Brighter flowers come from healthy soil

Alyssum. Borage. Nasturtium.

Names which don’t roll easily off the tongue, but as the edible flowers around your garden they can be a delight to the eyes, and the mouth!

Like everything in our garden’s ecosystem, what goes in will affect what comes out. Soils that have a lot of nitrogen from manure and fertiliser tend to produce plants with lots of leaves and few flowers. Surplus nitrogen can leach from soil into waterways to cause dreadful blue-green algal blooms.

Considering we don’t plant these beautiful species for their leaves, we want to ensure our soil is in good health to help fuel the growth of the eye-catching colours. Healthy soil is a living ecosystem with lots of organic matter, and does most of the work of nurturing healthy plants on its own.

Adding organic matter, especially as compost, is the best way to build soil health.

Kitchen scraps contain many nutrients, including nitrogen, which are good for gardens. To reuse these goodies, first unlock them in a compost system, where kitchen scraps are turned into nutrient-dense (sticky) compost soil. Since the nutrients aren’t yet in a form for plants to take up, you can’t plant directly in compost soil.

It is simple to make unlocked nutrients available for plants. Leave compost soil in a sheltered spot for maturation to occur, as it converts naturally into a stable end-product. Mature compost looks and smells like crumbly rich soil. Incorporate it in your soil or potting mix to grow your plants.

Mature compost acts like a slow-release fertiliser, bringing the necessary balance of these key elements to ensure the makeup is optimised for improved flower growth.

Importantly, its unique structure conditions the soil, enabling easier movement of roots, water and air to help regulate what we don’t see under the surface, so what we do see shines its brightest.

So if you want to power your flowers and make your herbs superb, feed your soil to feed all plants!