Soil Stabilization Techniques For Your Home Garden
Activities such as cultivation, poor drainage, and accumulation of plant material can make your garden soil unstable and loose. Stabilization techniques help to compact the soil to enable it to support healthy plant growth.
Many people may postpone soil improvement projects because they are worried about the cost. Soil stabilization is a less costly alternative to soil replacement and is worthwhile for minor projects such as home gardening. You can enlist professional soil stabilization services to help decide on the best technique for your home garden.
Here are some soil stabilization techniques for your home garden.
Use of Chemicals
Chemical soil stabilization is popular and involves introducing certain elements into the soil to improve its properties and structural composition. A professional takes a sample of the soil to a soil laboratory for testing. After that, they can determine the right proportion of chemicals to inject into the soil to help in the stabilization. Further, they can use special machines to mix the soil with the chemicals until they achieve the right balance. Even though professionals may add cement or fly ash, lime stabilization is the most popular option, as it helps in improving certain properties such as bearing capacity, swelling, volume, compressibility, hydraulic capacity, and density.
Mechanical Techniques
As the name suggests, mechanical processes are energy and time consuming since they involve the use of equipment to ram, vibrate, blast, and roll the soil to improve it. The application of force thoroughly mixes the soil with other grades and materials to achieve a dense and compacted mass. The advantage of engaging a professional is that they come with heavy machinery to turn and compress the soil. It's cost-saving since some of these machines cost a lot to buy or hire. Likewise, other costs such as storage and maintenance come into play with machine acquisition.
Polymer Process
The polymer process involves adding polymers to the soil to boost its physical attributes. Even though it's common in engineering work, it's also used by professionals in farming projects. It's a modern approach that's less costly, eco-friendly, and leads to sustainable soil preservation. Polymers are binding elements that help link soil particles or molecules. This method improves the soil structure to support plant growth and other processes such as irrigation, greenhouse construction, and fumigation.
Soil stabilization techniques help in improving the structure of your garden soil. Contact a soil stabilization expert to help you choose the right technique.