frontiergirl53
Garden Ornament
So I am working on soil pH levels, and getting the soil just right, and I have too much clay in the soil! Is there other alternatives to putting sand in the soil? Our Lowes doesn't carry sand.
Too much clay...
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thistlebloom
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I don't think you want to put sand in your clay, that leads to brick material! Others who grow in clay will be along to help you more specifically, but the best thing you can do is add lots of compost.
@journey11 is one I can think of that gardens in clay and she can be more help.
@journey11 is one I can think of that gardens in clay and she can be more help.
buckabucka
Garden Addicted
I think I need more coffee. I read the thread title and went into art teacher mode, -it never occurred to me that someone would be talking about soil!
My friends have clay and use tons of compost. We are 100% sand here.
My friends have clay and use tons of compost. We are 100% sand here.
canesisters
Garden Master
Yup, compost-compost-compost.
It'll take a while but you'll end up with 'magic' soil that will grow things like crazy.
It'll take a while but you'll end up with 'magic' soil that will grow things like crazy.
so lucky
Garden Master
I agree with the compost advice. People do make pottery with the clay around here...it's that bad. But several seasons of adding chicken litter, garden compost, leaves, straw, etc. is beginning to help.
digitS'
Garden Master
There are several kinds of sand.
As unusual as it seems to those of us who "garden in gravel," coarse sand can be a useful addition to some soils. I could leave my gravel behind and be in soil suitable for bricks in a few miles ... where I would likely struggle to make improvements. I'd need to be sure that it wasn't fine sand like what is used in masonry.
Sand, perlite, vermiculite, or organic material - the idea would be to loosen the soil. If your part of the world gets a lot of summer rain, you might do well with sand. That summer rain is also unusual around here.
Something we've got ... is gypsum. If your soil has a high pH, it would be a better choice than limestone as a soil additive for calcium deficiency. Gypsum also improves clay.
@MontyJ would be a good one to tell us about how to deal with mineral deficit soil but I know little about it. Have you had soil tests, @frontiergirl53 ?
Steve
As unusual as it seems to those of us who "garden in gravel," coarse sand can be a useful addition to some soils. I could leave my gravel behind and be in soil suitable for bricks in a few miles ... where I would likely struggle to make improvements. I'd need to be sure that it wasn't fine sand like what is used in masonry.
Sand, perlite, vermiculite, or organic material - the idea would be to loosen the soil. If your part of the world gets a lot of summer rain, you might do well with sand. That summer rain is also unusual around here.
Something we've got ... is gypsum. If your soil has a high pH, it would be a better choice than limestone as a soil additive for calcium deficiency. Gypsum also improves clay.
@MontyJ would be a good one to tell us about how to deal with mineral deficit soil but I know little about it. Have you had soil tests, @frontiergirl53 ?
Steve
journey11
Garden Master
Frontiergirl, one of the best things I've put on my garden was huge amounts of cow manure. The livestock market at the county fairgrounds gives it away by the truckload for free! 
A truckbed load of composted goat manure was also really good for loosening up the clay. Where I've added those the soil is black, and crumbly, has really good water drainage and doesn't compact when you walk on it. Sometimes nasty weed seeds come in with manure like that, so you want to be sure to stay on top of removing them until they eventually piddle out.
I should take a picture of my soil to show you guys. When I dig down much past the 4" of topsoil on any unworked portion of my yard, I find dense red clay, pure enough to probably make pottery from. My daughter, Ava, likes to make little sculptures with it.
Clay is not all bad, in that it is easier to retain water over the summer and has more micronutrients than other soil types. It takes a long time to really get it where you want it though. Just keep adding organic matter and keep checking your pH as you go. Lime as needed. After you get the soil humus built up, then you can add some sand if you want.
Wood ashes, in moderation, also do a great job of conditioning the soil and breaking up that clay. It adds potash to the soil as well as some other trace nutrients. If you add too much, you can mess up the pH of your soil, making it too alkaline (going above 7.0 is bad, really want to stay around 6.5 for most veggies.) On the other hand, my soil here tends to be too acidic anyway (in the 5.5 range) and the wood ash helps that. Just don't pile on too much, and make sure it (if you have a fireplace, that is) that you use it fresh from the ash pan, as rain leaches out the good stuff.
