pH: The Most Important Thing You're Ignoring In Your Yard

Okay, I did make a bit of an assumption with that title, but I'd still be willing to bet that most of the people out there who garden, casually or otherwise, have never checked their soil pH.  I think most people who have been gardening for more than a season or two have read or heard that certain plants prefer a certain pH range, but even for those who know about those ideal ranges, it's often not the first thing that comes to mind when a problem pops up. 

You probably already know, on a basic level (hah!  See what I did there?) what pH is.  pH refers to the acidity or alkalinity of a substance.  That measurement is referred to in numbers from a scale ranging from 0 to 14.  Seven is considered pH neutral.  Any number below seven is acidic, and anything above seven is alkaline.  In gardening, we're usually talking about the soil when we refer to the pH of the garden or yard.  Different parts of the country tend to have different average pH ranges, depending on the composition of the soil in that region.  For example, the soil in my area tends to be pretty acidic by gardening standards, with averages hovering between 4.8-5.5.  The average soil pH in other regions can be more toward neutral, or even alkaline in certain chalky or limestone-rich soils.  It just depends on where you are, what's in the soil there, and what that soil has been exposed to in the past. 

So why does this matter?  Well, let's apply this to a tomato plant.  Let's say you're growing a tomato, and it did pretty well earlier in the season, but now the leaves are turning yellow with a network of green veins, and the plant just looks like hell.  For a lot of gardeners, the knee jerk response is to start spraying it with stuff.  Maybe it's a fungus, so you break out the Daconil, or maybe it's an insect, so you whip out a bottle of Sevin and go to town.  None of these things work, and the plant continues to decline.  You just wasted a lot of time, and sprayed a bunch of chemicals all over the place that didn't help, and the plant looks like it's on death's door now.  At this point, a lot of people would give up and let it die.  The more determined might google the symptoms or take a leaf to somebody in the know.  One way or another, you get an answer: iron deficiency!  You have a name for your problem, and probably a big assumption to go with it: your soil doesn't have enough iron in it.  So you buy a bottle of ironite, and it seems to help.  Problem solved, right?

Nope.

Here's the problem: chances are, the iron content of the soil was never an issue.  Most soils contain a decent amount of iron, and you may have just spent a lot of time and money adding something to the soil that was already there in spades.  Yeah, it fixed your problem for now, but it could have been faster, simpler, and cheaper, if your first reaction to a yellowing leaf had been one of these:

or one of these:

Now, before I get a flood of comments from people who really DO live in areas with low iron content in the soil, let me just say this:  your soil is weird.  Yes, truly iron deficient soils exist.  There are tests out there to check for this, and most local extension services can also check this for you, usually for a small fee.  But the majority of the time, iron deficiencies have nothing to do with the actual iron content of the soil.  The problem occurred because you're growing a tomato that likes a nice, acidic 6.5 soil, and you're trying to grow it in a garden that's sitting at 7.3.  Maybe you just live in an area with alkaline soil, or maybe you followed the advice of some old timer gardener who swore that adding lime to a tomato hole will make magical supertomatoes (which may have worked in HIS soil conditions, but your garden is not his, and your soil may be different).  But either way, you now have a problem. 

The issue with pH is that the acidity of the soil affects soil chemistry and root performance in strange ways, and those ways affect whether or not the plant is able to take up and use certain minerals and nutrients in the soil.  If the soil is more acidic than that plant prefers, the plant may have trouble taking up and using calcium, magnesium, and nitrogen.  If the soil is too alkaline for the plant, then iron, zinc, and phosphorus tend to get bound up in the soil, and the plant runs into trouble. 

This all might sound awfully complicated, but the practical solutions are pretty simple.  As with most things in life, an ounce of prevention really is worth a pound of cure.   Unlike most things in life, piling on some bullshit makes everything better.  Starting the season by tilling well-composted organic matter, such as manure, yard waste, and kitchen composts, into the soil does more than just add nutrients and improve drainage; it also buffers the soil against rapid changes in pH.  It helps stabilize things a bit, so that the pH will be less prone to wild fluctuations as the soil temperature rises and falls with the seasons.  Doing a soil test before planting is another preventative measure that can save you a headache and improve plant performance later; if you discover a problem before it causes a problem, it can be fixed.  You aren't stuck with your natural pH.  pH can be adjusted fairly easily with garden lime to increase alkalinity, or garden sulphur to lower it.  Both can be purchased from most garden centers, and both are pretty cheap. 

