Testing my soils composition of clay, sand and silt to help determine what what I need to use as amendments. The mixture of Sand Silt and clay is called Loam. It appears from the testing that I have a very high silt (organic material) content.
VIDEO: Soil Composition Testing
Testing my soils composition of clay, sand and silt to help determine what what I need to use as amendments. The mixture of Sand Silt and clay is called Loam. It appears from the testing that I have a very high silt (organic material) content.
That is a very interesting experiment. Most of us would love to have that much loam. I think adding the sand would be a good idea, but don't go overboard with it. I'm wondering if the reason why you don't have a lot of root system is because the plants are getting all they need without spreading out to find water and nutrients.
V interesting TY, i may give this a go.. I was always under the impression a heavy loam soil was good for all sorts of plants?. It would also make sense your soil would be rich in nutrients too with the amount of leaf shedding trees and bushes you have on your plot. Would it be a good idea to loosen the soil with such an incline you have? JMO but i think for the hill of a plot you have i'd say theoretically your soil was perfect. I'm no expert though, thanks for vid food for thought.
Thanks for posting this Jay… Having some issues with a few of the beds out the front & forgot about this testing method.. Might have a bash at testing them & see what turns up.. Have a feeling its too much organics & not enough drainage/sand..
Yacon is looking great as well..
Cheers mate..
Great vid Thanks for posting
The biochar will help you may not need sand, or try two test one sand one with biochar.
Interesting study! I had to search up the word loam, trying to find the norwegian name for it. Under this search I found this site explaining something interesting about loam. See link: http://www.hort.purdue.edu/ext/loam.html
Here where I live, seems to be an old shore line beach from the end of the ice age. Since then, the sea level has dropped about 100 meter. A quite thin layer of humus covers an underlaying deposit of silt and sand. This top layer is so thin that it gets somehow mixed with the silt/sand when digging with a shuffle. Would have been cool to try the same soil test as you`ve done here.
Cheers,
Halvor.
Perhaps if you haven't turned over your garden with a plow, a large percentage of your sand may have perked down too far to be of benefit. I'm no expert, but if you dug down maybe 18 inches or so and tested that; then simply plowing your garden, or plowing deeper might help.
This is very interesting… I think that you will get the results you desire through trial and error. Thanks for sharing.
Thank you for posting this link, now I'm positive I need a bit of sand mixed into my soil. I was going to try it this year, guess I had the right idea. Thanks again!
Thanks for reminding me of this soil composition testing technique. I had read about it years ago but never tried it and forgot about it. I need to give this a try myself. Thanks!
I've been wanting to do this exact soil composition test myself, I just haven't found the time to so it! LOL I'm really glad you showed this via video Jay because it will help the rest of us not waste time with the water only, thank you for sharing about the soap. I'll let you know how mine shakes out (pun intended)! 🙂
First time I have seen that J. Good post.I think the sand should do the trick but I also think the char will too. The yacon is growing great guns. I can see alot of people trying this. I will be for sure. Nice one Dave
I know I have mostly sand because I am on a gigantic wash in the desert, but it would be good to know just how much my compost and rotted goat manure is affecting the garden soil. thanks, will give this a go.
So, if you are going to dig in some sand, how deep would you turn if in ? Only the top 5 or 10 cm ? Should work fine to let the water collect into the top, then hold it while it has some more time to percipitate deeper into the loamy soil ?
The soap buffers and de-ionizes the particles. That is, it helps to keep the particles from sticking to one another. Every particle holds a tiny amount of electrical charge. The soap helps to minimize this attractive force between particles.