Compost is definitely good, though I find it harder to come by in bulk (at least not for free, like I can get the manure). Straw/spent hay/horse manure that is well composted is also great for adding humus to the soil. I prefer to mulch with that during the growing season and it gets tilled in the following spring.
A truckbed load of composted goat manure was also really good for loosening up the clay. Where I've added those the soil is black, and crumbly, has really good water drainage and doesn't compact when you walk on it. Sometimes nasty weed seeds come in with manure like that, so you want to be sure to stay on top of removing them until they eventually piddle out.I should take a picture of my soil to show you guys. When I dig down much past the 4" of topsoil on any unworked portion of my yard, I find dense red clay, pure enough to probably make pottery from. My daughter, Ava, likes to make little sculptures with it.
Clay is not all bad, in that it is easier to retain water over the summer and has more micronutrients than other soil types. It takes a long time to really get it where you want it though. Just keep adding organic matter and keep checking your pH as you go. Lime as needed. After you get the soil humus built up, then you can add some sand if you want.
Wood ashes, in moderation, also do a great job of conditioning the soil and breaking up that clay. It adds potash to the soil as well as some other trace nutrients. If you add too much, you can mess up the pH of your soil, making it too alkaline (going above 7.0 is bad, really want to stay around 6.5 for most veggies.) On the other hand, my soil here tends to be too acidic anyway (in the 5.5 range) and the wood ash helps that. Just don't pile on too much, and make sure it (if you have a fireplace, that is) that you use it fresh from the ash pan, as rain leaches out the good stuff.
Compost is definitely good, though I find it harder to come by in bulk (at least not for free, like I can get the manure). Straw/spent hay/horse manure that is well composted is also great for adding humus to the soil. I prefer to mulch with that during the growing season and it gets tilled in the following spring.
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Ridgerunner
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Do we have any brick makers on the forum? What is the purpose of sand in brickmaking? I took several soils courses in college but that was from a foundations/construction aspect, not brickmaking and not agriculture, so I have a little knowledge but a little out of context knowledge can be a dangerous thing. And as Steve said, there are different types of sand. There are different types of clay. There are other types of soil particles too. I thought I had a clay but no, after a soils analysis I found I have a loamy silt.
In general clay is highly charged electronically at the molecular level. It is a rich source of nutrients because it holds them electronically. Those bonds are extremely strong but at the right pH the plant can get and use some. Water makes a difference too. When it is wet clay is a plastic substance, soft, oozy, and can easily be reshaped. That temporarily breaks the electric bonds so when it dries the reestablished bonds are really strong and you have a dirt hard as brick. When it dries undisturbed it sets up those molecular bonds and becomes really hard and will attach to other things. Water cannot pass through clay either. Clay shrinks when it dries.
Sand is inert. It does not have those electronic bonds so it is not going to hold any nutrients for the plants to use. Any nutrients in sand will flush out in rain, but it does allow water to easily pass though. The sand particles are many times larger than clay particles and handle compressive forces really well.
As I said, a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, that's why I asked for an expert. But my understanding of the brickmaking process is that the clay forms the bond to hold the brick together and the sand stops the brick from shrinking so it holds its shape better. Sand gives the clay a surface to bond to and has great compressive strength to stop shrinkage. You can add fiber like straw or animal hair to sun-dried brick to help keep them from cracking. I'm not sure how much good that would do in kiln-dried brick because of the high temperatures. I think it would disintegrate but I could be wrong. The normal red or yellow brick we see in house construction are kiln-dried to temperatures where the clay particles turn glassy and will repel water. Makes them really hard too.
I'm going through all this because I don't think adding sand to clay is going to make a brick, though sand may make it more abrasive when it dries. Hopefully an expert can convince me I'm wrong. I thin, and again this is my opinion not fact, that the differences in the size of the particles means you have to have enough sand in the mix so that the tiny clay particles do not fill all the voids and thus keep water from draining through. I don't think adding a little sand to clay will help drainage much, but once you reach the right mixture of clay and sand, then the drainage should increase dramatically. I don't think adding sand will hurt anything, it just might not help drainage much either.
