Soil pH Makes the Difference

“pH is wrong” my grandmother exclaimed as she saw my offering of a Madonna lily bulb, “we can’t put a lily in this garden. It just wouldn’t be happy here.” Grandmother knew that she couldn’t raise lilies, delphiniums, gardenias and primroses in her garden, although she loved all of them. It was useless to plant them. After a fashion, she knew why – pH.

Just what is this “pH?” It is a way of measuring soil acidity and alkalinity just as a yardstick is a way of measuring inches. The pH yardstick runs from 0 to 14. The 0 end of the measure is the acid end; the 14 the alkaline. Therefore halfway between, or 7, the acid and alkaline exactly balance and the soil is neutral, neither the one nor the other. If the soil tests less than 7 it is acid, if more than 7, it is alkaline.

Many Western soils are alkaline, mineral rich but with the minerals locked up by the high alkalinity. That was Grandmother’s trouble and the despair of her gardening life. How easily it could have been corrected! When I woke up to the true needs of my soil, and added compost, peat and leaf mold to it, I found that I had no trouble at all growing anything in it.

I have known Eastern gardeners to come out to our country, and, before planting in the spring, spread a goodly amount of lime on their soil, thus increasing its already too high alkaline content. Liming would be excellent treatment for most Eastern soils where rainfall is heavy and soil is often clay. Calcium and magnesium are dissolved in rainwater and leached out of such soil. Lime replaces them, at the same time raising the pH. If my Eastern neighbors had tested their soil first they would have added sulfur, not lime to it, and immeasurably heightened their flowers’ chances for health and beauty.

Most flowers do well in a soil that ranges from slightly acid to neutral.

If you have to choose one pH for all your plants, the best would be 6.5 to 7. Here is a good reason; at this pH all the minerals in the soil are available to plants. If the soil is too acid, or too alkaline, certain necessary minerals are “locked up” in it, there, but not to be had by plants hungering for them. Then you have the wretched situation of plants starving to death in the midst of plenty.

The 6.5 to 7 pH provides the best environment for the tiny organisms that change the nitrogen in the air to food which plants can absorb. It is the best soil for the bacteria that decompose plant tissue to make humus.

You will find an impressive number of flowers that prefer this pH for growth and flowering; roses, African violets, bleeding hearts, fuchsias, geraniums, hyacinths, irises, lilacs, narcissus, pansies, snapdragons, tulips, to mention a few.

Here is another reason for changing your pH if your soil is either too acid or alkaline. You will have much better “tilth”, a nice crumbly even texture when your pH is 6.5 or above and below 8. This is especially true if calcium has been added to bring up the pH. From lumpy dirt it becomes the soil you love to touch. It all goes back to those busy bacteria. Give them a soil in which they can live and work efficiently and they’ll work it over and over, producing a medium in which plants can put forth strong roots. Decomposing remains of these roots continue to keep the soil structure in good condition.

Related Articles Of Interest:

• Should You Test Soil Acidity and Alkalinity Before Landscaping?
• Acid Soil
• How to Make Soil Acid
• Tips on Building Garden Soil