The first step in planning a garden is to test the soil. You can’t tell from observation if it is deficient in any elements or if it is adjusted to the right alkalinity/acidity for the crops you plan to grow. Such services are available through your local Cooperative Extension Service. In some areas, there may also be private soil testing laboratories, and home testing kits are available in garden centers and supply stores.

Unfortunately, most of us don’t have the rich loam and perfect drainage that bring out the best potential of our crops. Select sites where the water doesn’t puddle or stand for prolonged periods after a rain. The excess water should drain away in a day or two. Many plants will succumb if they sit in saturated soil for more prolonged periods. If the site is not well-drained to begin with you may have to go to tedious and/or expensive procedures to correct it by raising the soil level or installing drain lines.

Now you can proceed to amend your soil to improve the quality and character to simulate a rich loamy one. That is done by the incorporation of organic matter. It can take a number of forms and you can apply one or combinations of what may be available to you. The one perhaps most readily available in all areas is peat moss. Other materials used for the same purpose include compost, partially decayed leaves, well-rotted manure, well-rotted sawdust, mushroom compost. There may be other materials available in your area that your cooperative extension agent may know about. These materials will make a clay soil more friable and porous and a sandy soil more moisture and nutrient retentive.

Another way of adding organic material to your soil is the planting of a green manure crop. This can be applied in the case of where the site is not used all year, like with many vegetable gardens, or in preparation of a lawn area or other garden area that may not be planted for a season. Crops can be sown in fall and spring and then plowed or spaded under to decay. Two types of crops are grown, legumes and non-legumes. Legumes, like vetches, provide the added benefit of fixing nitrogen from the air into the soil, and non-legumes, like rye which can grow even in poor soils.

When adding the organic material to a new or virgin site that you have prepared by turning over or tilling, you can start with a 4 inch layer of the material over the surface and turn it into the soil. In preparing individual sites for shrubs and trees, excavate the soil to the depth necessary to accommodate the roots. If you need to dig the hole much deeper such as to remove a barrier layer of material, it would be most ideal to dig it a season ahead of time to allow the soil to settle. Otherwise, you may have to set your plant in soil a little higher than the surrounding soil so as it settles the crown won’t be sitting too deep. You can dig the hole twice as wide or more than the spread of the roots. With that material that you have excavated, mix it in the proportion of one-third organic to two-thirds excavated soil to use as the back-fill when setting your plant in the ground. Use the mixture rather than just something completely foreign to the surrounding soil so the roots will develop out into the surrounding soil and not stay just confined to the prepared area.

If you have a clay soil, use a mixture of 1 part of the best soil from the planting hole, 1 part organic matter (compost, peat moss, rotted sawdust, or leaf mold) and 1 part sand to improve it.

Whenever you lift, divide or replant, add more organic materials to the site before resetting. Many of these materials also make good top dressings to the soil to serve as mulches and gradually break down to become a part of your ever improving soil.