The Secret Is In The Flower Gardening Soil & preparation

Nutrition is the secret to long and enjoyable life for all creatures great and small. Feed your flowers, plants and shrubs with what they need and they will reward you with displays of unrivalled vibrancy, color and beauty year in and year out. And it all starts with the site we choose for our flower gardening project

The 4 over-riding considerations for a good flower garden site are ...

  1. soil quality

  2. soil drainage

  3. soil pH

  4. soil exposure (wind and temperature)

Soil Quality

This is a very broad term and encompasses many things but for the moment consider this to relate to good soil preparation such as digging the garden soil well in preparation for planting and by adding composting materials and possibly fertilizers too. Annuals are more forgiving of poor soil preparation whereas perennial plants like most shrubs will struggle to get beyond one or two years of age without good soil preparation. You'll find that what is referred to as good loam soil is best ... and by the way the colour is not critical. Good loam can be black or even orangy-red as in South Africa. The soil color is determined by the trace elements contained in it ... a lot of iron would tend to favour reddish soils for example. What is important for all good soils is for them to be rich in organic materials (compost) since this is the staff of life and allows moisture to be retained better. Adding composting materials onto the surface of the soil and then digging the compost in is the best way to improve soil quality ... the best times to do this are in Autumn (Fall) and early Spring.

Soil Drainage

Bog plants love (in fact insist upon) wet feet and an excellent example is the marsh marigold. You can see list of such plants here marginal or bog plants . However most flower gardens will need well drained soil. For soil to drain is vital to the well being of most flowering plants and shrubs. Serious problems can occur to plant growth if soil remains waterlogged and this is especially true in winter time. You can easily test a soil for drainage ... dig a hole about a foot deep and fill with water. The first time the soil will drain quite quickly probably so you'll need to repeat at least twice more. If water is remaining in the hole after 2 hours following the second filling then drainage is poor and most shrubs will not easily survive such poorly drained areas.

Soil pH

pH is a complex chemical and physical property which essentially refers to whether soil is acidic (pH is less than 7) or alkaline (pH is more than 7). It's important because some plants need acidic soils to look their best (eg azaleas, rhododendrons) while others will not survive in such soils. Other plants behave different depending upon pH ... hydrangeas in acidic soil are blue. Hydrangeas in non-acidic soil are pink. Soil pH is ideal at about 6 to 6.7 (slightly acidic) and this pH can be measured suing a test kit. If there is a need to change soil pH this can be achieved by adding limestone (increases pH) or peat or sulphur (lowers pH)

Soil Exposure

In this respect we talk of 4 factors that influence plant selection ... plants need light to allow them to capture the sun's energy and thus create green matter (photosynthesis) from carbon dioxide.

  • Full sun ... this means plants see sun for at least 6 hours per day

  • Partial sun ... Between 3 and 5 hours of sunlight per day

  • Partial shade ... mainly dappled sunlight for short periods only

  • Full shade ... there is no direct sunlight (typically a south facing wall in Southern hemisphere and a north facing wall in northern hemisphere)

Not many plants can grow in dense shade as you can determine by a walk in a dense forest.

Have you asked these question?

  • Why am I creating this design, do I really want a flower garden or maybe a vegetable garden? Alternatively you might have a desire to create a specific type of flower garden for butterfly attraction as an example. Maybe your idea is for a beautiful rose garden to give scented areas or blazes of colour or maybe you want to cut the roses for indoor use. People create spring gardens or autumn gardens or Japanese type gardens ... there is an endless list of shrubs and flower garden possibilities so try to focus on one or 2 main ideas. You may even have ideas of creating a water garden