Regular lime is Calcium carbonate. Dolomite lime is Calcium carbonate and Magnesium carbonate. Does your soil test tell you if you need Magnesium? I always buy dolomite lime, just in case. Pelletized lime is very easy to apply, but is often not dolomite lime.

You should look for the big 40 pound bags. They give you the best price per pound. Farm supply places will have a good variety.

Phosphate does not leach quickly out of the soil. You can apply it now. Both lime and phosphate are best tilled into the soil, so they are available to the plant roots. Phosphate fertilizer can be applied at the same time as lime.

Ammonium fertilizer is one form of Nitrogen fertilizer. If it is applied along with lime, gaseous ammonia is released, and the nitrogen is lost. Nitrate fertilizer is not lost. In any case, nitrogen fertilizers are highly mobile in the soil, and can easily be lost to leaching. So they should not be applied until the plants need them.

Is someone actually selling trisodium phosphate as a fertilizer? It's a detergent. You should not add sodium to your soil. It can damage the soil structure, and make it very dense. Bone meal is OK, but expensive. Rock phosphate is very slow-acting. Why not just buy an NPK fertilizer like 10-20-20? If you need additional phosphate, buy a bag of superphosphate or triple superphosphate. Again, I hope you won't buy those cute little five-pound bags, unless you enjoy being robbed.

Thanks for the reply.
Sorry, tri-sodium phosphate was a typo on my part. I meant triple super phosphate.
The report states my magnesium level is sufficient.

You did notmention what your PH reading was, or is.

Anyway, it takes months for lime to act and raise PH. Best time would have been in the fall to add lime.
They also have "Quick Acting" lime which is pricy. It is supposed to work faster.
Another good source for raising Ph is wood ash from your fireplace, wood burning stove or brushes and limbs burned outside (not on the garden though).They say that wood ash has half the potency of lime pound per pound. I have been using just wood ash. I think wood ash should work faster because it is very fine dust.

Thanks,
The PH is 5.8
We have a large fire pit. I will use the ash from it.

PH of 5.8 is not too low. better than 90% of garden vegetable can grow fine in that soil. Two years ago my garden PH was even lower than that.

The ash in the pit is a good source of alkaline. also dig up some of the soil undr the ashes and mix with the ashes.

As already advised, do not add any fertilizer, especially Nitrogen containing, now. Wait until planting time or after. Some nurseries sell triple phosphate (just P). If you are not 100% organic gardener, any balanced all purpose fertilizer (10-10-10 or 13-13-13) should be fine.
As far as the plants are concerned, fertilizer is fertilizer. Organic in this case is just an environmental issue.
Wood ash is also a good source of Potash(K). K is vey stable and sticks to soil. N is water soluable and will leech out quickly unless the soil is rich in organic matter. P is semi stable.

Rock phosphate is available in courser or finer grades. Keep that in mind if you decide to use it. The fine stuff is like powder and undoubtedly faster acting, although not as fast as some of the other phosphates. I like that rock phosphate becomes available gradually over a long time. You have to plan ahead though.

I have a lot of confidence in bone meal although, as lilydude says, it is not an economical source of phosphorus. I don't spread it over the garden, I just put a handful under each plant when setting out tomatoes, eggplants and the like. It's great for potted plants.

Lilydude's advice is good. Definitely avoid those "cute little five pound bags". Place a special order if necessary and get 20 or 40 pound bags. It keeps.

Jim

5.8 is the low end of perfect for pH as far as making nutrients available to the plants. It may just be the result of clay soil, and adding organic ammendments (compost) will buffer it upwards a bit. Adding a bit of lime won't hurt, especially if the acidity is due to clay, because it will help the soil structure by aggregating clay particles.

Wood ash is somewhere between 0-1.3-4 to 0-3-8, and also has significant amounts of Mg. So, if you want your Mg, your P, your K, and your pH all in one shot, you know what to do. I never throw away any ash, and I even collect that of my neighbors. Right now is the ideal time to apply it.

In this instance, you have to go with about 10lb of wood ash for 100 sqft (which, to be honest, seems low to me. My pH was 5.5, and still is 5.5 away from the garden, and I will typically scatter 20lbs over 100sqft every year).

The 10 lbs will also be about 0.1-0.3 lbs of P and 0.3 lbs of Mg, which will certainly satisfy the plants for one or two crops. In fact, if you mulch heavily and let the mulch become soil, it is virtually impossible to have a long term P deficiency. P is required in substantially smaller (3 to 6 times less) amounts than N or K. Generic compost tends to be close to 2-1-2. Anyhow, if you really want a P bomb, go with chicken manure.

Thanks for all the replies!

I checked on a couple of things.
I do not have enough wood ash to gather together enough to make a difference.
From now on I will be collecting it after we burn.

I went to several nurseries and found pelletized lime and pulverized lime. According to the package, the pelletized lime has to be soaked in with water for 30 minutes before tilling. I do not think my husband will want to make a huge mess with the tractor tilling in wet soil. LOL

I did buy a 40 lb bag of pulverized lime. The package did not mention watering in before tilling.

At one nursery, they had broken bags of Epsoma Bone meal 24 lbs for 1/2 price. I found two completely sealed and unopened bags and the nursery mentioned those were half price, too. I bought 48 pounds of bone meal for $24. It seemed like a good price.

Also, I have access to horse manure.
Since I have to wait an amount of time to add it after the lime, should I forget adding manure this spring and just wait until fall?

I am thinking of adding lime now and then at the time of planting around April 15, I will use the bone meal for each planting hole along with a 10-10-10.

Does that sound like a good plan?

We are in he process of building a chicken coop so hopefully next year I will have some chicken manure.

I never heard of the soaking requirement for the lime. Maybe it was fast-acting lime that you were looking at.

About tilling in the manure: is it well decomposed? Is your soil dry enough to till? If so, then till it in, and don't worry about the lime reaction.

I would sprinkle the 10-10-10 over the whole planting area and till it in. It will save you a lot of work later on.

I agree with Lilydude about the manure. If it is well composted and your soil is dry enough to till, then till the manure in now with the lime. The amount of ammonium-N in composted manure is small so don't worry about the lime reaction.

University of Minnesota has a great report about the Nutrient Availability from Manure and Compost. See the link below.

Keep in mind that while composted manure and compost are great soil additions in many ways, they are not good sources of nitrogen for immediate use. Most of the nitrogen in composted manure and compost is in the organic form (not the ammonium form), and the organics must be broken down over time by microorganisms in the soil. Adding another source of nitrogen is essential.

I add a generous layer of composted manure/compost to my soil when it is dry enough to work, then mix in some organic balanced fertilizer like Espoma Garden-Tone (3-4-4) just before planting.

Hope this helps.

Here is a link that might be useful: Manure and Compost as Nutrient Sources

Thanks for the great info!
The manure is fresh.

Make a dome shaped pile of horse manure and cover it with something so that it will not get wet and cold.
H.manure composts very fast if it does not have too much other stuf in it and it is not too cold out there. You can till in small amounts so there isn't big chunks of it left unmixed. This way compostinng will be very very slow and will not harm plants

lsst,

Loooks like you are headed for a great garden this year. I envy your good deal on the bone meal.

Jim