Garden Soil Help.

[MarkV]

I sure could use some help from you gardeners. We are in a new home in Northwest Georgia and finally have some room to start a good size garden. Any of you that know our soil in the Southeast know that clay is the main ingredient. I would like to start improving the soil in the future garden area and I am not sure where to start.

We will get a soil test done and it is pretty much a sure thing that lime will be required in this area. Everything I have read indicates that organic material needs to be worked into the soil to help loosen up the clay. It is real serious clay around here. There is a commercial tree service near by that has a wood chip pile that must be two stories tall where I can buy truckloads of somewhat composted wood chips. It has also been suggested that a load of sand tilled in may help.

So, what do all of you suggest. With the experience I have, no suggestion is too basic.

MarkV

 

[pajoube]

Another thread on this site "Composting" will offer some good advise as well. I would suggest you start with the mixture of sand and the chips that you will work into your clay soil. Then on top of your garden you will put compost on the entire area. If you can get good compost in quanity till this in along with the sand.
PJ

 

[RalphVa]

That red clay down there probably isn't too bad. I'd just get some compost and work it in. You have to be careful with sand. Could end up with concrete.

You need to try to make mounded rows to help them drain a little better. The mounded rows and clay-like soil with some leaf or similar mulch on top after the seeds sprout a bit will help to drain but also to maintain the moisture in the soil.

I have a Gravely rotary plow that is great for making mounded rows. Been trying to get experience on these forums from folks using a 3 pt plow behind a compact/subcompact to mound rows without any response yet, as I plan to upgrade to a subcompact in April. Will keep the Gravely around until I can replace it in all aspects though.

Ralph

 

[GregJ]

Mark,
I am no expert, but have read where partially composted wood chips could be bad for your soil. They deplete the nitrogen to complete their composting process. I know that organic material will help break up clay, but I would make sure that it is "completely cooked" before tilling it in. If you can get the wood chips cheap and compost them yourself, I think that would be a good thing. I bought 10 yards of "high quality" compost last year for $35/yard and it came complete with Morning Glory and about 6 new weed varieties that I had never seen before. And as an added bonus they threw in some broken beer bottles. When I complained, they said obviously the weeds and broken glass wasn't from them because they are a "high quality" operation. I'm doing my own compost from now on. I have found this web site to be very informative: Soil, Compost and Mulch

Greg

 

[Bob_Skurka]

You can loosen clay with coarse sand, you do not want fine/small grain sand. But that will add zero to the nutrient base of the soil. I also have heavy clay soil and we tilled in some sand and it helped, but all it did was loosen it. You can also till in spagnahm peat moss (the dry compressed stuff) to loosen the soil.

Amending it with compost will help the garden. Wood chips may need to be composed a year before you till them in. If you have a chipper you may want to run the chips through your chipper because the big commercial chippers may give you something more like chunks. Our gas/electric company gives away truck loads of chipped trees if you get on the list early, it includes every part of the trees from the leaves to the small branches to chipped tree trunks and it is not suitable for tilling into a garden as it comes from them. But if you compost it down it is good. Leaf mold is also good, compost your leaves over the winter and till them in.

If you are serious about gardening, you will want to till in whatever organic matter you can get your hands on AND THEN do a soil test to see if you need things like lime. Some of the composted matter you add to the soil can change the ph of the soil so doing the soil test BEFORE you add whatever you add may give you some direction, but it is not your final answer.

 

[sassafraspete]

MarkV, I live on clay ground , so know what you are talking about. I have done lots of gardening...from small plots to 2 acres. Grew 3000 bell pepper plants one yr, from seed to maturity. It is very important on clay soil to not work it wet. You can compact it very easily. If you plow and can grab a handful of dirt, and squeeze and it stays in a ball, then too wet. If it crumbles...OK. Sometimes, you have to work wet if you don't get the right weather. If you work wet, you will be living with hard dirt clods the rest of the year. On the other hand, if you can get lots of organic stuff in the ground , go for it. The soil will then crumble...even when wet. I currently have a small garden that I have been improving by tilling in leaves every yr. One year I got a little heavy in one area, and everything was stunted in that area...I think the leaves took too much nitrogen out of the ground while decomposing. So you have to watch for that. However, after a few yrs of the leaf thing...there is no comparison with the texture of the soil. Also , I've had to be generous with the lime.

pete

 

[Bird]

Mark, I've heard and read so much about decomposing wood chips depleting nitrogen in the soil that I figure it must be true. However, I put massive quantities on my garden, both from using a chipper shredder myself and from truckloads delivered to me by the guys who were pruning trees from power line right of ways. And I'm sure "composting" is a great way to improve a garden; guess I'm just too lazy; never did any composting; just threw it all in the garden and tilled it in. I had black clay and I had a soil analysis done the first year that indicated it was OK as it was, and then I raised rabbits, so that provided quite possibly the best fertilizer you could get. And after 3 or 4 years, I also cleaned out a neighbor's calf barn that had not been cleaned out in at least 4 years, so I had two dump truck loads of that tilled into the garden. No one in that part of the country had a better vegetable garden than I did.

 

[MarkV]

Great advice so far, thank-you, I am taking notes. I kind of knew that I was starting to late, couldn't be helped, and that it takes several years to develop soil. What do you think I should do for this first year?
a. Forget the garden this year and start tilling in anything I can get, like manure, chips, leaves, ect.
b. Plow under the existing grass and plant in what I have while developing compost for next fall.
c. Look for the best organic material I can find in bulk, till it in, plant and cross my fingers.

To be honest I didn't even know you could buy real compost in bulk. That would seem to be the best for this first year and I will look locally for a source.

MarkV

 

[RalphVa]

I've bought compost in bulk here in central Va at Panorama Paydirt. Have also bought mulch from them. I've found that the fresh stuff won't grow plants well until it seasons for a while, or until you get the pH right.

I've thrown mulch between my green plants for years in NJ, La and now here in Va. It's a great way to control weeds. It turns to dirt for the next season.

Some plants (raspberries) even like something with a way-off C:N ratio like sawdust, which is about 500:1 vs. a more normal value of about 30:1. I've heard about it drawing N from the soil but don't know if anyone has ever proven it.

Ralph

 

[fivestring]

1/3 sand
1/3 organic (compost)
1/3 native soil (in your case, clay)

You need some clay to hold moisture.
You need some sand to move moisture.
You need organic to use nutrients.

Add some gypsum. It keeps the clay from packing too tight.