You're listening to the Beginners Garden podcast. I'm Jill McShehehe with Journey Withjil.net,

and my goal is to give beginning gardeners the tools they need to grow talking about testing your soil.

Now, if you're listening to this, when this episode goes live at the end of October, then you probably fall

into one or two camps. The first one is you have gardened in the past, this past year perhaps,

or maybe you've gardened for years, and you realize that you probably need to get a better

idea of what's going on in your soil. Or maybe you are like me

and you are planning your very first garden for next spring and you're getting a head start.

So either way, now is a great time for us to be talking about soil testing.

Soil testing is one of those subjects that I'm very

passionate about because I've seen the results of the things that I have done in my garden

over the years. I've seen the difference that the actions that I've taken as a result of my

soil tests have made. But it's also one of those things that is very overwhelming,

or at least it can be if you let yourself get too caught up in the details of everything.

Before we get too far into the content of today's podcast, I feel like I need to confess

something to you. Even though I have a college degree, I have never taken a chemistry course.

Not in college, not in high school, never.

Honestly, probably eighth grade earth science is the closest that I have gotten to any kind of education in soil science.

Honestly, it's a little overwhelming for me to think about

talking to you about testing your soil when I don't have a whole lot of formal education

in the subject. But I have done research and I have been able to give myself a working knowledge

as well as I can as a home gardener. And I think you're going to find that refreshing because I know one year

I bought a book. I was so excited about it. It was all about the soil and it was so over my head.

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