Now, all of that said, I'm a big believer in working with existing conditions instead of fighting them whenever possible.  Choosing plants that actually LIKE your natural pH will be less of a hassle and much cheaper in the long run than constantly having to measure and adjust your soil pH to suit the plants you chose.  You can maintain a certain pH for a long time through frequent testing and adjustment, but you'll never win that battle.  Of course, for things like vegetable gardens, you're going to grow the veggies you like regardless of soil conditions, and there's nothing wrong with that.  Just accept that you may have to do some extra work to keep them healthy and get a good crop.  But for ornamental plants, and even lawns, there are probably options perfectly suited to your yard that will perform better for you than others.  If you adore acid-loving azaleas but your natural pH sits at 7.0, you're going to be fighting with the natural chemistry of the soil every year.  You might have a nicer garden in the long run if you choose an alternative that does better in your area.  If you need suggestions, most areas have local extension offices that can give you lists of plants that are known to do well with whatever weather and soil conditions are normal in your area. 

So it all boils down to this:  buy a soil tester.  Own it.  Use it.  Love it.  Call it George if you must.  Or find an extension service that will test soil samples, and use that service.  It might solve some problems you've been battling for a long time, and will probably make life a little easier for you in the future. 

The Most Painful Cut

Yes, that's part of my compost pile.  Yes, I know it needs to be turned.  That's what happens when you rely on chickens to turn your compost, they're slackers and don't do a thorough job.  But that's not what this article is about.  We can discuss my laziness some other time.  Today, I want to talk about the most painful aspect of gardening.

Today, I want to talk about... pruning a healthy plant.

Now, I don't know about you, but I hate putting a sharp pair of pruners to a robust, healthy plant.  It feels like vandalism.  Here's this awesome tomato plant, or rose bush, or azalea, or whatever, and it's growing like a weed, completely free of signs of disease or insect infestation, and doing juuuussst fine without your intervention.  It doesn't need you, right?  

That's right now, though.  Sometimes, plants lack restraint.  Much like some people, they are prone to taking advantage of the good times and gorging themselves on an all-you-can-eat buffet of great weather, good soil, and adequate water.  Also like people, stuffing one's face and putting on some bulk seems fine early on, but can be regrettable later.  Plants don't get diabetes and heart disease, of course, but there are other problems that can crop up when growth is allowed to go unchecked, especially in a crowded, overplanted garden like mine.  Yes, I am guilty of the sin of planting my tomatoes too close together.  I just HAD to squeeze in one more cultivar, because the plants aren't the only ones in my garden with a bit of a common sense problem.  

The most damaging of these problems is disease.  A huge, wild mass of tomatoes, or a thick wall of green rose leaves, might look impressive and healthy, but lurking in the soil beneath those plants are a plethora of infectious fungus spores, bacteria, and viruses, just waiting for a chance to grow.  No matter how clean your garden area is and how careful you are, pathogens of one sort or another are always there, just waiting for the right conditions to set off their unchecked growth.  For many of these, those perfect conditions involve shade, wet leaves that never completely dry off, and low air circulation.  Your plants, in their eagerness to shove fistfuls of nitrogen into their metaphorical pie holes and pump out tons of new foliage, have unwittingly provided a fungal wonderland.  A thick tangle of leaves shade out the sun and hamper air circulation around and through the plant, leaving the leaves and stems under the canopy perpetually damp and protected from the sterilizing UV rays of the sun.  It's a recipe for disaster.

So what do you do?  For many, the natural reaction is to wait for the first yellow spots, and then reach for a bottle of fungicide.  Fungicide can be a valuable tool, but it shouldn't be the only tool in your toolbox, or even the first one you reach for.  Fungicide can stave off symptoms for a while, it can help the plant survive with minimal symptoms if it's a fairly resistant cultivar, but once that disease is there, it's there to stay.  You can't get rid of it, and even if the plant survives this bout, those spores will remain in the soil, just waiting for those damp, shady conditions to return.  Next time, that fungus could spread to other plants.  No, prevention is far preferable to fighting an ongoing issue.  And while a preventative spraying of fungicide can be a good idea if you live in a wet or humid area, often, preventative garden maintenance starts with that terrible, painful sound.

Snip.

Snip.

Snip.

Now, you don't have to butcher that poor plant, but you are going to have to remove a few branches that look just fine, and if you're like me, you're going to second-guess every cut you make and wonder if that branch next to it would have been a better place to start.  Suck it up, sunshine.  It's got to be done, and the plant will be fine. First, remove any branches that sport leaves that are in direct contact with the ground.  These make a brilliant entry point for any pathogens lurking in the soil.  Next, choose branches that crisscross each other, which could rub and damage the stems later, and remove at least one of those offending branches.  If you're a serial overplanter like me, it's not a bad idea to remove stems and branches that are encroaching into the personal space of the plant next to it.  Unless you're trying to grow a hedge, open space between each plant will help the air circulation and sunlight work their magic.  You should reach deep into the plant and make each cut as close to a main stem or trunk as you can without damaging that main stem or trunk, not on the outside of the plant; the idea here is to open up the center of the plant so that air and just a little bit of sunshine can reach the center.  If we're talking about a shrub or tree, you'll be better off in the long run if you prune each branch by hand instead of breaking out a hedge trimmer; just snipping off the twigs on the outside encourages a dense mat of foliage to grow around the outside of the plant, which could exacerbate that whole airflow and sunlight issue I've been droning on about.

