Welcome to Read Your Soil
Crop success depends on the fertility of the soil. To improve a soil, you must first understand what it needs (and what it does not need) so you can improve its weaknesses and maintain its strengths. Read You Soil provides you with the tools neede to understand and improve your soil regardless of your access to a soil testing laboratory.
Each soil is unique. Just as there is no medicine that is good for everyone, there is no fertilizer that is good for all soils. How do we determine what to add to a soil to improve its fertilty? We could take a soil sample, have it analyzed by a soil testing laboratory and then send the report to us for an expert interpretation and custom organic fertilizer recommendation. But what if we don’t have access to a soil lab or a soil consultant?
Read Your Soil also provides information and tools for you to perform simple tests to better understand your unique soil and how specifically to improve it. Our app guides you through a number of tests, including soil quality tests, irrigation water tests, and observing and interpreting crop deficiency symptoms that you can select and perform. Once you enter your results, the app will create a custom organic fertilizer recommendation listing specific organic inputs and application rates to improve your specific soil. Once you create a free account (we do not use your information), the app works offline so you can use it in the field. The Read Your Soil app includes a large number of nutrient deficiency symptom images for a wide variety of common crops, so often you don’t need to plant specific crops but can simply observe the crops you are already growing to learn more about your soil.
In addition to the app, this website provide an ever-growing number of Soil Science Spotlights (blogs) to provide a good soil science foundation you can apply to gain a better understanding your soil, water and crops, regardless of your educational background. With this foundational knowledge and the handy app, we hope you have much success in better understanding your soil’s uniqueness, strengthening its particular weaknesses and maintaining its strengths.
Soil is A WOMB, comprised of the presence and interactions of Air, Water, Organic matter, Minerals and Biology. Read Your Soil can help you analyze each of these components and determine how best to improve your particular soil.
