Curious about what’s in your soil?

SoilSafe Aotearoa is offering free soil tests for everyone around the country.

At the moment we don’t know very much about the content of New Zealand’s domestic soil, says Auckland University scientist Dr Melanie Kah.

Her team are particularly interested in detecting heavy metals such as lead which may be in too-high concentrations in some areas.

To gather enough soil data, the scientists must gather and analyse as much soil as possible.

The SoilSafe Aotearoa website has detailed instructions, but the sampling and sending process is pretty straightforward, Dr Kah says.

“Basically you just have to go into your backyard with a trowel and scoop out some soil and put it into a little bag. We need about a cricket-ball size sample, and you can send up to five samples collected at different locations around your house – your front yard and your vegetable garden, for instance.”

Discovering what lies beneath the lawn could help people avoid growing vegetables in soil with unsafe levels of heavy metals. A raised vegetable bed may be a better option in such cases, Dr Kah says.

The SoilSafe service is completely free of charge, except for the cost of posting your soil samples. (Dr Kah asks that people get in touch via the website if postage cost is a barrier.)

People who send in soil samples will later be sent a report on their soil’s composition.

All soil data will remain anonymous and will be analysed collectively to help identify specific areas that may have an issue, Dr Kah says.