Finally, don't forget one very important but oft-overlooked step: sterilize your pruners! Cutting into a plant you didn't realize was diseased and then using that same equipment on healthy plants is a surefire way to spread disease all over the place.  Every time you finish with a plant, use bleach solution or a commercial sterilization solution formulated for garden equipment to clean up the blades before moving on to the next plant.  When the job is done, take the time to sterilize them again before putting them away.  It's worth the extra few moments of inconvenience to prevent a long-term headache.

So go ahead, take a long look at that giant, unruly beast of a plant that is taking over its garden space.  Enjoy its vigor and good health... then whack that sucker back so that it and everything around it has a better chance to stay healthy.  It hurts, but that plant will thank you later.

And So It Begins...

Hello! Welcome to my blog, also known as "the place where I can ramble on and on about plants without having to pretend I don't see the glazed stares of disinterested listeners."  Allow me to introduce myself; I am Dens, a.k.a. The Garden Nut, and I probably need an intervention.

 Let me ease you into my little world with a bit of history. As a child, I had only a vague awareness of gardening or agriculture in general. My grandmother in Cape May, New Jersey had a vegetable garden, and I remember wandering through it when we visited and trying to figure out what that shiny black thing was (I later learned it was an eggplant. I also learned that I do not like eggplant). I remember eating snap beans raw right off the vine, and I remember refusing to eat them any other way. I remember watching a discarded peach pit in the compost pile grow into a young peach tree over the course of several years, and noting its new growth every time we visited. I remember my grandmother trying to interest me in it all, but alas, I also remember not really caring all that much. I would listen for a short time, then run back inside to draw horses. Horses were my sole obsession at the time, and gardens had little to do with horses, so I'm afraid my grandmother's attempts to impart horticultural wisdom fell on deaf ears.

 It wasn't until many years later, in my early 30's, that I was abruptly possessed by a sudden desire to grow a tomato plant. Most people entering a midlife crisis buy fast cars or motorcycles or start chasing after hot young sex objects, but not me. I bought a Black Krim tomato plant and a few hanging petunias. One might be tempted to suggest that at least my midlife crisis was inexpensive. Anybody who would say that has obviously never had a garden, but I digress. I managed to get a few strikingly delicious tomatoes off of that plant, and a few hummingbird visits from the petunias, before I inevitably killed all of them. That was the beginning of the end for me. A new addiction was born.

 The following year, we bought a house, and I started a garden, which I then proceeded to kill. Feel free to just insert the castle in the swamp speech from Monty Python and the Holy Grail here, because it serves as an excellent metaphor for my clumsy slogging through my first few gardening seasons. I took comfort in gardening after an unpleasant divorce, I moved, and moved again, and everywhere I went I made a bigger and less weed-infested garden.

At some point, small glimmers of success began to appear every here and there as experience and research forced their way into the way I handled my horticultural habits, and more and more of my life and wallet became dedicated to the not-so-simple joy of growing things. I read everything I could get my hands on about the subject, I spent hours googling solutions to problems the books couldn't answer, I got a job in a garden center, and slowly, over the course of a decade, I learned.

 I also got arrogant as hell. There's nothing like becoming "the expert" in your workplace to inflate one's ego. After a few years at the garden center, I decided to go back to school part time and start working on a horticulture degree. Easy stuff, right? I knew my shit, and I knew it well, and I figured I'd waltz in there, do my time, and walk out after a few years, piece of paper in hand, with little to no effort.

 I'm here to tell you that life has a way of slapping you down and reminding you of your place. Horticulture Science class did that for me. I walked out of my first day of class stunningly, uncomfortably aware of the fact that I did not know jack shit. It's been a few years since that first class, and I've learned so, SO much since then, but always, with each new semester, I'm constantly reminded that I will never be the expert I thought I was. I say this because I've realized that experts do not really exist. There is always more to learn, no matter what subject you're studying. No matter how well regarded you are, no matter how much you think you know, somebody out there has something to teach you. Maybe I can use this blog to teach you a few things about your yard and the plants in it. Maybe you can use it to teach me something, too.

 tl;dr: I got into gardening late in life, I'm obsessed with it, I go to school for it and I sell things for them. I like to think I know a few things, but you know things too, and the things you know might not be the same things I know. Let's grow together.