Most would not recommend the wood shavings, there is nothing wrong with the hay AFAIK. Amendments to the soil to improve drainage needs to be done before planting as the issue is under the plant at the root level. Perlite is terrific for this as are small stones. The first thing is what is your soil composed of? Is it a raised bed garden or directly in the ground type? Do you have areas of standing water or puddles? If you have standing water in your in ground garden you may want to consider raising the rows or using raised beds.

This is a 60'x150' garden. I have not had our soil in this area tested, but did have a test on the turkey litter. Water will stand after a large amount of rain, but soon dries leaving the bottom of the row a black or blue color. The garden is planted so I am late! I thought that maybe adding the hay in the rows and in between the plants may help the drainage. Any thoughts on improving drainage with out disturbing the plants?

the balck or blue appearance is probably algae from the dampness. I wouldn't add wood shavings or hay, which would be full of weeds. The best thing for right now might be some Garden Gypsum, which is a natural aerator. Also, if you have straw or partially finished compost, you could add that where ever possible without disturbing the plants. good luck.

How do you apply Garden Gypsum? I see different forms available.

How much turkey litter did you add. Your symptoms are classic too much nitrogen that is burning the roots on the tomatoes the other crops can handle more nitrogen but when you mentioned after the rain they wilted the rain has released more nitrogen from the litter and isnow burning the other crops. Rodger

I assume by your name you are in SC . I am in the upstate of SC and we have had a very hot dry spring with temps in the high 80's and low 90's. Everyone I have talked too has stated there veggies are struggling.

I have used hay but it was too fresh and seeded everywhere. I spent all summer trying to get rid of hay seedlings.

I switched to pine straw and cypress mulch.

I use cypress mulch around the veggies and pine straw everywhere else to help control weeds.

My soil is red clay that is very acidic and low in phosphorus.

I add lime in the winter to lower the acidity and amend the soil by adding compost and bone meal to the planting area.

HTH

rodger you are on the money! Everything looks awful today. Even the crops that looked good yesterday either look dried up or the more mature plants look as though they were hit by frost. We put to much litter on the garden. Is it a total loss or can I repair this and salvage the plants?

You have a long growing season. You could take everything out, amend your soil (that's the time to work in the compost, straw, gypsum, etc), and start over. It's only May, and you don't have frost till October, right?