we are going to
pH that soil with this pH test today on
Epic gardening stay tuned
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guys all right so we're going to pH the
soil in the front yard and first of all
let's talk about why we would even do
this in the first place for me that's
soil that I've never grown in before
because this is a new place for me so I
have no clue what the soil's uh pH is so
number one that's the reason I'm doing
it but number two the broader reason why
everyone should do it especially if
you're growing in a spot that you
haven't grown in before is because every
type of plant and in fact all plants in
general require a certain PH range in
the soil to make sure that they're able
to uptake the nutrients that that they
require to grow so we talk about plants
needing light water nutrition well pH is
sort of a gate on nutrition if it's
inside of a certain range your plants
are fine if it's outside of a certain
range your plants are not going to be
taking in the nutrition that you put in
the soil so you could have perfect soil
amazing quality of nutrition in in
organic matter in that soil and then
nothing will be able to be uh absorbed
by the plants so we're going to be using
the rapy test PH soil testing kit uh
this actually comes with a few other
different types of soil tests that'll
I'll go over in other videos so you need
this or or some equivalent of this it
comes with these testing capsules and
what we're going to do is go out in the
front yard and grab a soil sample grab
some water and mix those two together
with one of these see what soil we have
or see what PH soil we have in the front
yard so let's go ahead and give it a
go one thing that you should consider
when you're testing your soil is testing
multiple spots so this is my front yard
and I'm going to ideally be putting in a
permanent raised bed in the back here so
it makes sense to test the back but what
I'd like to do is eventually remove the
Jasmine there uh prune down this this
low quat tree right here and then take
out these rose bushes in the habiscus so
I I'll be growing in the front as well
so it makes sense for me to test both
the back and the front and see if I can
get sort of a more normalized or average
reading uh for soil PH so I know what's
sort of amendments I should put in so
I'm going to go ahead and hop in the
front yard and we'll go ahead and dig
our samples out all right so when we're
digging our soil sample out you're going
to want a clean container and a Trel and
you don't want to just take it right off
the top dump it in here and and call it
a day you want to actually dig down if
you're going to do vegetables and fruits
around 4 in or so so I'm going to grab
my Trel got kind of compacted soil which
will be the the subject of another video
on how to deal with this but you're
going to want to dig down about 3 4 in
in and get a sample from around that
area to get a real good sense of the
underlying nutrition in the soil
apologize for the wind guys it's kind of
a weird day here in San Diego it's
usually been pretty hot but
lately getting a little bit of this
weird wind so I I'm about 3 4 in down
now make sure I get some of that surface
oil out of here just so I get an
accurate test and I'm going to go ahead
and
grab just about that much you don't need
a lot you'll see how much you
need okay so we have our soil we have
our testing kit we have a perfectly
neutral
7.0 pH water and we have our capsules so
it's very simple the next steps all we
have to do is fill this with soil then
fill it with water give it a good shake
and as and add our capsules as well and
we are off to the races so I'm going to
go ahead and get started it's important
to not touch the soil with your hands
because your hands can affect it so I'm
using a metal spoon just so I don't
touch
it it's okay if we spill here just going
to go ahead and add some of that
in make sure I get to that soil
line pretty much got
it almost perfect now the next step is
adding in the
capsule all right I have now chopped the
top off of a capsule and I'm going to
pour that on top of the
soil feel like I'm in Breaking Bad right
now getting my chemistry
on all right we've got it all in
there capsule's empty next step is very
simple we just add our pH neutral water
up to the water line
and then we need to give it a good shake
after we put the top on of
course all right let's shake this baby
up so after we're done shaking what we
need to do is let this Soil and Water
and um capsule rest for a bit in order
to settle and settle on a true pH for us
so what I'm going to do is set the
capsule down or set the test
down you can see it's kind of bubbly and
and
foamy and oh you know what I'll give it
a bit more of a shake just to make sure
okay cool so we're seeing some settling
happen already which is great but what
I'm going to do is lower the camera a
bit so you guys can see it settle in
time- lapse
Style so we will
freeze right
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there okay so it's settled and this is
where we do the color matching and so
it's important to do this in daylight
which is why I moved outside because I
had a different light on uh inside my
house which means that it would sort of
taint the color and I wouldn't be able
to get an accurate prediction so we're
just looking for the one that matches it
closely and of course it's never going
to be exactly perfect but it can be
pretty darn close and in my opinion let
me know what you guys think this is
looking somewhere between pH 5.5 and ph6
somewhere in that range I would go
something like a 5.8 if I had to guess
and so what that tells us is that we
have acidic soil and honestly probably a
bit too acidic for what we're growing so
we're going to cut over to exactly how
you might amend your soil based on this
information so the Ry test kit comes
with recommendations on how you might
alter your pH so if you found that like
me you have a bit acidic pH somewhere in
the range of 5.5 to 5.8 for me unless
I'm color blind which I actually am
slightly color blind so hopefully I got
that reading right and definitely let me
know if I didn't um it shows you what
you can use so we've got dolomitic or
calcic Limestone hydrated lime iron
sulfate and aluminum sulfate as
potential options but of course there
are many other ways that you can amend
your soil and change your pH it lets you
know how many units to use as well as um
what what you might want to use
depending on the type of soil you have
Sandy LOM or clay and and these units
are pounds per per 100 square ft um so
there's many different ways to do this I
might do another video in the future on
how you might amend your soil maybe in
an organic way or in an effective cheap
way depends on what you guys leave me in
the comments but stay tuned thanks for
watching how to test your soil PH at
home and let me know if you have any
suggestions or methods that you've used
cuz I'm always looking to learn from you
you guys as well stay tuned keep growing
happy gardening hit this video with a
like And subscribe if you want some more
stuff and definitely let me know what
you want to see next in the comments
thanks for watching guys I really
appreciate it
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