Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Last year the garden's soil was terrible. It took forever for plants to grow, was difficult to tell if it retained water, and was hard to work manure through. It was nearly all clay soil. This year, I want to tackle it a bit differently than I did before.
What's the best way to work with clay soil? Should I consider adding other nutrients to make the soil more workable? One of the concerns I have is with how long it took plants to grow. I took my herbs over 2 months to finally germinate! That seems absurd when the germination time should have only been 2-3 weeks.
It will take a long while (probably no less than 3 years), but this works on Houston gumbo which is surely the worst soil for gardening possible. In the meantime, maybe consider raised beds?
Raised beds if you want to plant in 2014. Otherwise you will have to amend the soil. Lots of organic matter. Your local Master Gardeners may be a good source of information.
I had clay knolls in the farm fields when I used to farm.
Fall plowing was a must as you needed the freeze/thaw cycle to break up the clay soil.
Clay soil can't be worked when wet in spring and gets really hard in a drought also.
If you're going to till it, chicken poo makes a good and affordable remedial agent. The downside is that it smells like chicken poo. If you're going to plant right away, any sort of manure needs to have been composted for at least six months.
I think I am going to go about it with raised beds this year. Other people in the plot land (it's rented plots) used raised beds and their gardens yielded plenty of produce. I've never worked with a raised bed before, so I'm not sure how I'd start it.
If you're going to till it, chicken poo makes a good and affordable remedial agent. The downside is that it smells like chicken poo. If you're going to plant right away, any sort of manure needs to have been composted for at least six months.
I disagree about chicken manure.
In order to do any real good in clay soil, it would have to be applied very thick.
poultry manure is very powerful of a fertilizer and thus needs to be applied at small rates.
Too small to change the texture of clay soil.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
