This year has been the International Year of Soils, organised by the United Nations, and today, Saturday 5th December is International Day of the Soil. Considering everything we do at Incredible Edible Bristol relies on soil, it can’t go without us commenting at the very least upon the importance of soils for our food and for our climate.

There is a lot of information around about soils and how they are becoming less and less fertile in our traditional farming lands. But did you know that research from Sheffield University shows that our urban parks and allotment soils are generally much more healthy, holding up to 30{2f2874fc6125dd5cf7bd0be296e4e150855e421b2444f8743791b81c4b31d296} more carbon than agricultural land. Why is this I hear you ask…….

Rather than being chemically dependent most urban food growing soils are managed in a far more traditional way, using organic matter to replenish it each year and not cropped in such an intensive way.

So how do you go about looking after soil in your garden, community garden or on your allotment to ensure it stays healthy? Organic matter is the key and this can come in many different ways. Homemade compost, farmyard manure and green manures all have their place in creating a healthy soil and in a mixture will create a beautiful and rich loam that is perfect to grow anything in. Over winter a good layer of up to 4 inches of farmyard compost laid on top of the fallow land and worked into the soil by the worms already in the soil, is an ideal way of keeping both yourself and the soil well  and warm. Follow each crop with a layer of homemade compost to top up that fertility. Using green manures on pieces of your soil that are unused for short amounts of time also gives the opportunity to address specific issues such as opening up the soil (alfalfa) or adding nitrogen (crimson clover). There is more info about green manures here.

If you want to learn more about using and making compost and no dig gardening, where you add material to the soil to keep it healthy and weed free, Charles Dowding is your man. Charles grows salads and vegetables in his garden in Somerset as well as opening his garden and giving talks and workshops there and further afield. More can be found out about this exciting way of gardening whilst looking after our precious soils here.

So let’s remember to look after our soils. After all we rely on them for 95{2f2874fc6125dd5cf7bd0be296e4e150855e421b2444f8743791b81c4b31d296} of our food!!

Wonderful horse manure!!

Community composting bins