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Cheyenne, Wyoming

I just got my soil test results back. The lady who analized my soil sample said nothing would grow in my garden, due to a salinity level of 12. She said this level should be around 2.

As I did some research, it appears that the salt or salinity level is raised when using manure, chemical fertilizers and gypsum. How do growers put large amounts of these things - particularly manure - into their gardens without having excessive salt problems?

The plant science lady about passed out when I told her I put between four and eight inches of manure in my garden each year. She said that was way too much!

2/4/2004 5:47:18 PM

[email protected]

Gyspum won't add salts. In fact it is the proper method to get them to fall out or leach through.

Apply at least 150-200 lbs of Gypsum per 1000 sq ft ASAP. Then hope for lots of rain or provide significant irrigation water to leach those salts.

It sounds like the manure used was just too fresh. Try to use well composted manures. Building a nice compost pile this summer will give you a place to age your own manure if fresh is all you can find. Also a good place to dump your own yard wastes.

Steve

2/4/2004 5:53:30 PM

Puyallup, WA

Don't panic! I was told the same thing...once, "That's way too much manure!" I put nearly 12" on my patch! Just be sure to plow and then rototill it in very deep....ie. 12" into the native soil. I still hit 800#!!

2/4/2004 5:59:47 PM

I'm with Gordon... GO UTES!

This is a topic dear to my heart... my test came back
with 6.3 as my ECE level (salinity level, anyway) and
this was the highest of the 100 or so soil test reports
that Andy Wolfe compiles.

My soil is heavy clay, and about 2 feet down is a hardpan.
I think the hardpan is the biggest problem. Over many
years, my soil is beginning to turn into a Great Salt Lake.

My plan of attack...

A. Try to dig down through the hardpan, at least around the
stump of each plant. I'll just have to do this every year,
moving the stump each time.

B. Use gypsum.

C. Avoid chemical fertilizers. I'll be using seaweed this
year.

D. Add a lot of well broken down compost.

E. Water the heck out of it.

Any other suggestions?

Regards, Cliff

2/4/2004 6:59:41 PM

Western NY

those are good reccomendations cliff.

what i want to know are the units behind the number "12".

Andy

2/4/2004 7:20:16 PM

Cheyenne, Wyoming

Do seaweed and fish fertillzer add to salinity problems, or are they free of salt?

2/4/2004 7:23:40 PM

Cheyenne, Wyoming

Andy:

This is my first soil test, so I am certainly no expert on what the 12 for "salts" means, but here is what I think it means:

The plant science lady told me that the "12" is number used to measure my soil's electrical conductivity or EC.

Apparently, salinity is measured by the electrical conductivity of the soil. It is expressed in deciSemens/meter or millimhos/centimeter. They say both of these are equivalent units of electrical conductivity.

So, to answer your question on what the 12 means, I think it means that my soil came out 12 dS/m or deciSemens/meter of electrical conductivity.

John

2/4/2004 7:35:40 PM

Western NY

John, the dS/m is the units i was looking for. 12 is high. way high. pumpkins are classified as moderately sensitive to salts. i am keeping an eye on the future results of certain growers to see if slainity is really a serious problem with the giants, and would love to keep track of your data as well. please email me if you get a chance. thanks.

Andy Wolf
[email protected]

2/4/2004 8:48:02 PM

San Diego

my salt level came back this last fall at 5, and I started the season at 2. So I jumped way up in just one year. I think I used too much chemical ferts, my san diego water might have played a factor too. I added lots of gypsom, and have been praying for rain. Please send me more rain, we get so little sometimes here. We have a whole house filter system and I plan on using water that goes through this filter system next year, should take out a lot of the crud and be much better water for my garden.Our city water is terrible here. I didn't add any manure this fall either and am going way down on the chemical ferts this coming year. We'll see what my salt level drops too in the spring. Jim

2/4/2004 9:29:59 PM

Bemidji, MN

Have fought high salt levels for 3 years now. Started at 7.2 and this fall it was down to 2.1. My soil is extremely heavy clay. Down 16", was clay barrier that nothing could drain through. The plot had been a cattle area for years, and the salt from the urine built up and could not drain anywhere. My attack was to avoid all granular ferts for 3 years, I add 10" manure each fall, but the manure that I use now is atleast 5-10 years old, so salt has leached out. Also, and I'd highly recommend this to anyone in clay soil. I got my neighbors tractor and his digger, and dragged all thru the plot. Those fingers got down 18-24" and broke the clay barrier and now allows drainage. The digger was key to whole problem, without having done that, salt level would not have dropped as quickly. Steve

2/4/2004 9:54:16 PM

Midway City, California

To Day I saw a chart that said Cow manure has a salt ratio of 150 lbs salt to one ton of manure. Will check further into it tomorrow, John

2/4/2004 10:28:22 PM

In the shade - PDX, OR

Didn't Boily have a high salt rating last year?

