Off Grid Living / Camping > Gardening

Improving Soil in the Vegetable Garden

<< < (2/5) > >>

rossw:
Gypsum is frequently used to "sweeten" and break up clay. Not sure about your way, but sure was here.
Our place was "high-heeled-boots" material. Walk 10 paces, and you'd have 4" platforms.

Lots of organic material - whatever you can get - and dug into the clay, along with gypsum, and we have a few patches of ground now that are aproaching useful. It's not a quick process though. :(

oztules:
It can be done as quickly as you can afford ;)

Here we are on acid sand (ph4.5) (where the house is), quite coarse. I have a 10 yard tip truck, a 955l cat loader and 400 acres and am close to the beach.

In a 12m x 12m area I put about 30 meters of peat (from a different part of the property), and about 4 utes (pickup truck) of seaweed. Rotovated it all together and then built the greenhouse / garden arrangement over it. It grew like stink from the get go. Outside this area is pretty poor and just grows kikiyu grass.

The sand helps keep the peat/clay from clumping, as does the seaweed...... then a neighbour (who thought I needed some exercise )dropped off a couple of tons of sheep manure.... still digging that in bit by bit.... :-[ ( cant get the tractor in now)

I cost me only diesel (and not much of it) to make a very productive veggie garden from lousy acid sand. Your situation no doubt is different, but a few truck loads of decent soil, and ignore the original material will make it come to life instantly..... otherwise it is a long process of building up the organics I'm afraid.

Clay is very mineral intensive, and a good material to work with..... if you don't have too much. ;D

I'm just lucky I have all kinds of soils across the property, and the tools to move it.



................oztules

tomw:
Raised Beds

frackers:
Lots of very course sand and organic material.

I'm fortunate to be on river loam but only 200mm of it
This sits on fine river sand and clay/silt mix - about 1m of this
This sits on 6km of shingle
Which sits on a faultline   :'(

Over 8 years I've built this up using everything organic I could find - kitchen waste, trimmings and prunings, weeds, llama poo and the contents of the cat dirt boxes (composted bark). Come winter my pile 2m high and 4m across will get dug into 3 beds 5m by 20m each  :)

Norm:
About like Tom says just where you are going to have plants......

My Uncle used to just spade where he was going to plant
something ....long rows with grass in between, wide enough to
to run the lawnmower .....hardly any weeding.

.....Then there is the thing of multi-tasking like 1 underground vegetable
together with 1 above ground.....less space less digging......also the
knowledge of knowing what plants will keep certain bugs away from
the plants that attract certain bugs.

 I don't do any of this stuff but I've know a lot of people that have.....

 One guy (Bob)I knew claimed that earthworms were a must was against rototillers

......kills a lot of earthworms ....he only used a spade or plow....as proof he pointed
to his garden and his neighbors almost  next to his, neighbor used a roto-tiller.....
Bob's was 50% better than the neighbor's....made a believer out of me !

Norm.

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[#] Next page

[*] Previous page