I suspect your Extension Service offices will soon have information from the university as to what to do to for soil which was/is inundated with sea water.

Gypsum may well help but it depends upon just how much of the damage is due to "salt" -- more specifically the sodium ion. (Determining that may require a professional soil test.)

It's important to realize that flooding, alone, can damage and/or kill plants.

Locate your county's Extension Service office with this clickable map:
http://www.csrees.usda.gov/Extension/

That office may already have an appropriate publication available or may be able to refer you to a soil scientist or soil lab.

Here is a link that might be useful: Locate your county's Extension Service office

Good advice to check with the county extension office.

How to restore your soil will depend (at least in part) on what kind of soil it is and how much salt is actually left behind. Less flood time means less saltwater percolated down into the soil. Sandy soil will wash out with rains faster than clay. And so on.

Generally, your soil is still going to have what it had before: whether it's sand, silt or clay, its natural pH, organic matter, etc. will still be there. It's just a matter of getting it drained (only time can do that) and getting the salt out.

So sorry to hear of your loss!

Thank you so much for that link. I was thinking that it may be more than just sea water damage, no telling what else was in the water polluting the soil.

Gypsum has been the mineral of choice to neutralize the road salt in areas of the country where that is spread on roads to aid in melting the ice that can form in winter. Just how much to apply depends and I would think the people at Cornell Cooperative Extension should have that information.

Here is a link that might be useful: Cornell CES

redteddy, want to tell you how sorry we are that this happened to you. Hope you will keep giving updates re the impact of the salt water flooding. And pray that you didn't suffer further damages. Must be so disheartening, to put it mildly.

May the squirrel go away and the birds return.

Rosie, Sugar Hill, GA

Several years ago, one of our blueberry shrubs got a dose of sidewalk salt, from an adjacent driveway. The shrub did not look very healthy the following spring. I put down about 100 gallons of cold water, to dilute the salt, and help it drift down into the subsoil. That did seem to perk up the shrub a bit, and it survived the first season OK. This shrub is still alive, and produces considerable fruit, so I can reasonably say that it has partially recovered.

Unless you are very close to a source of hazardous waste, I doubt there is much to worry about here in terms of toxins, for several reasons: 1) Even though there is likely to be petroleum and smaller volumes of other stuff released, the volume of water is so high and the land area so great that pollutants are fairly dilute; 2) the polluted water recedes, taking most of the stuff with it, and only a fraction is left behind in the soil; and 3) the most common pollutant in a flood is plain old sewage, which is a bacterial hazard that fades away after the soil dries out for a few days and is exposed to air.

I don't know your particular situation (obviously), so this is just the general opinion of a hazardous waste wrangler from a flood-prone state.

Thank you all so very much for the words of advice, condolence and humor. I will let you all know what comes out of the extension service office and give updates so if anyone else comes across this problem they will know a little of how it can go.

@ericwj- I thought of flushing the soil but was afraid that maybe more water on top of what its already experienced might be too much but thanks for the tip, I will try it.

@toxcrusadr- I don't know of any hazardous waste that may come from anything in our community but I will find out more from the extension office.

Everything I have read in this thread has done much to calm my fears over the soil condition. We were lucky in that our soil was very good and vital and I want it to get back to that same condition. We've had two rainfalls since the storm and so this must help to flush out the salt et al somewhat and maybe a bit of watering will help it further. The only positive side of losing all of my plants is that I'm a better gardner today than I was when I started which means I can start anew without making the same mistakes I had first encountered as a new gardner.

Many years ago, a hurricane caused great destruction to Charleston, SC area. The tidal surge was enormous. Gypsum was applied generously over trees and landscaped areas....in the public locations, private properties, commercial businesses...any where the salt water saturated.

This is an area where salt water intrusion is so common that the coastal golf courses usually have a few tons of granulated gypsum on hand at all times.

I had a container nursery for a few years and had a deep well for watering. During a year of terrible drought, salt water invaded my well and I watched 13 acres of plants go downhill fast. Gypsum saved the day for me, even in containers!

Your local extension office should be able to help you with application rates. It is important that sufficient rainfall or irrigation follow your application.

My post was intended as 'you probably don't need to worry about it' with respect to toxics. But if you're interested in learning more about sites in your area, I can help you with that.

@toxcrusadr

Please if you can I would be very grateful. What information do you need from me? I live between the bay and the ocean. We have JFK airport on across on the bay side. I know we have a water treatment facility but its about 25 blocks away from our home. Any information you can help me with would be appreciated.

EPA has some large searchable databases to find out about all kinds of stuff, from Superfund sites to active facilities that generate hazardous waste. They are not all necessarily contaminated or releasing toxins; for example, any generator of even small quantities of hazardous waste is listed, but it just means they generate waste, not that they have ever spilled or mishandled it. Schools even appear on that list because they have labs. Anyway this page will give you some choices. From here you can go to the Where You Live page and search by zip code.

http://publicaccess.supportportal.com/ics/support/kbanswer.asp?deptID=23012&task=knowledge&questionID=16317

However, much of env. regulation and cleanup is done at the state level. This link will let you search for contaminated sites and cleanups in your area:

http://www.dec.ny.gov/chemical/brownfields.html

Underground storage tanks (such as at gas stations) are the most numerous source for subsurface contamination. It would be my guess that flooded USTs at gas stations would be the most likely culprit for contamination in flood waters, and they are all over the place.

I will be happy to try to answer general questions since this is what I do for a living. I just don't know anything about your specific location.

After some months of rain, if you still want to see if you've got too much salt in the soil, the University of Massachusetts soil test lab will add a salt test for $5 to its normal $10 basic soil test, and will tell you if you're in the safe range.

Good luck!

We live in Staten Island and just heard that the Community Gardens in Miller Field will not be planted this year due to contamination. There are sewage treatment plants and small stations in the beach areas. Oil from heaters leaked when they were turned over or floating down streets. I am very worried about what could be in the soil...Marist College had offered free soil testing and is no longer doing it. The salt water killed most of my mother in law's plants and shrubs and what survived is now covered with something - we don't know what it is. Perhaps it is some type of mold. I would be afraid of planting any type of garden with vegetables - I just read an article in today's paper that people are being told not to eat fruit from their fruit trees/fig trees if they survived, and not to eat anything like strawberries or herbs that may come up again. It is suggested that until you know what is in your soil, not to plant vegetables. I have a friend who had the air tested around her home and there were high levels of many different types of contaminants. We and a lot of other people are looking for a place that will test soil.
Btw redteddy, I wish you luck in the Rockaways - I have been volunteering for nearly 6 months and have been sending donations to your area with many people here. I hope you recover quickly.