Ben - chime in here if you are on.

Oh yeah give us an update too!
Grow 'Em BIG!

2/5/2004 2:35:18 AM

Ljubljana, Slovenia

Does anybody know what the symptoms of high salinity are?
Jernej

2/5/2004 3:44:21 AM

I'm with Gordon... GO UTES!

One more thought... of what I read about mycorrhizae, poor soil
conditions can kill it. My best quess is that my soil lacks
this beneficial fungi, so I'll be including that in my plans
this year. - Cliff

2/5/2004 12:41:45 PM

[email protected]

Salt injury pictures:

http://aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/cucurbit/leaf/42.2.html

2/5/2004 2:57:22 PM

Key West, FL

water water water water

2/5/2004 2:58:09 PM

San Diego, Ca.

I started a new patch last fall and tilled in only 3" of manure to a depth of 12". The manure was supposed to be well composted but turned out to be anything but. I think I have you all beat for salt in the soil...my test came back with a reading of ECE at 27.8 ds/m. I have real problems! What I did was contact the argonomist at A&L labs to see what I could do about it.
After a while of doing some calculations he called me back and said I could till in gypsum at the rate of 290lbs. per 1000 sq.ft.(I had low calcium levels anyway) then apply at least 6" of water to the soil at one time. ( I used a sprinkler with a can set in the patch to catch the water until it was filled with 6" of water)The idea is to saturate the soil to get the salts moving and the gypsum helps the leaching process of salts.
I am eagerly awaiting the next test report I will have done in March. In the meantime I have a cover crop of clover growing quite nicely right now so I think things will be ok for me I hope!

2/6/2004 11:41:01 AM

Puyallup, WA

Gourdzilla,
Something is not right here! Your soil must have had high readings even before the manure was added. I added four times as much manure as you did and my Soluable Salts readings were never above 6 mmhos/cm.

2/6/2004 6:38:50 PM

San Diego, Ca.

Stan, that has crossed my mind a few times. It is quite possible that the soil might have had a high salt content to begin with because the soil was trucked in and is not the native clay and rock soil I have here so therefore I really don't know for sure its orgin or what was in the soil to begin with..........for all I know it might have sand added to it that came from down at the beach that was loaded with salt, who knows. I just hope it is corrected by planting time. At least the clover is growing good :-)

2/6/2004 7:45:43 PM

Colorado Hail, CO. Elev. 5,900 FT

Adding chemical fetilizers to manure or compost enriched soils will raise your salt level, as organic matter holds water and chemical fertilizers more than soil without oraganic matter. If your in a dry climate or have clay soil, go easy on chemicals anyway. When leaching the soil, remember it's better to 'flood' each zone, getting the soil as saturated as possible in each 'zone' before moving on to the next. Sandy soils leach easier than clay soils, knowing what your soil is and what it needs comes with time and with observation. Mine is sandy, eats a lotta organics, and looses a lotta nutrients, but I've still had high readings of salts... back when I used chemicals. I've gone 95% organic, and have slower releasing and slower leaching results since, and bigger fruits. Calcium is my biggest need, as organics breaks down best when the acidity isn't so low, and I loose my calcium quickly in the sand.

I'm curious... who can explain why you can add clay to sand and not sand to clay... this is a question that I never could get figured out. You should add a lot of organics to clay to loosen it up,and add them to sand to tighten it up, and add clay to sand also. But if you mix sand in clay soil you get adobe {not acrobat reader either}... please explain what physical properties are behind that so I can explain it to my Eiffler friend, who lives 2-3 miles away from me and has 1000% clay. I myself never could understand that one...

2/8/2004 2:45:00 AM

I'm with Gordon... GO UTES!

You have to add enough sand to clay, or else you get...
cement.

At least that's the way I understand it. You would need
lots and lots of sand to break up clay soil. Too little
can actually hurt......

2/9/2004 12:12:47 PM

In the shade - PDX, OR

Madman - I think you have to add up to 50% by volume of sand to the clay in order to get it to work out right. Often this is not economically feasible.


It has to do with the physical properties of the clay.
The individual clay particles are very small - this allows them to 'cling' together easily.


If you don't add enough sand the clay continues to bind to itself and basically swallows up the sand particle - and this allows it to still cling to other clay particles.
You end up with cement, adobe, hard pan & a bigger problem than you started with.

As mentioned earlier the best way to soften up the clay is to add copious amounts of organic matter.

2/9/2004 8:54:30 PM

Appalachian Mtns.

the wrong type sand can shoot your pH through the roof. some claim it's neutral but not all sand is....

2/9/2004 10:43:43 PM