Soil fertility is the garden’s foundation. Soil Fertility Management in your yard and garden means maintaining a healthy plant and soil environment by supplying the right amount of nutrition, in the right place, at the right time. A Tahoe Friendly Garden involves selecting plants that thrive in only lightly-amended soils, reducing fertilizer usage and enhancing water infiltration and storage while allowing your garden to thrive.
5 Tahoe Friendly Plant Suggestions to enhance your Soil Fertility- You can search websites such as Calscapes or CalFlora to learn more about the following suggested plants:
- White Dutch Clover, Trifolium repens (good lawn alternative, provides nitrogen, doesn’t need a lot of water, can be mowed, attracts pollinators, can be aggressive)
- Lupine, Lupinus ssp. (a natural nitrogen fixer, many options specific to Tahoe)
- Blue Elderberry, Sambucus nigra ssp. caerulea – (leaves and branches can add carbon to your garden)
- Snowberry, Symphoricarpos albus var. laevigatus– (the leaves and branches can add carbon to your garden)
- Showy penstemon, Penstemon speciosus (the leaves provide carbon to your garden)
Soil supports plant growth by providing:
- Anchorage: root systems extend outward and/or downward through the soil, thereby stabilizing plants.
- Oxygen: the spaces among soil particles contain air that provides oxygen, which living cells (including root cells) use to break down sugars and release the energy needed to live and grow.
- Water: the spaces among soil particles also contain water, which moves upward through plants. This water cools plants as it evaporates off the leaves and other tissues; carries essential nutrients into plants; helps maintain cell size so that plants don’t wilt; and serves as a raw material for photosynthesis, the process by which plants capture light energy and store it in sugars for later use.
- Temperature modification: soil insulates roots from drastic fluctuations in temperature. This is especially important during excessively hot or cold times of the year.
- Nutrients: soil supplies nutrients and also holds the nutrients that we add in the form of fertilizer.