I don’t know what the numbers next to the different categories are, I basically think it’s a 100 scale where 100 equals “100 percent of ideal”.

For future reference, now that you have your pH in a more preferred range, in your situation, I would consider using wood ash to maintain the pH. Although, if you live in a city, and don't have a fireplace or wood stove, it can be more difficult to source.

I say this because your Ca, Mg, and K are literally off the charts. Wood ash has a lesser percentage of Ca and Mg than limes, and a fair amount of P. The research is fuzzy right now because there are so many variables to compare. Soil type, pH, CEC, nutrient ratios, etc... all have an effect on nutrient availability.

From what I've read though, the 2 stand out considerations are pH, and 'optimum, but not excessive' nutrient levels.

Since you have your pH in an acceptable range, and your Ca and Mg are excessive (with P being optimum,) do a bit of reading on the difference between wood ash and lime, and how to use wood ash properly. It has a faster reaction time than lime (so sometimes a 'less is more' approach is helpful,) and it has a 'better' nutrient profile. If your soil tracks toward acidic, then small additions of pure hardwood ash each year (or maybe every other year or less - depending on the acid reactivity of your soil) might be more appropriate to your conditions than either dolomite or high Ca lime.

Anyway, it looks like your efforts had an overall positive effect on your numbers.

a decent question to ask would be: is the increase in P and other elements consistent with the input, or is there a bacterial source of increase (that is organic P alreay in the soil which was made available by biology)? because compost will increase that, even if it is "finished" as people say here.

I think it’s consistent with adding lime, bonemeal, and compost.

Lime increased the calcium, bonemeal would increase P, and all of the numbers should elevate with compost, right?

Too much lime and bonemeal. You would not expect to see compost contributing to excess nutrient levels like the ones listed here, especially not after just one year. After multiple years of adding lots and lots of compost, maybe some numbers could get a little high. But compost in itself is very low in nutrient levels, compared to fertilizers. It doesn't dump in a lot of nutrients at once; what it does is feed the ongoing biological processes in the soil that mineralize and recycle nutrients, making them available to the plants.

Bear in mind, also, that increasing organic matter in the soil has the effect of buffering pH toward neutral, even without adding any lime.

I would drastically limit or stop adding the lime and bone meal in the coming year. Keep adding compost at the surface and in new planting holes but limit digging and tilling as much as possible. To build the kind of soil fertility that delivers consistent and appropriate levels of plant nutrients over time, you need to let the soil biology do more of the work, and that takes time to develop fully.

What makes you say the University of Delaware test is "not the best"?

People here have said that, theparsley!!

Yeah, no more lime or bonemeal this year. The only nutrient I feel I need to worry about is N.

If pH does creep down, I’ll follow rgreen’s suggestion of wood ash - we do have a wood burning fireplace and a fire pit, and plenty of wood to burn.

I'm not sure whether the criticism you saw of this lab was about the methods being used, or what they're analyzing for, or the accuracy of the tests themselves Presumably the UD lab is using standard QA/QC procedures in its tests. You could ask them about accuracy etc. if you are that interested. These tests are pretty well standardized after decades of doing them, so it's hard to imaging they're not accurate. I can't comment on the other angles.

There are some people that will disparage any and all of the state university soil testing labs since they believe the more expensive private labs are somehow better. Think of where the people that run those private labs were taught, at the state universities that some people disparage. One advantage to using the state university soil testing labs is that you have someon, your county horticultural agent, to go to and ask questions of.

Adequate soil nutrients fall in a range and are expressed as Parts Per Million (ppm) or Pounds Per Acre (ppa), Pounds Per acre are twice that of Parts Per Million. They are Phosphorus (P) 25 to 85 ppm or 50 to 170 ppa, Potash (K) 200 to 400 ppm or 400 to 800 ppa, Calcium (Ca) 1500 to 4000 ppm or 3000 to 8000 ppa, an Magnesium 300 to 800 ppm or 600 to 1600 ppa.

Without knowing what the numbers in the boxes on the chart express, and not seeing the suggested fertilizer program it is difficult to make suggestions except to not add any fertilizer of any kind until the nutrient are lower, except to maintain the level of organic matter.

Have you talked with your counties UD Cooperative Extension Service horticultural agent about this soil test?

The suggested fertilizer regimen was basically to add N only.

"The suggested fertilizer regimen was basically to add N only."

And that is pretty standard :-) N is the most mobile of all the basic plant nutrients and volatizes or moves through the soil rapidly so often needs supplementation. Pretty much ANY soil test will say similar. Depending on how much they suggest to add and what you are growing, there are various ways to approach this......a high N fert might be the easiest and simplest.

I don't grow any harvestable crops in ground - only ornamentals - but I find that all nutrient issues, and especially the need to supplement N, are more than adequately addressed by mulching with a quality compost. I use no other fertilizers or amendments.

I don't think of my garden as "ornamental" - it's mostly food crops, but the food is for bees and butterflies rather than for me :-)

Nitrogen supplementation becomes less and less necessary as organic matter is added over time and soil is kept protected and undisturbed to allow the soil life to establish and diversify, but certain plants like annual vegetables deprive soil of nitrogen more rapidly. So the baseline assumption that you need to add extra nitrogen MAY be correct, but annoyingly, soil tests don't actually directly tell you that. Watching carefully for signs of nitrogen deficiency in the plant growth *before* adding supplemental nitrogen may be all you need to do (depending on the crop) - since nitrogen acts very quickly when added.

My textural analysis. Better than my mason jar.

I plotted this on the triangle based on the results above.