Hi ! I bought my first property 40 000 sq foot and need some help. Im building a house in front but the backayrd purpose will be to grow grass and trees and havé a small garden plus chicken Coop. How to amend my soil ?? Heres some pic, mostly clay
by SteadyHyper
9 Comments
Hello! I dont have property but am planning to buy some this year. But some advice Id give is to collect the clay and you can sell it for a very high price depending on the area if youre looking to get rid of some!
Good Muck boots… good ones
I have clay in my garden. I have been amending with loamy horse manure compost. (I have a horse). But I’m still having trouble growing well, so I’m thinking next year I’ll go with raised beds. Off topic, watch how the water drains… Be sure it doesn’t run into your chicken coop! I finally have a dry coop using swails and raising the coop floor a bit.
Instead of “amending soil” do yourself a favor and cover the top layer with a mulch of wood chips.
Arborists typically deliver them for free via chip drop, if you’re in the right area.
Or overseed the site with native seeds or cover crop
A large chunk of your land shouldn’t be bare, exposed soil. That causes erosion/top soil loss -which makes the clay problem worse
So, for this year, I’d just seed your ground with whatever is native to your area, and see what takes.
Once you have your chicken coop, use straw bedding (the one without seeds) and pine pellets (horse pellet bedding) for the floor of your coop. Then when you clean out the coop, cover part of your land with it each time. Spread it a few inches thick. As it decomposes, it brings life back to your soil and worms come in to break it all down. I’ve been doing this where I live for 2 years. Where I’ve put the bedding to compost is now rich soil for gardening, and every shovel full has at least 3 worms in it.
Make sure to let your leaves decompose instead of taking them to yard waste. Mow over them to start the decomposition. The straw also holds the soil in place as a mulch.
When you are done with the main part of your land, for your garden area, mark out your area and lay out more chicken bedding the autumn before. By the time spring comes, you’ll have great garden soil for growing in.
Another helper is get a woodchipper. Use that to chop up any branches that come down in storms. Use that as mulch and spread it over your garden. Again, once it breaks down, it improves your soil.
It’s crazy tough to amend. You’re better off replacing with different soil where you need it
Probably you’ll hace drainage problems
1. Determine where the water should be leaving your property so that you can facilitate drainage. You’ll have a hard time establishing a lawn underwater
2. Wait for the ground to dry and in the meantime source wood chips, manure, etc (ideally whatever you can find locally and cheaply!)
3. Spread organic matter on the soil and till it in to help add organic matter into the top layer of your soil. ensure that land is graded to facilitate drainage. Also consider adding a swale, etc if needed or desired.
4. Seed and mulch.
Also if you have the desire and funds to get a soil test, this would be the ideal time to address any major issues in nutrient balance, pH etc when you go to till it in. Good luck!
Home Depot wildflower seed packs and just throw em all around