Anyone else suffering with really dry soil - already?
My soil is heavy clay and I've been mulching it in autumn and spring, as well as digging in more compost between plantings.
But it's so dry. We've had hardly any rain for ages (I probably should be careful what I wish for though shoudln't I?!) The top inch or two of soil is bone dry. under that it's not exactly soggy!
I want to mulch again before the plants cover the soil. But it's just too dry. I don't want to water it from the tap.
Oh and my waterbutts are only half full.
No advice needed really! Just wanted to have a slightly tongue-in-check whinge!
I am really enjoying the sunshine though!
Yep, these plots are 6 foot of soil sitting on a limestone escarpment, they drain superfast and then dry rock hard in summer.
There already getting hard, theres been so little rain in the last 3 months
I am taking advantage of the dry spell to get my vegetable garden rotavated, including the area which I am not using this year. I shall rotavate the spare ground whenever I see weeds start showing through. This should get rid of all the weeds during the Summer. My land is a mixture of Boulder clay, Oxford clay and Kimmeridge clay (my old governor used to say that there's nothing worse).
I think it might be a good idea to alternate the veg. plot with the fallow plot.
Ive got heavy clay on my plot too & yep its bone dry already :-\
Im going to build more raised beds this year & fill them with good quality compost because my raised beds are doing so much better & dont seem to dry out as quickly, they are soooooooo much easier to work too.
Quote from: Larkshall on April 08, 2011, 21:32:09
I am taking advantage of the dry spell to get my vegetable garden rotavated,
Ground is getting too hard here, best times to rotavate here are when the ground is soft and wet and has been for a week or more. After a couple of months of no rain, even my 6.5 HP Merry Tiller starts to struggle.
The bit I've just dug is pretty dry, the bit I dug a while ago and stuck 6" of manure on as I went that got rotavated in a few weeks ago is still moist just under the surface.,... so pooh and lots of it is the recipe for our soil..... If this week goes as planned, a trailer or two of manure will be going up there this weekend to finish the job....
chrisc
Yup the top inch or two are bone dry, and cracking where there isn't any mulch. What happened to April showers :-X
No april showers here and no march ones either. My water butt in the front garden is more of less empty. Having to water the seed beds like crazy. Still moist down under. Some light showers forecast Wed and Thurs but I will not hold my breathe.
When it is dry our soil sets like concrete, trying to add lots of biomass and mulching as much as possible.
too dry, couldn't even dig today as it was like concrete
Have faith!! The rain is coming, watch the next few days!!
there's no better job in the world than hoeing damp earth down to a fine tilth.
Quotehoeing damp earth down to a fine tilth.
GWE (green with envy)
no, my plot is as dry as a wotsits wotsit. I'm waiting for lincsyokel2's rain.....
Only since I have had an allotment do i look forward to rain!!!! Friends think i am mad!
it's raining!
Another nice sunny day here. Showers forecast for around 1pm but nothing on the radar.
Yup raining here too in Preston
Quote from: Bugloss2009 on April 10, 2011, 22:38:51
no, my plot is as dry as a wotsits wotsit. I'm waiting for lincsyokel2's rain.....
its coming, i promise, def by thursday.
well the sky has clouded over and it's gone rather gloomy here, so I'm sure rain is immenent. I'm so confident of the fact that I'm not going to water this evening.
It is very odd actually wanting it to rain, especially during the school holidays! But that's what happens when you're a gardener! :D
We had a 5 minute shower yesterday, :( I put the football on and saw it was chucking it down in Liverpool. :-\
A real delluge here. Oh no its just the horse in the next field peeing.
Lol - nothing here in my little nit of South London and the wind is drying the soil out even more..
Been raining here for couple of hours at least - could do with a few days of it though.....
I was really annoyed earlier as weatherman said heavy rain from early morning so planned my day to get stuff done indoors. Then what do you know but didn't rain til 2pm. We did need it though but fed up I couldn't get down the allotment to finish putting my fence up! Oh well, always tomorrow.....
its tried to rain here,few spots but thats all
planted spuds yesterday which were watered in,just need a nice rainfall to work through the soil a little
and ive digging to next week,no chance with the dry clay clumps that need breaking up,its like concrete
Well all the possible blobs on the radar have passed by now and we did not get enough to join up the spots. Will not water the soil and certainly nothing to fill the empty water butt, only one light shower on the forecast over the next four days.
all we've had since I started this thread was about half a mm! This week we've got temperatures in the mid-20s! :o
On Sunday I dug holes to plant my spuds. A foot down the ground was completely bone dry. :o
So I'm going to have to resort to soaking the ground with the hose. :o and quickly spreading a thick mulch before the lot evaporates again. ::)
I just hope I've got enough compost!
A couple of days ago they were predicting rain for us for the end of the week.... now they're not.... it's all sunny.... that means either tomorrow or thursday evenign I will spend all the daylight tiem from when I get home to when it gets dark watering the allotment.... argh.....
I cant remember when we actually had any rain?.....apart from the half dozen spots we had last Thursday at around 11:30am!!
I incorporated lots of manure again this year like I do every year and there is moisture about 6" down below the surface.Im trying to go easy on the watering but if we dont get some soon the hosepipe will be out to top up the butts!
I seem to remember we had a dry spring last year, followed by a very wet unsummery summer, and so I'm just enjoying it while it's here, and assuming everything will right itself eventually!
I came home from work this morning to see (with some joy) spots on the patio. I thought of the newly earthed up spuds and the freshly erected guttering on my shed aiming for the IBC (1000ltr water butt) thingy me bob.
Such disappointment, not even a covered patio slab !!!!!!! ... I can't afford to keep taking water to plot from house. Charges are huge from last year :(
Yeah, dry here too, they are saying northern France has had 30% less rain than it should at this time of year.
I have all my little seedlings in, so I watered Saturday, and Sunday and this morning! Although suprisingly the things I just transplanted this weekend (lettuce, beets, broccoli) seem upright and happy!
Dry here too, no rain since mid Feb. :o
When we got our council compost I covered my spud bed with it, and its now damp underneath where I have dug to put the spuds in. :D