It is important to know what makes a soil healthy and how this results in growing plants full of nutrition.

Bacteria and Fungi play major roles in the relationship between soil and plants and we need to encourage the beneficial species of these.

Many ingredients go into making a healthy soil. Some provide nutrients and others help to condition the soil so it is able to provide a medium for the nutrients and water that plants need.

Knowing what products are available and what they provide will help you to understand why we add these.

In the natural world many these additives would have found their way into the soil through the normal cycle of life but unfortunately this does not happen in our world so we need to add them as we go.

This is what it is really all about. How we can make it as easy as possible for plants to access the nutrients in the soil.

It helps to know what the purpose is of the various nutrients and how to correct imbalances.

Two factors which have a great influence on the availability of nutrients are:
1. Soil pH
2. Cation Exchange Capacity (CEC)

Hopefully this section will explain all of these and aid in understanding the importance of the soil as the base from which everything else evolves.

Soils are formed by various geographical occurrences over time. Whilst soils may vary, they are classified into main groups which have similar characteristics.

Having some idea of the type of soil you have will determine what inputs you need.