Topic: Compacted soil

[allotment_chick]

Any fellow boardies managed to deal with VERY stony and compacted soil? It almost seems a contradiction in terms, I know, but I only managed to get the fork in about 3mm today!  I think my options are:

• cover with manure and forget about it for two years  :o

• sow deep rooting green manure in spring (lupins maybe) ???

• Cry  :'(

• cover with woven polypropylene fabric :-/

• Pay somebody else to do it!  ;)

any advice appreciated!
AC

[Palustris]

First option is probably the easiest and best. Worms will loosen the soil for you in pulling the manure into their burrows. Better not to walk on the soil either. Part  of our garden has a mixture of clay and house brick, all I could do at first as get the fork in as far as possible, then wriggle it about until it slid of the bricks and went further in. Then lever out the lump, remove the bricks and go on to the next piece. Once  I had removed lots of rubble etc. we put 12 inches of compost on top and left it over Winter. Then I dug it again in Spring and added another 12 inches of compost. By the following Autumn the area was plantable. We still have to remove rubbish when we plant in it, though the bed is now so full there is little room for much else. It does work, but it does take time. Sorry there are no easy solutions, just hard work. Have fun.

[Hugh_Jones]

My own garden was a compacted mass of pebbles of every size and my first attempts to get a fork in the ground resulted in badlly jarred wrists and ankles.  In the end I had to use a pickaxe to break it open and get out the larger pebbles - some of which were literally as big as a football.  Then I smothered it with every sort of humus making material I could lay hands on.  In later years I saved all the household newspapers throughout the year and dug them all into the vegetable beds in the autumn and this made a terrific difference to the soil.

Once you have broken it up and started growing things the root activity should make the stones keep coming up to the surface and you can rake off the larger ones.  As Eric says, once you can get some worm activity going this will help considerably.

For a green manure to help break up the soil, lupins sown in the spring to dig in the autumn, or winter rye in the late summer or early autumn to dig in February/early March

[allotment_chick]

Thank you both!  How nice it is to think things through with friends!!

I was slightly heartened yesterday as the little rain we had overnight did seem to help.   I managed the get the tops off some brambles.

Talking of worms....have only seen 2 since the hot weather started - and they were snuggled in the manure around the comfrey!  

[Palustris]

Had a thought about Option 3. The water would help soften the ground and the salt would kill off the weeds, but you would need to be very very upset to make a real difference.

I have just walked past the worst part of the clal/stone section, henceforth known as the Summer House border. There is a pollarded Paulonia in the middle. The leaves (now beginning to show signs of Autumn cold) are about 2/3 of a metre across. Our farmer neighbour said that we would never get anything to grow in that area, so don't give up, keep working away at it, a little at a time.

[teresa]

Hi AC

Good advice from the men but my bit is water.
my lottie was taken on in begining of  summer and rock hard so I put buckets of water on strips of 4ft at a time and covered with blankets plastic tablecloth carboard. went back the next day and forked it over.
Did half the lottie this way and found 8 worms hibernating in a figure of 8 when I got to the end of patch 10 in total I found.
With using fish poo water and growmore for the plants the worms are moving round the plot a lot more and more off them ready for the manure they will get this winter.

Worms need our help - help the worms they are our buddies - worms forever - worms united hee hee
Teresa

[allotment_chick]

Eventually I hope to have plenty of organic matter - I managed to persuade my other half to come up the lottie and screw together a few more of the pallets that a fellow allotmenteer kindly let me have, so now I have a set of three bins (eventually for compost but currently one compost plus two manure) and a set of two bins which I shall be filling with manure as soon as I can summon the energy!

I thinK I have picked up a case of that well known allotment holders problem of desperately-wanting-to-get-stuck-in-but-don't-have-the-time-or-energy-and-its-all-a-bit-too-much-itis.  Once I follow my own advice of setting small targets, easily achieved, I'll be right!

I reckon it is all about wanting to set my seal on the plot, to make it mine and to show the old hands who think I haven't got what it takes how wrong they are!  No doubt, I'll be back for further counselling in due course.... :)