The Weathervane
Soil Conditioners
Soil conditioning, in the broad, general sense, is anything but new. Ever since man first raised crops there has been soil conditioning of one kind or another, and if there hadn’t been we’d probably still be living in trees or caves or burrows or -wherever we first lived.
But in the narrower sense, as distinct from cultivation and fertilization, soil conditioning is of recent origin, or at least the idea behind it is. Anyway, in recent years, and up until this year, “soil conditioner” has usually meant peatmoss, leaf-mold. humus, composted garden refuse or any of quite a few crop by-products Iow in plant nutrients but consisting mostly of organic matter. Occasionally lime. sand, gravel and other rock derivatives have also been considered “soil conditioners.”
Now, during 1952, “soil conditioner” has been taking on a still narrower meaning to gardeners who’ve followed - the news stories and advertisements of a host of products ending in “hurt,” “il,” “ir,” “tick” and the like. It has come to mean a chemical of some kind that “conditions” soil by causing the clay particles in it to stick together in small lumps or aggregates. This aggregation of clay particles makes the soil “loose” or “friable” in a somewhat different way titan the addition of organic matter does, but apparently it serves pretty much the same useful purpose by increasing water penetration and retention, by making for better aeration, by facilitating plant root development, and so on.
Quite likely the development of these new materials will prove to have been the most important thing that happened to gardening around the mid-point of this century. Its impact on the minds of gardeners�highlighting the nature and importance of soil structure�is alone enough to benefit gardening more than anything else that’s turned up in late years. And even if the soil conditioners themselves do less than one-tenth what some people expect them to do they’ll still have worked minor wonders on gardening progress.
Just how some of these new materials will work for individual plants in individual gardens only time will tell. It goes without saying there’ll be reports of unqualified success and others of complete failure, and although there’ll be reasons for both it may not always be easy to pin them down. The recommendations for using some or all of the products will probably be revised from time to time and the same goes for the directions on the packages and the claims of the advertisements. The materials are that new.
All of which means: (1) if you’re the kind of gardener that likes to try out new plants, fertilizers, sprays and garden gadgets. you’re missing out on something pretty exciting if you don’t try these new materials. but (2) if you’re the kind that likes to play safe” with things that have been proved and feel cheated if something doesn’t come up to your expectations, you’d better adopt the same cautious attitude toward the new soil conditioners as you do toward everything else.
On page 52 will be found a listing of all the synthetic soil conditioners on -which information was available at the time this September issue went to press. By the time some readers get to it, new brands may have been introduced and, conceivably, some of those listed may have been discontinued.
Before long we’ll have well documented reports on the performance of many of these products under the carefully controlled conditions of the scientific institutions. We’d like to supplement these with reports from “plain dirt gardeners,” and so all our readers who have tried any of these materials are invited to write to us briefly on their effectiveness.
The kind of information we’d like to pass on to other readers would include the name of the soil conditioner used, at what rate it was applied per 100 or 1000 square feet. what kind of soil it was used on (sandy, clayey or an “in-between” loam), what kind of plants were grown in the treated soil, what effect if any the material had on the soil and what effect if any it had on the plants. If you’d like to tell us whether you found the material easy to use, the directions easy to follow, etc., we’d be glad to have that information too.
The more reports we get the more we’ll all know about how these new soil conditioners work both for home gardeners and for plant scientists. So as soon as you have any definite information on them. by all means let its hear from you. FLOWER GROWER readers will be grateful for your cooperativeness.
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