainage, but I've found it best to work it into the soil prior to planting otherwise you just have to try and fork it in around the plants.

[flounder]

Dammit, grubby stole my joke

[grub]

Dammit, grubby stole my joke

[Dim]

Happy to spend a bit doing it and a good mulch is worth it but I'm not sure what to use.

Best that I have used is imported compost called Bat Mix special which I buy from my local hydroponic store .....

http://www.camgrow.co.uk/bat-mix-special-50-litre-bag/

costs £13 for a 50 litre bag, and is a blend of several types of peat, perlite, bat guano, worm humis etc etc and has a ph of 6.4 ... I also use this in the planting holes of all shrubs/perennials etc ... add a 2 inc layer and dig it into the soil

then, in spring, topdress your plants with worm humis/vermicompost:... I pay £8 for a 10kg bag

so google your nearest hydroponic store and check their imported composts

as for homemade compost, it is also good, but has to be made properly .... very few people check the ph value of homemade compost.... and it takes a long time to produce ....

[Blairs]

What bugs do you have problems with Tom? A mulch can give slugs and snails places to hide. Vine weevils and the like can be deterred by a mulch. Too much foliage attracts moths/butterflies and their caterpillars can romp away unseen till the damage is great.

[Kristen]

I reckon well rotted manure would be best. Beware of manure where animals may have eaten hay/silage from, or grazed on, pasture treated with Aminopyralid. If the owner does not know then shop somewhere else ... that broad-leaf herbicide persists through the animal and the composting of the manure. However, stricter regulations were brought in a couple of years ago and I haven't heard much about it since, so probably less of a problem than it was. So called "Organic manure" from garden centres is not immune, friend of mine lost all his vegetable plants using that a few years back. "Organic" only means anything, on a label, if it is Soil Association certified.

I get manure from the local farmer. He delivers in a huge trailer, probably around 10 tonnes, for £40 a load.

Mushroom compost is a good alternative, already well rotted etc. and presumably won't contain herbicides etc., and its nice and friable and easy to work with. It does contain quite a lot of lime, so not ideal if you are on an alkaline soil, but using it just-the-once probably won't matter much even then. (probably a really bad idea if you have acid-loving plants though )

Drainage might be the other thing to consider. Soil gets compacted over time, and digging it to let some air in will help. particularly on heavy soil where rough digging over winter allows frost to get in and break up the soil. May not be very practical in a border though? I dig the areas where I lift plants for the autumn - e.g. where the Dahlias were - and that makes those areas a lot easier to plant the following year. I dig in the manure, which was a mulch from the previous Spring, and then re-mulch the following Spring at planting time.

If the soil is heavy and "wet" then personally I would install land drains to improve it. They make a huge difference to the amount of air that gets into the soil - i.e. it isn;t full up with water in the winter! which I think helps worms etc.

I wonder if a green manure, in & amongst plants, is an idea? Bit too late for this year though, but several of those are reputed to help break up the soil, and lock in nutrients. Only ever used it on fallow areas of my veg patch. You need quite a bit of seed to cover an area, and for that reason I get mine from Moles Seeds as their seed packets are more "bulk" than the run of the mill ornamental seed merchants. Field Beans for example.
http://www.molesseeds.co.uk/flower_and_ ... _3617.html

[Dim]

try these guys in East Yorkshire .... its the compost made from green/brown bins at the recycle centre ...

http://www.wastewise.co.uk/soil-improver

in my area, we get as much as we want for free ... its not a fertilizer, but it does improve the soil structure ....

it has a ph of 8.0 though

[derrick]

How about Alpaca poop i always see bags of it for free near my work place .This is something i need to do improve the soil .I did get some bags of manure from a farm the year before .When is the best time to start ?

[Dim]

How about Alpaca poop i always see bags of it for free near my work place .This is something i need to do improve the soil .I did get some bags of manure from a farm the year before .When is the best time to start ?

I've never heard of an Alpaca till I googled ...

I'd eat that

[Tom2006]

Thanks everyone. bugs have been rife. Slugs and snails, earwigs, lily beetles moths. I know that a mulch wont stop bugs but I want a good mulch.thanks for the link Dim. Just called them and they sell soil improver a tonne bag for 30-35. Delivery is an issue though.

[dorothy]

I've just had a friend move in with me and she has a rabbit.Found out that rabbit poo is also good for the garden, I'm going to tell her to start throwing that on the garden now

[derrick]

Alpaca pooh now 2 pound a bag at Petlake Alpaca farm near my work place .So next week i will have a look .Alpacas very strange creatures and make a strange noise . Had one stick his head through the open window of my van at some house.