What do I need to do to prepare my dirt to be a flower garden? It is now a hard slab of dirt.?

I am a novice as a gardener/botanist and want to grow some annuals and perennials. I have a hard slab of dirt from it being made into mud, and then drying. I think it's straight black dirt. Please help:)
What do I need to do to prepare my dirt to be a flower garden? It is now a hard slab of dirt.?
I use a tiller (shovel will work its just more work) and loosen the dirt so that air gets into it and I also like to use mulch and just mix it in. But if you dont want to do that much work to it you can always poor dirt on top of it and put some bricks around the edges to hold it up. They both work!



Hope this helps
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Reply:Digging your bed, adding peat moss and compost are all great ideas. If you add manure, be sure it is composted. In addition, a great idea is to add vermiculite - it keeps your soil loose and helps hold water longer. Pearlite also keeps your soil loose, but will not hold water and tends to float and move around in your bed. Another good idea is to build yourself a frame (wood, brick, cinderblock or whatever) around your bed - don't bother to dig your soil, and fill your frame with a mix of equal parts peat moss, vermiculite, and composted manure. See www.glennhumphries.net for more details.
Reply:Dig up the dirt about the depth of the shovel head and chop it up fine with a shovel or Hoe. Add some Sphagnum Peat Moss and a bag of manure or some compost.