Hodgson Biologic
2 Klarides Village Drive
Box 205
Seymour, Connecticut
06483
203-888-3898
In Connecticut's
Naugatuck Valley
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Soil - The FoundationSoil is a key component of the health of any living system, including your garden, lawn, or woodland. It provides physical support for the plants, and contains water and nutrients that the plants need.
It is more than just "dirt." It is a complex and unique collection of living and nonliving things that result from how the soil has been treated over time.
It consists of nonliving particles such as clay, silt and sand. Clay is the smallest. Individual particles can only be seen with a microscope. Silt particles are somewhat larger than clay, but are also microscopic. Sand particles are large enough to be seen without a microscope, but some of us need our reading glasses or a hand lens!
The elements in these particles can include silicon, oxygen (yes, oxygen), aluminum, potassium, phosphorus, magnesium, iron, and many more.
The size of the particles and their elemental composition help to determine the structure and behavior of the soil. For example, they determine how well the soil holds and releases water and plant nutrients. They also determine how easy the soil is to turn, and how well plant roots can push through it.
Aside from the nonliving components in the soil, there are the living and formerly living components, the organic matter. In my opinion, organic matter is absolutely the most important factor that you can work with to improve your soil.
Living organic matter includes the microscopic life forms that live in the soil (bacteria, fungi, protists) and what are called macroscopic life forms (worms, insects and other arthropods).
When these living forms die, their remains continue to be part of the soil, and provide food to other living things including plants.
The air found in the tiny spaces between soil particles is considered part of the soil. Plants are aerobic organisms, living things that need oxygen. Some plants can manage with "wet feet" but most require at least some air around their roots to function well.
Water is closely attached to the soil, literally, but we will cover it as a separate topic.
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Here, windflowers are just beginning to push up through the soil in the spring. (R.Brown photo)
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