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Soil Fertility in the Vegetable Garden

© Arzeena Hamir

By now, most of my seedlings have been started and are waiting for warmer weather before they're placed in the garden. We've had a few warm, dry days and I'm taking the opportunity to amend the garden with organic fertilizer and lime.

Here on the "Wet Coast" the high amount of rainfall we get leaches away a lot of the calcium, magnesium and other nutrients that help maintain soil fertility. In their absence, our soil tends to become acidic. So, every year, I try to add a bit of lime to counteract this leaching affect and to bring my soil pH closer to 6.0 (without lime, it would be a around 4.8).

I usually alternate between normal agricultural lime (also known as calcium carbonate) and dolomite lime (which has magnesium). Ideally, this lime should be applied in the autumn to allow it enough time to take effect. However, I usually overwinter many plants and the springtime is usually the only time my soil is bare. I like to do everything all at once, lazy gardener that I am!

I particularly like to lime in areas where I'll be growing brassicas and tomatoes. In this region, clubroot disease in brassicas is prevalent and one of the only ways to prevent it from flourishing is to increase the pH of the soil close to 7. The fungus that causes clubroot prefers a more acidic pH and therefore doesn't proliferate. Tomatoes also get a dose of lime more for the calcium that lime provides. Blossom end rot in tomatoes is caused by a lack of calcium uptake by tomato plants. Often, this is due to uneven watering - periods of extreme drought followed by heavy watering. Still, providing some extra calcium in the soil along with mulching will prevent my Romas from succumbing to BER.

Along with the lime, I take this time to fertilize certain areas. Whatever well-rotted compost I have, I apply liberal amounts to the asparagus bed. I'm not planting potatoes this year but if I were, I'd probably use the rest of the compost for them. The rest of my vegetables get their fertility from my own fertilizer mixture. I first found this mixture in Steve Solomon's book "Growing Vegetables West of the Cascades". I tried it out in a test plot with my tomatoes and it performed so well, I've used it in the rest of my garden ever since.

The recipe goes as follows:

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