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Amending clay soil recommendations.

E

Emeoba69

So Im in my third year of growing peppers and want to expand into other types of herbs and vegetables. I stuck mostly with containers until last year and was went through the growing pains of experimenting with what ever half decent store bought soils I could get and mixing it with soil from my property. It wasn't until last season where I planted some peppers and tomatoes in ground for my first poor attempt at soil amending (and trying out a soilless mix recommended in some of my potted plants) did I realize how the compact clay soil I have inhibits root growth and plant size. I live in Southwest Ohio and every plant I stuck in the hard clay went nowhere.

I'll probably borrow an uncle's rototiller to help out this spring. From some of the stuff I've read humus seems like the best route. I've also read tilling in pine fines works too. What has anyone else used that has worked? Anyone struggle with clay soil have tips? Any good guides or websites dealing with this?
 
Not really a tip so much, but we have quite a bit of clay in the soil in our area and I had doubts about being able to grow tomatoes etc.. I had the garden area dug out to a depth of 18 inches and then I raised the garden a bit to give me a depth of 24 inches. I filled it with a mix of soil and compost, and away I went.
 
As stefan stated above, double dig (deep digging and or raised bed), We have red clay here in georgia. We remove quite a bit of the clay and amend amend amend.
Perlite, vermiculite, compost, peat, and a good organic soil. After a few seasons, the beds well be a lot easier to maintain.
 
gypsum was once thought to breakdown clay soil but i was constantly amending my garden with fresh compost, peat, seaweed, vermiculite, grass clippings, zeolite and anything else the garden centre would recommend - this went on for 18 years. i finally gave up and built raised garden beds out of 2 x 12 and bought a large bag of potting soil mix from a soil company. that fixed the problem! the large bag was so large it had to brought in by forklift, they dropped the bag in my yard and i slowly picked away at it, spreading it into the beds.

every year i would be out in the garden in spring with shovel and ho, then go at it with the garden claw. every year the clay was the same as the year before and just as compact. it would create little compact balls as the spring thaw started.

good luck and save yourself a lot of time.
 
im with Alpha with everything but the peat moss as you want to promote earthworm activity they will help with the amendment process also, peat is very acidic and can drive worms away, use lots of premixed soil even the cheap stuff if you have a large area, lots of organics that the worms and other microbes love to eat, household waste such as coffee grounds,banana peals, veg and fruit waste,leaves,grass etc all will promote good natural amendment, rabbit and various other manures,hay and straw will also help
a raised bed is a good idea but not always necessary IMHO
you can amend sections where you will grow and maintain it easier,it also allows the worms to work there magic better , on going amendment after the initial shot in the arm is also recommended, fresh food for the worms and other microbes so they keep coming back, you will notice as time goes by that your soil will look better and better,
this is what i did over the last 3 years in my yard, when i started it was just back-fill and clay now its beautiful soil and my plants go nuts

i hope this helps
thanks your friend Joe
 
Our soil is a clay called Bull Tallow - think of a very hard wax !
When it gets wet it swells and is even more difficult to penetrate. Swing a pick axe at it and will bounce back at you! It never drains. Planting peppers in it is a certain death.
The silver lining is that it's rich in nutrients and will grow nearly anything when fortify with organic matter the ph is correct ed.
Lime, particularly Dolomititic lime is the key. It takes MUCH more than you think to hold a 6.0+ ph in clay. It may be practically impossible to overlime in heavy clay. Hydrated lime will make quick corrections, but you must be careful as it may burn if overused. OSU has a great web site and can guide you. (BTW I personally dislike peat moss with peppers. Leaf mold, composted pine bark and home made compost are my preferred supplements.)
 
SanPatricio brings up a good point in that clays have allot of nutrients in it, and all clay/soils are not the same. I would suggest getting soil tested, I got mine tested for free at a local college. I am trying to build up my soil also, and added allot of shredded leaves, pine needles, manure and some ash last fall.

I have a ways to go to get where I want but, there is no time limit! I am hoping over the next couple years to build it up and add some bark or other fine mulch to start keeping the soil from re settling into hard clumps. On a whole my soil is not that bad, thankfully, but it is far from the lush aerated soil filled with worms that I hope for.
 
As previously stated, there's no easy way out... You just have to make a raised bed or till/spade deeply and add lots of humus. My personal favorite is to spade in a truckload of sawdust horse bedding/manure in the fall and let it mellow over the winter. In spring I screen my compost pile and add that as well, along with my other soil amendments. Do this every year and you'll see a marked improvement.
 
All above is well worded. Aji Joe makes a great point about the peat, and I guess i was generalizing when i mentioned. Worms are the way... i keep them in my compost pile and then move them with the compost when amending the soil. They are tremendous workers. Due to the worms being present, i turn the beds by hand, ie no roto tiller. Each year, the worms are still present and doing their job. I use pine straw as a top dressing over a fabric or paper layer. Both break down nicely over the course of the season.
 
AlphaHydroponics said:
All above is well worded. Aji Joe makes a great point about the peat, and I guess i was generalizing when i mentioned. Worms are the way... i keep them in my compost pile and then move them with the compost when amending the soil. They are tremendous workers. Due to the worms being present, i turn the beds by hand, ie no roto tiller. Each year, the worms are still present and doing their job. I use pine straw as a top dressing over a fabric or paper layer. Both break down nicely over the course of the season.
Click to expand...

thanks i use pine straw also at the end of the season when i till, i know that the tiller does some damage but i have way to much space to turn it by hand, the worms always make a come back doesn't seem to do any irreparably damage , having said this i still love my worms, i just keep throwing coffee grounds and other organics on the grow area, and keep ringing the dinner bell, it works well after i water or a good rain i see worm holes and casting as well as long as i walk softly i can actually see the worms out dining on the stuff i put down

thanks your friend Joe
 
Work in about 4 inches of compost and about 1/2 inch of manure. I did this 3 years ago on our East Texas red clay and now I have the nicest crumbly black soil you could ever wish for. Top up regularly with compost or quality mulch and add nutrients as needed. I have had great results with clay as a base soil.

I also added some lime and ash, but you should research your particular clay to know how much or if you need to do this.
 
There is information available about raised beds over hard pan, if you raise the bed over 18 inches and then use goo quality soil to fill it you can save years of amending and grow almost anything in them. Building and filling a raised bed can be extremely economical in comparison to amending poor soil. In the cities here people sometime put community gardens with raised beds in on gravel lots or concrete even.
 
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