Topic one: Choosing a location for your garden bed

What’s under your feet?

Determining your section’s soil profile

Topic one: Choosing a location for your garden bed

Topic one: Choosing a location for your garden bedTopic one: Choosing a location for your garden bed

Your raised bed will sit on whatever type of soil is in your section.

Most soils are loams, which are a mixture of sand, silt and clays, plus organic matter and air.

Soil Types

Topic one: Choosing a location for your garden bedTopic one: Choosing a location for your garden bed

Loams are named according to the main textural class present.The 3 broad groups are:• loams• sandy loams• clay loams

Loams

A simple way to check soil texture is to moisten the soil and form it into a ball or worm shape and then press it with your thumb.The way the soil deforms tells you its texture.

Topic one: Choosing a location for your garden bed

Loams

Loams are the best soils for gardening. They are made up of …

When you roll and squeeze them they deform but don’t break.

sand40%

silt40% clay

15%

organic matter

5%

Topic one: Choosing a location for your garden bed

Sandy loams don’t hold together well and won’t easily form a ball.They break up when you try to roll them into a worm shape.

Sandy Loams

They don’t hold water well and are normally low in nutrients.

Topic one: Choosing a location for your garden bed

These soils are yellow to brown in colour. They form a ball or worm well, and when you press them you leave a clear imprint of your thumb

Clays are high in nutrients, but these soils bake dry in summer and flood in winter.

Clay Loams

Topic one: Choosing a location for your garden bed

The soil structure is the way your soil holds together.An ideal soil structure for growing vegetables is one that is friable. This means it breaks up easily into a crumbly form.A simple shatter test will tell you what sort of structure your soil has, because different types of soil behave differently.To do the shatter test: Take a spade-full of soil and drop the back of the spade onto the ground.

Soil Structure

Topic one: Choosing a location for your garden bed

Due to its friable nature, a block of loam will break up around the edges when dropped.

Loams form a crumby soil which drains well but still holds sufficient air and water.

Shatter Test: Loam

Topic one: Choosing a location for your garden bed

A block of sandy loam will break up and collapse when dropped.

Sands are loose soils that collapse when you try to cultivate them.

Shatter Test: Sandy Loam

Topic one: Choosing a location for your garden bed

A block of clay loam will keep its shape and hardly break up when dropped.

Clays are tight and blocky, and are hard to dig and cultivate.

Shatter Test: Clay Loam

Topic one: Choosing a location for your garden bed

As well as the deformation (ball/worm) test and the shatter test, you can also use a feel test.• sands feel gritty• clays feel smooth and slippery• loams sit in between

Evaluating Your Soil