Frontiergirl, if you want to try adding sand you might try construction supply companies or landscape companies. They should sell it by the truckload. I'd stay away from sand from salt flats because the high salt content is deadly to plants but most construction sand should work. The landscape company might possibly have someone that could help you with how much you should add once you show them your soils analysis but I doubt it. A better bet might be to talk to someone at your state land grant university (in Arizona that is the University of Arizona) and talk to someone in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. If you don't want to call them directly your county extension agent should be able to line you up with an expert. Don't trust me, I'm no expert on this, but a real expert can straighten me out on this or dispel some myths about adding sand to clay in a garden. The extension agent may know where to get the right sand by the truckload too. Maybe not.
I fully agree with the others. Adding compost to clayey soils or adding compost to sandy soils is a great thing to do.
In general clay is highly charged electronically at the molecular level. It is a rich source of nutrients because it holds them electronically. Those bonds are extremely strong but at the right pH the plant can get and use some. Water makes a difference too. When it is wet clay is a plastic substance, soft, oozy, and can easily be reshaped. That temporarily breaks the electric bonds so when it dries the reestablished bonds are really strong and you have a dirt hard as brick. When it dries undisturbed it sets up those molecular bonds and becomes really hard and will attach to other things. Water cannot pass through clay either. Clay shrinks when it dries.
Sand is inert. It does not have those electronic bonds so it is not going to hold any nutrients for the plants to use. Any nutrients in sand will flush out in rain, but it does allow water to easily pass though. The sand particles are many times larger than clay particles and handle compressive forces really well.
As I said, a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, that's why I asked for an expert. But my understanding of the brickmaking process is that the clay forms the bond to hold the brick together and the sand stops the brick from shrinking so it holds its shape better. Sand gives the clay a surface to bond to and has great compressive strength to stop shrinkage. You can add fiber like straw or animal hair to sun-dried brick to help keep them from cracking. I'm not sure how much good that would do in kiln-dried brick because of the high temperatures. I think it would disintegrate but I could be wrong. The normal red or yellow brick we see in house construction are kiln-dried to temperatures where the clay particles turn glassy and will repel water. Makes them really hard too.
I'm going through all this because I don't think adding sand to clay is going to make a brick, though sand may make it more abrasive when it dries. Hopefully an expert can convince me I'm wrong. I thin, and again this is my opinion not fact, that the differences in the size of the particles means you have to have enough sand in the mix so that the tiny clay particles do not fill all the voids and thus keep water from draining through. I don't think adding a little sand to clay will help drainage much, but once you reach the right mixture of clay and sand, then the drainage should increase dramatically. I don't think adding sand will hurt anything, it just might not help drainage much either.
Frontiergirl, if you want to try adding sand you might try construction supply companies or landscape companies. They should sell it by the truckload. I'd stay away from sand from salt flats because the high salt content is deadly to plants but most construction sand should work. The landscape company might possibly have someone that could help you with how much you should add once you show them your soils analysis but I doubt it. A better bet might be to talk to someone at your state land grant university (in Arizona that is the University of Arizona) and talk to someone in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. If you don't want to call them directly your county extension agent should be able to line you up with an expert. Don't trust me, I'm no expert on this, but a real expert can straighten me out on this or dispel some myths about adding sand to clay in a garden. The extension agent may know where to get the right sand by the truckload too. Maybe not.
I fully agree with the others. Adding compost to clayey soils or adding compost to sandy soils is a great thing to do.
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frontiergirl53
Garden Ornament
If you are talking about pH tests, yes. My pH is around 5.5
digitS'
Garden Master
Good goobily goop!
How is an Arizona soil so acidic? That is not at all what I would have expected.
I understand that one thing not to add, in the way of organic matter, would be peat moss.
Steve
How is an Arizona soil so acidic? That is not at all what I would have expected.
I understand that one thing not to add, in the way of organic matter, would be peat moss.
Steve
