Perfect Topsoil for Your Home Garden
How to Select the Perfect Topsoil for Your Home Garden
Topsoil for Your Home Garden
If you’re thinking about planting a garden this spring, it’s important you select the best top soil. Selecting the perfect topsoil for your home garden is the first step in ensuring that your garden will be all that you want it to be. Topsoil is crucial in having a plentiful garden. The nutrients in topsoil allow your plants, flowers, fruits and vegetables, and even grass to grow. With the right selection you’ll have topsoil that’s going to make your garden shine.
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The Darker the Better
Topsoil is typically considered the top 2-8 inches of soil. It’s the part of the soil that is the richest and most-life giving for plants. It’s made up of mostly various silts, decomposed plant matter, clay, and sand, and that’s why it’s so good for your plants. This is the part of the soil that will make your plants grow.
The best top soil is always the darkest. Choose a topsoil that is really rich in a dark brown or black color. Typically the darker the soil, the richer it is in organic matter which means it’ll contain life-giving food for your garden plants. Earthy dark soil is the first step in the process of creating a lovely home garden.
Choose Loose Topsoil
Not only should topsoil be dark in color, but it also needs to be a variety that is loose and easily permeable. The topsoil is where worms, bugs, and other critters like to burrow and dig and this allows plant roots to grow deeper and lets water seep in. Choose a topsoil that feels loose in consistency so your watering efforts will be effective.
Too much lumpiness and you’ll have an uneven garden bed and ineffective soil. The soil should be loose and easily tilled. Tilling your topsoil is important for a productive home garden. If it’s too hard or clumpy, tilling won’t be as easy and you won’t yield your desired results. When you’re gardening, the right nutrients need to be able to easily glide through the topsoil and hit the roots of the plants.
Don’t Settle for Cheap
There’s a lot of topsoil varieties that come at a cheaper cost because they are mixed with other debris that won’t help your garden. Avoid topsoil that have small rock particles, other plant roots, and substances. This will interfere with the healthy growth of your garden.
Invest into a topsoil that costs more but will make your garden grow and flourish. You can easily find topsoil at most home repair and garden stores. Ask a garden associate to help you decide which topsoil is best for your garden. Some topsoil bags will be labeled with different information to help you decide.
Know How Much You Will Need
Topsoil is an important resource for the health of your home garden. Make sure that you know how much topsoil you will need. You can do this by making sure you have taken the proper measurements of the size of your garden. If you’ve just planning on having a small garden or flower bed, you won’t need as much soil. If you’re looking to yield a plentiful harvest and expand your garden, having enough topsoil is extremely important. Know your dimensions and work from there.
Although topsoil is normally considered the top two inches of soil, again it can range all the way to 8 inches deep. Most gardeners will use more topsoil than just the standard two. Your garden can use topsoil that is 7-8 inches deep which means you will need to factor in the amount of topsoil to be purchased. If you’re just looking to grow your grass, then you can use up to 6 inches of topsoil.
Topsoil is sold in bags and in bulk. Usually with bulk orders you’ll have to make special arrangements. If you do buy topsoil in bulk, it is not priced like regular bags, but rather by the cubic yard. Also, varying topsoil is available based on factors like the area you live in, and a particular soil availability in that area. Sometimes the town or village office locations will occasionally leave bulk piles of topsoil for local gardeners for free. Look out for these opportunities in spring and summer.
Take Lawn Edging into Account
When it comes time to plant your garden and use topsoil, be sure to take account of any lawn edging around your garden bed. Lawn edging creates crisp and clean lines around your garden so it’ll be separated from the rest of the lawn area. It’s a great way to ensure that grass won’t reach in and mix with your topsoil. Because grass, weeds, and shrubs grow very quickly, make sure you have enough topsoil to continue proper upkeep of your home garden.
There’s a lot of different lawn-edging landscaping techniques. You could choose to surround your garden or flower bed with sidewalk pavers, steel or aluminum edges, or plastic edges. When using metal edges, make sure to wear shoes when you’re walking around your garden or you could easily get a cut.
You can install edges around your garden by digging a trench all around your garden as the first step. Next, you will want to use stakes and the materials mentioned above to secure the material into the ground so it’s not easily uprooted. Be careful not to create garden edges too closely to where you have planted roots. Skilled lawn care workers can also easily install these edges for you or you can look on the web for tutorials on proper installation.
Your lawn edges will need maintenance as time goes on. When trimming overgrown or unruly grass around your garden, it’s inevitable that some pieces may fall into the topsoil and mix. It’s important to have topsoil on hand to refresh the top inch or two after trimming. Having a lawn edge is definitely a great preventative method but you still need to make sure you’re maintaining the edges of your garden when necessary.
If you hire a company to take care of your lawn and garden, make sure the workers know to replenish topsoil. Have them use topsoil that’s of high quality, dark, rich, and free of debris.
Topsoil Top Points
To summarize, select the perfect topsoil for your home garden by choosing dark and nutrient-rich soil. Make sure it’s loose and easily tillable. Invest in soil that may cost more but will have better long-term effectiveness. Know your garden dimensions and have enough to cover the necessary depth. Lastly, upkeep your garden with lawn edging and replacing topsoil after trims and lawn work.
