Soiled Again! It Feels Soul Good.
This article was originally published in our local newspaper: The Applegater, Spring 2026 edition.
Is soil the soul of a garden? Soil is certainly magical. Under the surface, it’s dark, insulated, womb-like and mysterious—only the worms and wigglies know what’s going on down there. For us above, soil is a source of wonder and appreciation.
Gardeners depend on soil far more than plants depend on us. To anyone who claims to have brown thumbs, I say “Wonderful!” because brown is the beautiful color of soil. What an honor!
To be real, gardening and soil building can feel soul-wrenching on a bad day. Other times they are an elegant dance with nature. I oscillate through this spectrum.
It helps to carry less expectations for myself and the garden. Building soil and gaining experience are also worthy gifts to my future self, definitely worth waiting (years) for. Yes, as they say, gardens teach patience—priceless!
Catch me building soil year round, one way or another. Here are a few favorites!
Lazy Compost Bed Prep
I cold compost out of the sheer joy of not having to turn piles. The downside of partially-broken-down compost is also the upside. Come end of season, I move the chunkier, unbroken-down part of the pile (the outsides and top) to a new spot. The bottom-middle of the pile is beautifully (partially) broken down, worm inhabited, epic compost that gets added to garden beds. Now! The soil that was under the compost pile no longer has grass or weeds and is majorly enriched—perfect for immediately planting into! Rinse, repeat.
Pine Needles Have Nutrients
Pine needles like to stay dry—it’s almost as if they want to burn. I’ve found pine needles nearly a foot deep at the base of a tree, dry and not very broken down. Well, pine needles decompose if they stay wet. So I layer pine needles in my compost. I layer them in mulch. I layer them in new raised beds—lasagna style. It works really well! And no, dry pine needles won’t acidify your garden!
Manure For the Win
Manure boosts our garden’s fertility! We don’t have livestock (aka poop factories), but we are lucky this region is inhabited by lots of animal lovers. Many said animal lovers don’t garden and have a, well, poop disposal problem. I am not picky about the animal, be it goat, horse, alpaca, chicken, cow, turkey, rabbit, what have you. They’re all good! My concern is their feed has not been sprayed, because persistent chemicals will kill soil for years.
Weeds Got it Covered
Weeds literally cover soil when we don’t. How smart. How generous! I am only diligent about weeding thornies (e.g. blackberry, star thistle) and runners (e.g. mint, rhizomatous grass). Other weeds are quite welcome until they start competing with another plant I favor. Then they are either harvested for food and medicine, used as mulch, cut back and allowed to continue growing as cover, or composted. Sometimes I let the weeds ferment or rot in water—“weed tea” makes an amazing liquid fertilizer!
Soil building is a gift that keeps on giving.
In part because the ritual never ends. When I dig into the compost pile, or pull back the mulch and find a new layer of rich, dark humus—when I harvest some veggies that I struggled to grow just a few years ago (in the very same spot)—I uncover more gratitude for the garden, for myself, for life. I find the gifts I left in the soil for myself, all those seasons ago, when I wove wishes and dreams into layers of Earth.
As I play in the dirt, I’m remembering something I inherently knew a long, long time ago as a young boy. Residual joy appears to come from the process, the ritual, the satisfaction of doing the thing—whatever that thing is—while not expecting a certain outcome.
Healthy plants, large veggies and abundant blooms are nice for a moment, if I’m lucky enough. When I’m loving the garden for what it is now—weeds, stones and all—it turns out I can love myself too, for who I am in this moment.
Recommended Reading
- Seed Saving is Good For the Heart
- I Am a Forever Beginner Gardener
- A Little Seed’s Winter Gift to the Hungry Heart
2 responses to “Soiled Again! It Feels Soul Good.”
My kind of gardening (and composting! I just dug trenches in empty spots in the beds, and added some partially worked compost and re-covered. And put a bit near the Good King Henry I divided from another spot)
I found your site seeking, skirret seeds and, oh! Your descriptions and stories make me want to grow them all!!
I have about 10 Homesteaders Kaleidoscopic Perennial kale – having grown it several years in McMinnville … moved a couple with me ~ 3 years ago (I may have had various plants in ~ 70 pots !! ) and one is still with me.
My son-in love coaches track, and brought home straw bales after a meet that I’ve layered over cardboard for paths. When I weed the beds, most goes on the paths or dropped in place.
I’m in a Grannie Flat on their double lot, so we have a lovely space for gardening in back (West of the houses)
I’ve just gone through and clipped pricklies (leaving raspberries – there will be a bed …), and enjoy the clover and geranium. I’ve got raised beds, and leave in some dandelion and dock … The morning glory has a special drying place …
My middle school grandson LOVES purslane, and we’ll be happy when it emerges.We’re several blocks from the creek, and Linfield hosted the annual Camas festival (in partnership with the Grand Ronde tribes) … when the environmental students cleared the blackberries near Cozine creek, camas re-emerged!
I am cold stratifying seed students collected from the beds in 2023, and imagine the wave of purple this land would have had 160 years ago and before … this same camas!!
I’m also stratifying seed of sochan (golden glow Rudbekia) which was a principle food of the Cherokee – and thinking using it like garland chrysanthemum greens, when I get a patch going …I’m working on sowing the backlog of seeds I’ve accumulated, into seed trays so the rolly pollies don’t *harvest* them as they emerge!! So will make myself wait to order goodies from you.
Many blessings to you and your family!
Nadya
Good morning Nadya, what a joy to hear from you! I loved reading these snippets about your joy for your gardening journey, and it makes me happy our paths collided online over skirret seeds :) So fun also to realize we are in the same state of Oregon, although we are in the southern part of the state.
The plants are all so fun! I appreciate you reciprocating the loving effort we put into our seed descriptions. The seeds are definitely a medium for us to share our joy out into the world!
Homesteader’s Kaleidoscopic Perennial Kale, Purslane, and Skirret are some of our favorites that you named. And I’m sure you can tell from browsing our catalog, we have a lot of favorites! I am so glad to hear you and your family can relate with us.
What a beautiful story about the camas coming back after the blackberries were cleared! I am trying to grow camas from seed for the first time this year. Only after I got the seeds did I realize there is also a large camas. I’m curious to try both and compare. Do you have any recommendations with camas and are you growing the “normal” size or the large?
Have fun sowing your seeds and gardening this season. I appreciate you getting in touch with your joyful words!
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