This is an ideal growing soil with optimum balance of sand, clay and humus.
In reality the perfect loam rarely exists. Most types of loam are either sandy or clayey.
The best loam is a rich, dark brown soil, made up of between 50 and 60 percent of sand particles and about 30 percent of clay.
The other constituent of loam is humus, the valuable organic compound formed by decayed vegetable and animal material.
Only a few bog plants prefer a clay soil, while most of the commercially grown flowers cannot be grown on clay soil because of poor drainage. A perfect garden soil consists of 1/4th clay, 1/6th humus, ½ sand and ½ lime. But there is hardly any soil which is ideal or perfect to this extent, but many of the loamy soils come very near to this characteristic. A sandy soil is not suitable for growing most of the commercial flowers, firstly, because it has got a very poor water holding capacity and secondly, these soils lack sufficient nutrients.
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