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Organic Lawn Care

New to organics. Please help. Soil test included

10 years ago

I'm new to all this but want to go to organics. I am planning on putting alfalfa pellets on my lawn next week for the first time. Any advise on other organics I should be using. I really don't know how to interpret this soil test either other than my ph is ok and I lack in om.

Thanks y'all.

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Comments (4)

Kimmsr
10 years ago
Did you sit down with your county horticultural agent to talk about these results?
Your soils pH is low, optimum for lawns is in the 6.2 to 6.8 range, and your Phosphorus is in the low optimal range.
What else you may want to know is how much organic matter is in that soil, how well that soil drains, what kind of life is in that soil, etc. and these simple soil tests can be of some help.
1) Soil test for organic matter. From that soil sample put enough of the rest to make a 4 inch level in a clear 1 quart jar, with a tight fitting lid. Fill that jar with water and replace the lid, tightly. Shake the jar vigorously and then let it stand for 24 hours. Your soil will settle out according to soil particle size and weight. For example, a good loam will have about 1-3/4 inch (about 45%) of sand on the bottom. about 1 inch (about 25%) of silt next, about 1 inch (25%) of clay above that, and about 1/4 inch (about 5%) of organic matter on the top.

2) Drainage. Dig a hole 1 foot square and 1 foot deep and fill that with water. After that water drains away refill the hole with more water and time how long it takes that to drain away. Anything less than 2 hours and your soil drainsÃ¢ÂÂ too quickly and needs more organic matter to slow that drainage down. Anything over 6 hours and the soil drains too slowly and needs lots of organic matter to speed it up.

3) Tilth. Take a handful of your slightly damp soil and squeeze it tightly. When the pressure is released the soil should hold together in that clump, but when poked with a finger that clump should fall apart.

4) Smell. What does your soil smell like? A pleasant, rich earthy odor? Putrid, offensive, repugnant odor? The more organic matter in your soil the more active the soil bacteria will be and the nicer your soil will smell.

5) Life. How many earthworms per shovel full were there? 5 or more indicates a pretty healthy soil. Fewer than 5, according to the Natural Resources Conservation Service, indicates a soil that is not healthy.
tarheel_fan
Original Author
10 years ago
Is HM (humic matter) the same thing as OM? If so the front shows 0.27% and back shows 0.46%. This is why I was planning on spreading alfalfa pellets. I will do the jar and hole test ASAP. We have a lot of worms around here but that might be because the are constantly being washed over here from neighbors yard. I have a lot of clay 4 inches deep in the ground I know. I am going to wait for the ground to dry out some before I do the hole test. We have had 20 plus inches of rain since June first. My soil does smell earthy. I plan on spreading lime some time around the fall. Thanks for any help you can give.
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You got it. Those recommendations and the read above, throw them out. They no longer apply. I hereby officially chastise your seed company and spank them with a wet trout. CEC 11.4: A silt-sand soil, and again, not a bad place to be. It'll drift much faster than the originally-reported-on soil, but still, testing every 2 years once it's balanced will be more than sufficient. OM 3.1%: Still in the Fair range, so the recommendations above apply. Mulch mow, mow your leaves, but there's no reason to go crazy about it. pH 5.1: Lower than the previous read and not so great, but we can work with this. I'll correct it under calcium, magnesium, and potassium where it needs correction. Sulfur 10: Exactly in optimal range, with tons of room to play with (we actually don't need any of this margin). Weak/Strong Bray 69, 75: Both sufficient (goals would be 25 and 50 or so, respectively). This test shows an interesting tendency for your soil P to be in available form over short-term bound form. That's not an issue, it's just interesting, and it'll change a bit as we alter the pH--by intensifying slightly. It implies a very good level of biological activity. Regardless, no phosphorus is required or desired, but you don't have to specifically avoid smaller phosphorus sources, either. Calcium 43.3%: Quite low, and what's setting off your pH problem. Target here is 60-70%. In a CEC 11 soil, my target is 65, but I really wouldn't be terribly worked up by anything within the target range. To correct this faster, we use calcitic lime to avoid adding magnesium (and also, again, the speed of correction). I recommend Encap, Mag-I-Cal, or Pennington Fast Lime. Magnesium 11.8%: Optimal for your CEC. There's no reason to raise this and I'm not inclined to do so, but you also don't have to avoid smaller sources of magnesium. Potassium 5.4%: While textbook, this is very high, I actually like to be in this range in many soils. Potassium enhances disease and temperature resistance, and gets used in tons of enzymes. None is required or desired but again, you don't have to avoid minor sources of potassium. Minor Elements: Most are fine, even if they say iron is very high (that doesn't matter, iron isn't toxic until absolutely ridiculous levels at a reasonable pH, which is where we're sending you). I'm not directly familiar with the test used or the quality of the testing in terms of boron. So although it reads low, I'm not inclined to fiddle with it at this time. Recommendations: June 1: Apply 8 pounds of calcitic lime per thousand square feet. October 1: Apply 8 pounds of calcitic lime per thousand square feet.
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While the test is lacking in some basic data, we can come to a few conclusions from this--for the most part, your soil seems to have enough of everything as far as this test can (or does) tell us. Your pH is above optimal, but that's not a problem for good grass growth. Grasses aren't particularly sensitive to high pH (which is caused by high calcium and/or magnesium, and potassium to a lesser extent). Grass doesn't care about it until it becomes really ridiculous, and yours isn't. Does that area by the pool see a lot of splashed water? Chlorinated water is a plant killer (with some exceptions). Limiting chlorine exposure at that point, or flushing the ground occasionally by irrigating that spot with 2-3" of water, will help you out there. If that's the area where the planter came out, there might also be something else going on there. Let us know. The other area in the top photo looks to be close to a shrub or tree, both of which suck out water like nobody's business (and might be shading the area a bit too much for good grass growth). If dry, irrigate more often (or ignore it and live with the browner grass; I tend to do that). If shadowed, an alternate grass might do better, like red fescue. All things considered, though? Your "bad areas" actually look pretty good.
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Kimmsr
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Soil is basically composed of 3 particles, sand, silt, and clay and which kind of soil you have is determined by the mix of those soil particles. Most of what I have seen in North Carolina is clay, not a soil with a lot of clay, just clay.
"Fixing" clay soils is as simple as getting adequate amounts of organic matter, sometimes called humic matter, into the soil.
Keith Baldwin, then a professor of soil science at North Carolina State University, wrote an article in Taunton Press' Kitchen Garden about amending clay soils that said the only thing to will help a clay soil is organic matter.
west9491
10 years ago
I agree I have been adding OM to mine for a few years now. Makes huge difference, and I still need way more.

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