Mission Impossible: the quest to grow on clay

[Bug n Flock]

There is a section of land on our property that is relatively flat(but sort of on a small hill) sunny, conveniently located, and warm. Perfect for a garden. Exceppppt: it is clay. Basically pure clay, and pebbles. *nothing* grows here. Bare clay patch, it's so sad and awful. When we first bought the place I foolishly planted a cactus pad(died) and a small rooted cactus of the same variety there. Mid septemberish, hardy cactus to this zone. They died, surprise surprise. Drowned I think. Soil is all clay and I am very new to the whole planting in the ground thing and this was a very rainy fall here.

Anyway, I love a good impossible challenge every week or so, and so I boldly claimed this section of land to put a vegetable garden in! My fiancee agreed, and is going to help me with my impossible project. Here is my plan so far for what to do:

Fence it. Immediately and completely. Enclose it in a 4' high perimeter of welded wire, and maybe run a hot wire or two for good measure(we let the goats free range during the day).

Build rabbit hutches there, raised off the ground and wire bottomed so I can put a compost pile under each and the rabbit additions to such will just do for themselves.

Build a large coop that will work for both turkeys and chickens inside of the fence, but that could easily be converted to a greenhouse, aviary, or garden shed in the future.

Put down a nice thick layer of cardboard and/or newspaper on the ground everywhere. Put down nice thick layer of leaves over the cardboard. Add wood chips, shavings, and/or straw everywhere.

Run 6 young heritage type turkeys in the space feeding them off compost and supplemental high protein pellets and assorted whole grains thrown in as scratch.

Keep adding shavings, straw, hay, wood chips as needed to keep turkeys in sanitary conditions.

Slaughter turkeys in mid/late April 2019. Rake out rabbit compost piles and add more shavings where needed to maintain sanitary conditions at all times, and to have fresh carbon for the nitrogen from all that manure to work on.

In mid march(probably) and in early june we are getting shipments of chicks from a hatchery(bargain assortments and additional breeds we wanted to try, exciting!). Will run a number of them in there for months, maybe sequential batches as freezer fodder or sold point-of-lay. Will keep birds in over winter and then asses in spring. Perhaps run the birds and bunnies there another year.

Pull the birds from the area and assess. Maybe mulch and let rest for a bit.

Plant covercrops like clover, daikon radish, and nettle. Let them grow for a bit and then mob graze with geese and/or sheep (if we have those by then). Remove birds/mammals and let covercrops grow again/reseed covercrops and repeat a few times.

At that point I might have something a little more workable than straight up plant killing bare murderclay baking in the sun.

Planning to then move the rabbit hutches, and begin planning my garden.

Thoughts? Advice? Tips? I worked a large garden back in highschool for a few years along with a crew of other kids, but this will be my first time starting a garden, having my own garden, dealing with clay, etc etc etc. Lot of firsts.

This year and until we have workable soil we are going to build and use raised beds. Have already started some seeds indoors for the upcoming season!

 

[oldhenlikesdogs]

I slowly converted hard clay to luscious soil in about 5-6 seasons mostly by adding compost, fall leaves and grass clippings. I also stopped tilling and I let my worms work the soil. I used free from raised beds for many years until I converted to raised boxes due to arthritis. You may too be better off making some raised beds. It just depends how much work and time you want to invest.

 

[Perris]

if the land slopes at all you could dig some drainage channels (arranged like veins in a leaf) and fill with the pebbles and some grit or perforated pipe, to deal with the autumn/winter wet. Pile on the organic matter and you will have wonderful soil sooner or later - clay is full of nutrients and things grow well once the tiny particles are interspersed with humus etc.. And put a few inches of grit/sharp sand at the bottom of any planting hole you dig, to stop it turning into a sump and drowning your plant.

 

[Oldspice]

I have clay in my soil, it is very hard to grow stuff

 

[CapricornFarm]

I use raised beds for our clay soil. I dig out the existing soil into a wheel barrow and add sand, peat moss, wood ash, and composted manure or fresh rabbit manure. Mix well and put the soil back in after i break up the clumps of clay by hand. Repeat for each section of the bed. I had good growth and probably would have had a good harvest but animals kept eating my plants. I planted stringed beans 3x! Even with a 4 foot garden fence and two hot wires! This year i will be adding more wire to the top of the fence!

