Maintaining Healthy Soil

Healthy soil is the key to sustainable organic gardening, but “healthy” goes beyond just tilling it gently and giving it plenty of mulch, fertilizer, and water. For example, did you know that it can take as long as three to five years for your soil to recover from an insect or fungal infestation? It’s not unusual for the same types of plants to get the same types of infections year after year, because the insect eggs and fungal spores remain alive in the soil. Short of sterilizing the soil (which is unadvisable, since you’d kill beneficial and harmful organisms alike), you can leave that particular patch uncultivated for several years until it improves itself. Of course, you can speed up this process by continuing to work in organic matter on a regular basis.