The 5 Most Important Principles of Scientific Gardening

Scientific gardening is all about using evidence to support your decisions as growers. As you might already feel, you want to ensure that your soil remains in good health for as long as you’re going to be growing it. This means you want it to have plenty of nutrients, microbial life, and have great structure. There are 5 principles that are going to help you achieve this for your soil.

No-Till

The first principle would be to disturb the soil as little as possible. The USDA once said that tilling was like causing an earthquake, tornado, and hurricane at the same time for the soil life. This isn’t something you want to be doing on a regular basis. Scientific evidence shows that disturbing the soil as little as possible does something magical to its structure and life. Happening over time, earthworms and other microbial life create burrows and tunnels as they feed on decomposing organic matter. This creates an excellent structure for air and water to move within the soil. It also creates new opportunities for new roots to easily grow. Tilling might seem like a good option to incorporate organic matter, but it adds too much organic matter all at once. The microbial life starts to quickly multiply because they feed on all of the newly incorporated material and this causes nitrogen to be tied up. Stable carbon stores also start turning into carbon dioxide as they quickly degrade. By not tilling, you are creating humus and longer stored, more stable versions of carbon.

Compost

Another important principle for scientific gardening would be the use of compost. As a mindful person, you probably want to divert any potential waste from sitting in a landfill to nourishing our lands. Scientific evidence has shown that compost reaps huge benefits for the soil. It improves the water holding capacity and it adds valuable organic matter. Compost is not a great source of nutrients, however, it has the ability to hold onto nutrients you might add later. By top-dressing with compost, you get the benefits of both no-till and adding the compost to the system.

Cover Crops

Cover crops are really a wonder for the soil. One of the goals for regenerative agriculture is to have a crop growing 365 days a year. Active photosynthesis is one of the best ways to build soil, pour carbon in the ground and increase soil biodiversity. This means you want plants growing at all times. If you have plenty of space, cover crops should find their way into your rotation. Some cool season cover crops can include rye, fava beans or vetch. Some warm season cover crops can include sunn hemp or sorghum-sudan. Be cautious about using clover in your vegetable gardens because it can be hard to kill and it will usually come back and compete with your crops.

Mineral Fertilizers

Fertilizers have been shown to increase root biomass, soil microbial biomass and overall yields. The issue with mineral fertilizers is usually their overapplication. Growers use too much at one time when the plants don’t need them. What probably is happening, as well, is that growers are using chemical fertilizers when they are also excessively tilling or digging their soil and they are probably not using compost or cover crops to increase the health and structure of their soil. Usually, fertilizer is not the only problem. Scientific evidence shows that using chemical fertilizers in limited amounts along with these other regenerative practices actually increases the health of the soil and reduces the need for those said fertilizers. A little really goes a long way. Because plants need the macronutrients and micronutrients, it’s best to find a fertilizer that contains every one of these nutrients in their proper amounts. The macronutrients are going to be needed in larger quantities than the micronutrients but it is essential that your fertilizer has at least a minute quantity of micronutrients to get the highest quality of yield and nutrition. If your plants do indeed need other nutrients that science is unaware of, then the native soil you are growing in will supply those nutrients.

Pulse Irrigation

Scientific research is starting to mount that irrigation practices could be even more effective and efficient than current techniques. Many gardeners continue to believe the myth that deep, infrequent watering is best for their crops. There have been only a few documented cases of deep root systems, like mesquite in the arid Southwest or perennial grasses on the Great Plains. Vegetables, on the other hand, do not have such an extensive root system. When you are trying to grow food, it makes most sense to use as little resources as possible. Water is valuable and continues to rise in expense, so you should do everything you can to use as little as possible. Pulse irrigation is the answer to this challenge. By watering for less amounts of time but more frequently, you will keep the top 1-2 feet of the soil consistently moist. This is crucial because science has shown that the most root mass is in the top 18 inches of the soil. This is because oxygen can penetrate to this depth but not much deeper. This is where most of the action is happening and where most of your soil life lives. By keeping this layer adequately moist, you will nourish the soil life, grow huge root biomass, and get proper yields. It all depends on where you live and what kind of soil you have, but you want to start with the idea of 6 watering times spread out of the course of the day and having each watering time go for about 5 minutes. This is in contrast to watering for 30 minutes once a day. Most of the water will leach further down into the soil and take the nutrients with it. You want to avoid this. Using a pulse irrigation technique, you can keep the water and nutrients where the plants can get to them.

Conclusion

Becoming a scientific gardener means using the best of both regenerative, organic and conventional methods. As you can see, many regenerative, organic methods are used in this system and school of thought because the scientific evidence supports their use. Not tilling the soil helps keep the structure intact and keep the soil life thriving. Using compost helps the soil retain nutrients and water and it also feeds the soil life. Cover crops keep photosynthesis active and that feeds the soil life and adds structure to the soil. One very important conventional method used in scientific gardening is the use of mineral fertilizers. Small amounts of fertilizer are crucial for maximizing yields and nutrition. Last but not least, using water wisely and only watering the top couple of feet of soil more frequently leads to better water use and nutrient availability. Utilizing all of these techniques is going to help you become a better gardener. You’re going to achieve higher yields, higher nutrition, and better flavor all because you chose to follow the scientific evidence. Strong evidence leads to strong results.