 

[Acre4Me]

I use raised beds for our clay soil. I dig out the existing soil into a wheel barrow and add sand, peat moss, wood ash, and composted manure or fresh rabbit manure. Mix well and put the soil back in after i break up the clumps of clay by hand. Repeat for each section of the bed. I had good growth and probably would have had a good harvest but animals kept eating my plants. I planted stringed beans 3x! Even with a 4 foot garden fence and two hot wires! This year i will be adding more wire to the top of the fence!

This is basically what you do to clay...mix in good amendments.

Don’t forget “green manure” which are cover crops that you grow then till back into soil. Usually in the late summer/fall sow the seeds, grow then turn under to rot over winter.

Compost pile: great thing to have in a garden.

Good luck!

 

[WthrLady]

We had our virgin prairie tilled and then I put down 4 feet of fluffy hay, which compacted down to 8 inches over the winter. The worms did the rest. I had 2 amazing gardening years in that soil until we determined that that was the best place on the property for the barn.

 

[IamRainey]

Raised beds was a good idea. So are the hutches and poultry pens with their nitrogen-rich pellets. But the biggest difference you'll make is to compost.

Then keep trying to grow stuff. You may not get the crops you're expecting right away but every root that works through the clay and every plant you turn back in at the end of the year is making a difference.

I used to have clay soil. The stuff they make adobe brick and saltillo tiles from! It's been 15 years but I'm proud to say that I can dig down a foot in my growing beds with my bare hands now.

Keep up your effort. Compost. Compost. Compost. And all that good organic clay will become part of a rich, healthy and much more arable soil.

 

[Rosa moschata]

What you plan is far more involved than what I'd do -- especially since I don't have livestock. So, what I'd do first is use cover-crops with deep roots to break up the clay -- namely, Daikon radish and sunflowers. The radish make fat taproots that go down deep and sponge up nutrients. The sunflower make a network of thin roots that also go down deep and can break through hardpan. Then add some type of legume to fill in at the base, like clover.

DO NOT TILL -- this will just compact the clay further. DO NOT RIP OUT THE COVER CROP -- this will pull out their roots, which have made channels into the clay, letting in water and air. Just chop-and-drop the tops after your first frost, cover with cardboard, mulch over that, leave to settle over Winter. If you're able, collect used coffee grounds and throw that on the mulch.

By Spring, earthworms will be working on what's under the cardboard and mulch, then start coming to the surface and finding lots of yummy coffee grounds. They'll feed on that there, and tunnel back down before morning. Coffee grounds have somewhat similar N-P-K to composted cow manure, and because earthworms eat it and bring it down deep before they poop it out, it means getting nutrient-rich organic matter down where roots can reach it.

All this will GENTLY till your soil, bringing organic matter down into the clay but not destroying the channels formed by the roots of your first cover crops. When you're ready to plant, new baby roots will follow the path of least resistance -- namely, following the channels made by the now dead-and-decaying roots of last year's cover crops. If clay continues being a problem, throw some more Daikon radish and sunflower seeds in the spaces between your crops -- or whatever you want to grow there.

If it's annual veggies, continue moving forward by repeating the chop-and-drop, cardboard, mulch, and coffee grounds after a killing frost. You could also do a Winter cover-crop, then cardboard-and-mulch as soon as you can in Spring. The idea is to keep old roots in the soil to make channels for next year's new plants' roots, leave their dead tops under a new layer of mulch for earthworms to feed upon during Winter warm spells, and the coffee grounds on top to encourage them to come to the surface and open up the soil for Spring planting.

 

[Farmdog267]

Organic matter is the key and it will take some time. I've had great luck incorporating some aged mushroom soil into the garden beds! That helps build good soil. I usually add some in the fall and mix in the leaves and such also for added benefits.