Clay soil found in new garden bed, can you still plant?

7 years ago

I bought this new house with blank canvas for gardening. Im trying to plant hostas and cali lilies along the fence but have discovered its clay soil as I have it all dug up now.

Can I just break it up and mix a good soil and compost/ fertilizer with it?

Or would I need to remove the clay soil and put a good quality soil in?

Im fairly new to gardening so I want to make the right choice but honestly don't want to get to over my head.

Thanks :)

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Comments (3)

rgreen48
7 years ago
last modified: 7 years ago
lady, where are you? Different locales have different forms of clay. In general though, from what I've read for those plants, just generously amending the clay with organic matter (compost, leaf mold, etc...) should do fine for the hostas. Mine do fine in my clay-based soil.

I assume you mean calla lilies - instead of cali - the resource I read from... http://www.gardeningknowhow.com/ornamental/bulbs/calla-lily/growing-calla-lilies-and-care-of-calla-lilies.htm ... indicated they like more drainage. You could remove some of the native clay and incorporate a mix intended as potting soil into the clay. As mentioned, all clays are different. You may have one that is just fine being amended once, or have one that will require a lot of work. Tough to know for sure from here. Some clay could be beneficial, but not so much that the soil doesn't drain well.
toxcrusadr
7 years ago
Most of us here will recommend that you work with what you have rather than trying to replace it. Clay has some great qualities, it just needs a little help with its attitude.

If you need to raise the level, then adding soil is OK, but if you really don't need to, add extra compost instead. Several inches is not too much. Dig or till it in. Avoid working clay when it's wet. Organic matter will work in several ways to help the soil become more spongy but it does take time. If these are perennial beds, you will want to use degradable mulches like grass clippings (no weed killers though!), leaves, wood chips etc. They will feed the soil without much work on your part and no digging.

You can search for 'clay soil' in this forum and see other tales of working with clay.
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Go ahead and plant and see what happens. I figured the heavy clay at my home would not be good for asparagus, but I planted anyway. That was 20 years ago and the planting continues to yield well. Sometimes spears are crooked or weird looking, and I assume it is because they had trouble getting through the heavy soil. But most are okay and all taste good. I did not amend much and have often wondered if doing so would have allowed water to sink in more quickly instead of running off the slight slope of the bed. Perhaps amending would have given me a permeable bed that fillled with water and would not drain from the clay bottom...but I don't know. So I'm not sure if I should encourage you to amend.....or not. But I think there is a good chance you can grow asparagus without making major changes to the soil. If you do want to amend alot perhaps you could go with raised beds.
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Hi Janice! Some ideas: 1. You CAN do a lasagne bed & plant in it now - (you'd have to remove your existing plants first) - just "build it", then "cut" the holes into it, add some soil or compost to the holes when you plant the plant into it, and voila! Several people on this forum have said that they've done this (prior to the lasagne bed decomposing) w/success. :) 2. Consider using STRAW as a mulch - w/ or w/o the other mulch you may use - straw is great organic matter and decomposes fairly quickly, and according to several posters on this forum, is pretty darn close to an ideal OM addition and/or mulch. 3. One thing to consider is that some bagged compost (although almost any compost is better than no compost) has less organic matter than others - e.g. a poster here pointed out that the "composted manure" (which I buy b/c there's no alternative @ garden center) that I buy has less OM than a vegetative-based (grass & leaves etc) compost has. 4. Another source for compost - check out your local municipalities - my County dump (which is different than my town recycling center) has FREE compost (made from leaves & grass clippings that other residents dump off), and I really like it too! 5. Do you have access to leaves? These are a great organic matter addition. Some use shredded leaves as a wonderful mulch that disappears into the soil and feeds the soil microbes. I added tons of whole leaves to my bed last year (w/some dried blood), and added a few worms this spring, and of course added compost & mulch, and we have tons of happy worms now :) Hope this helps, All the Best, Tree
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g'day caroline, my suggestion cut to the chase and go for raised beds, that way you need to be little concerned with the type of soil you now have, and that will all change in time. when you plant trees, requiring you dig a hole, consider the drainage requirements of the tree ie.,. citrus like it well drained so you need to create a raised planting position. if you like i could discuss this further by e/mail contact through our web site. buy a bag of good gypsum from the produce agency you will need to use lots of it. not many of the old hands seem to visit here much nowadays for me that is maybe once a week. len Here is a link that might be useful: lens garden page
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kimmq
7 years ago
There is nothing wrong with clay soil that adding a lot of organic matter will not make better. However, do not just add some organic matter to the planting hole since that will create a place that water can flow into but not out and the plants can drown. Organic matter worked into clay soils will separate the soil particles which will then allow water flow easier, plant roots to grow easier, and change the soil so plant nutrients are more available. Clay soils are generally better since the nutrients plants need arfe held in place much better than in sand.

kimmq is kimmsr

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Clay soil found in new garden bed, can you still plant?

Comments (3)

rgreen48

toxcrusadr

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