Improving soil

There are about a million things you can put on or in your soil. They all work I'm sure it just depends on what you want out of your soil and how much you want to spend. There are many reasons you add things to your soil but the two reasons I add things to my soil are: food/nutrients for plants and to improve soil quality (simply put: make my clay soil more workable). In my few years working the soil in my garden I have developed somewhat of a pattern.

In the fall, I bombard the garden with leaves. The major reasons I use leaves are they break up the soil; they break down easily; you can add as many as you want without worry of adding to much of the wrong stuff; and probably the best part of all is the fact that they are free and you can get a lot of them. I also like to get some type of manure which in farm country is pretty easy to find. My personal favorite is chicken but you have to be extremely careful you don't add to much or it will burn up your garden and nothing will grow. However, if you do it right you can get some incredible results. Honestly, anything you can add that is organic does wonders if you put it in in the fall, till it and let it sit for the winter.

In the spring, I like to add iron to keep the plants healthy and if I didn't add something high in nitrogen like chicken manure I will add some fertilizer higher in nitrogen to help break down the organic material added in the fall. Remember however too much nitrogen can kill your soil for a couple years. Essentially the key in my opinion to building good soil is adding a good amount of organic material to help break up the soil and keep in light and airy.

My first fall I added about 3-4 cubic yards of manure mixed with sawdust left over from lamb beds at the local county fair.