Our monthly column from Roger Crookes, the garden expert at Pugh's Garden Centre, gives you all the tips and tricks to make your garden bloom.
When I was being trained as a gardener back in the late 1970’s ‘The answer is in the soil’ was a well-known expression used by farmers and experienced gardeners alike. At the time, full of the ‘enthusiastic’ wisdom of teenagers’ , it didn’t mean much to me, but now after 50 years of trying to cajole plants into glorious explosions of foliage and flowers, I am still learning just how important our soil really is.
It was US President Franklin D Roosevelt who famously said that “The nation that destroys its soil destroys itself” and over recent years the world has come to realise how vital the health of our soil is to our lives … and that is as true in our own little gardens as it is on a world wide scale.
So, what can we do?
Well, after what has seemed like the longest and greyest winter in history here in south Wales; with week after week of rain during November and December it is likely that our soil, in both borders and pots, will have become depleted of vital nutrients required to encourage plants to burst into new growth this spring.
So March is a great time to put some goodness back into your soil, by using slow release fertilizers such as ‘Fish Blood and Bone’, Vitax Q4, or the new Boost 6 month slow release granules. All these fertilizers can simply be spread over the soil surface and then let the rain take all that goodness down to the roots.
But, and here’s another quote for you, ‘one handful of healthy soil can contain more microorganisms than there are people on this planet’ …Wow! that’s in excess of 8 billion helpful little organisms all going about their business right under our feet!
We are still finding out what these tiny soil improvers do but it is evident that they are vital to soil health and productive gardens. We can all help them by adding plenty of organic material such compost, well-rotted manure and bark mulch to our soil (again it can just be spread over the soil surface and then let nature take its course)
So, will you join me this spring by showing some love to your soil, and enjoy the results through what I hope will be a sunny 2025!
Got a question for Roger?
