Sara's Garden MarketSustainable Living, Gardening, Flowers, and Food

So, I noticed a big difference when I used dirt from my garden to grow some of my indoor garden this year!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And it wasn’t good. 🙁

I now highly recommend using only sterile, baged indoor potting soil for indoor gardens. Either that or you have to go through a process for preparing your soil to be indoors. (Such as treating it with a pesticide for a few weeks every 5-7 days and then letting it rest or washing it before bringing it inside. – much easier to just get some potting soil!)

Same is true for wintering over. If you have an indoor garden *and* you want to try to winter over some plants from your pots or garden I highly recommend keeping these plants separate from each other.

This year I used some soil from my garden for my indoor garden and I brought in a lot more than just soil for my garden! I also brought in some pests that put my indoor growing season way behind. There are bugs in that soil!!!

In particular Spider Mites and a type of Fruit Fly were what did the most damage to my indoor garden. I actually had to resort to using pesticides to get rid of these little buggers. (I got some that were highly recommended by organic gardeners that are specifically for food, and specifically for indoor use.)

So! Grab that potting soil, you’re not doing yourself any favors by trying to use raw outdoor soil for use in your indoor garden!

Thanks for stopping by!

Sara

So, I have discovered a few things about potting soil, and seed starting soil etc… that I want to share with you!

Seed starting soil:

• Already has fertilizer in it! Unless your soil is over 6+ months old do NOT use a fertilizer when you water!
• Seed starting mix has a lot of Peat Moss in it, which can throw off the Ph of your soil a bit if you don’t transplant right away. I have found in particular that it is deficient in Calcium. I remedied mine by adding a 50/50 solution of milk and water to one watering. I will also add some egg shells to the top of the soil next time I have some. This can also save tomatoes from blossom-end rot.

Potting Soil

• Not only does potting soil generally come with fertilizer already in it, you can get different kinds of fertilizer, and different kinds of mixes. Read the package well so that you understand exactly what you are getting!
• Testing the Ph of your soil in this case is also important. Simply by being on the shelf in that plastic package for too long can throw off the Ph.

Hopefully you can learn from my mistakes and not end up burning your plants or having them wilt due to being calcium deficient!

Thanks for stopping by!