Coastal and desert areas have a lot of sand,
which is a major problem for gardening and growing plants. People who live in
these areas and want to grow plants should consider using sand as a substitute.
They will have to find sustainable solutions that can stabilize the sand and
make it easy to grow plants. You won't believe it, but sand can be used for
gardening and growing plants just like soil.
Today
we are telling you such a simple and sustainable method through which you can
modify the sand property into soil and can also grow all types of plants in it.
This information is very useful for
those people who live in coastal and desert areas and want to do gardening. If
you understand this information completely, then you can also improve sand
easily and quickly like a natural soil and can do gardening and grow plants in
the same way.
The topics we are going to cover in
this information are as follows
- How sand is made?
- Why it is difficult to grow plants by using sand?
- How to turn sand into soil for gardening quickly?
How sand is made?
Making of sand is a natural process
in which large rocks break naturally and break into small pieces. This is what
we call sand. In short, small pieces of rocks are called sand and these are
made from large rocks only.
The process of making sand is
mainly of two types. First is mechanical weathering in which water is made to
flow in large rocks due to some reason and on cooling it turns into ice, then
due to the expansion of ice these rocks break into small pieces and turn into
sand.
The second thing is chemical weathering,
in this case when water moves through rocks, the minerals and chemicals
available in the rocks react with the water and the rock breaks into small
pieces and turns into sand.
Why it is difficult to grow plants by using sand?
The biggest difficulty in growing
plants by using sand is due to the poor quality of sand which is caused by the
following four reasons
- First is that the sand does not have the capacity to hold moisture for a long time
- Second is that the sand does not contain any amount of nutrients
- Third is that the structure of the sand is very loose, in such a situation it cannot support the roots of the plants and the plants do not remain stable.
- And the fourth is that the temperature fluctuation of sand changes very fast. It becomes very hot when it gets hot environment gets and very cold when it gets cool environment due to this it becomes very difficult for the plants to survive.
These four factors are the ones
that make sand very bad for gardening and if we can improve these four factors
in some way then we can easily convert sand into gardening soil and grow plants
in it.
I hope you have understood well why
we cannot grow plants in the sand.
How to turn sand into soil for gardening quickly?
To convert sand into soil, we will
improve the demerits of sand as mentioned above and for this we will follow
three steps which are as follows.
Step-1: First of all, we will take
as much sand as we want to convert into soil and clean it well with clean water
so that all the salt available in it gets completely separated.
For doing this, we will put the sand
in a container as per requirement and then after mixing it with clean water, we
will mix it well for at least 10 to 15 minutes. By doing this the salt
available in the sand will dissolve in water and after that we will separate
the water and dry the sand in sunlight. This process is very important because
the sand found in coastal areas and desert contains salt and if we do not
separate the salt from the sand then we will not be able to grow similar
plants.
Step 2: When the sand cleaned in
water gets completely dried, we will add cocopeat in equal quantity to the sand
and mix sand and cocopeat properly.
Mixing cocopeat in sand will
improve the capacity of sand to retain water and moisture for a longer time.
If you don’t know about cocopeat,
let me tell you that this is a resource made from coconut husk and is
sustainable as well as ecofriendly.
Step3: When sand and cocopeat are
mixed very well, then in the third step we will add vermicompost or any other
compost in equal quantity to the sand and mix everything again very well.
By adding vermicompost or compost to
the mixture of sand and cocopeat, essential nutrients and other micronutrients
for the plants will be added to it.
And when sand, cocopeat and
vermicompost or compost are completely mixed, our process will be complete and
now this mixture will be ready for gardening and planting. Now we can easily
grow all types of plants in it. So if we follow these simple steps then the
property of sand becomes just like natural soil and whatever poor quality of
sand was there, it gets improved in this way.
Moisture retention: By following
this process, the capacity of sand to hold moisture increases and now it can
retain this moisture till the required time.
Availability of NPK and other
nutrients: Now NPK and other nutrients required for the plant also become
available which are very important for the growth of any plant.
Improvement in structure: Now the
structure of this mixture becomes a little compacted which supports the roots
of the plants and helps the plants to remain stable.
Temperature fluctuation: Now the
temperature of this mixture also becomes stable and it neither becomes too hot
on getting hot nor too cold on getting cold.
Conclusion: If we have to convert
sand into soil, we have to improve its poor qualities and we can do this in a
very sustainable and ecofriendly way by using only cocopeat and vermicompost or
compost. This method is very easy and we have used it many times.
We hope you will find this
information useful and we have also tried to include all the points through
which we can convert sand into soil very easily.
If you have any question or concern
about this, you can write to us in the comment box and we will try to answer it
as soon as possible.
Thank you
