More than a little disappointed in my soil sample results.

[obsessed]

I did a quick soil test that I bought from Lowes. I took at least six sample for each of my five beds. I used distilled water and let the samples dried over night. All five samples came out the same

PH - 8
N - Low
Phosphorous - High
Potassium - Nothing (it was supposed to various shades of grey to black but it always looked white cloudy to me)

I know that these samples are not as accurate as sending the soil off to a lab and I think I will work that into next months garden budget. But I am bummed. I have bunnies and still no nitrogen. How could this happen. The rest of the stuff I don't know much about or where to get it. I compost everything I possibly can. I even pick napkins out the trash after dinner. I lied to my DH and told him that grass clipping = mosquitoes so I could have the clippings for my compost.

Anyone else do a home soil kit? Any advice? Darn I don't want to go back to hunting for duck poop with my pooper scooper!!!!!!!


ETA: My area is generally know for having acid soils that make blueberries very happy. Maybe it is the kit and not the soil?

 

[HiDelight]

I did ..then I sent it off because it made no sense and the real lab results were much much different ..also much more horrifying to be honest! I have soil full of heavy metal and poison
I live in paradise and wrestle with the demons of a careless past in the Puget Sound area ...
while it is one of the more fertile places I have ever lived ..we have very toxic soil here so toxic they run ads on tv warning people about it ...

I literally cried when I got my results considering I have grown vegetables in this same area for 25 years!

then a friend of mine who runs an analytical lab offered advice and research papers on improving toxic soil and how to grow in areas like ours he helped me improve my soil to the point he said he would "eat lettuce from it now if you grew it!"

I was so paranoid about feeding people stuff grown in it ..that I put all raised beds in imported soil for those and limed up the areas round my fruit trees and rhubarb to raise the pH ..then had it tested again ...to include the stuff I brought in and things are fine now ..I also had my fruits from the trees tested and they were fine as well


I know this was TMI about my own problems and you were asking about the nutrients not the toxic substances ..but the nutrients did not show on the home kit either and the lab test showed a much more detailed report of EVERYTHING in the soil so I had a better baseline to work with when I started to amend it

and now that it is amended I have actually put rhubarb in the ground where the pH is higher now ..keep liming in the fall and spring and work hard on keeping the toxins down and the nutrition up

I think it is worth the money to have your soil tested professionally! yes!

 

[vfem]

See if your local univesity or extension office offers free tests?! My county is a farming county and the extension office does free soil tests.... our local agricultural department at the college (NCSU) does free soil tests too.

I do not, and will not trust those soil testers from Lowes!

 

[obsessed]

I just talked to the LSU extension service he said for $7 I could get a soil sample and that it may be the rabbit poop that was raising the PH. So when is a good time for a soil sample? I wanted to grow some winter veggies and still might.

 

[patandchickens]

So when is a good time for a soil sample? I wanted to grow some winter veggies and still might.

If you want to grow some winter veggies, I would say *now* is a good time to send a sample off

Have fun, good luck,

Pat

 

[onedozenphyllises]

Or maybe before now! I'm next door to you in Texas, and I started my fall/winter plantings a few days ago... Depends on what you want to put in, I guess.

 

[obsessed]

I have some started broccoli and cauliflower that I will put in. Despite the poor results I had a decent garden this year. I planted some pumpkins, cukes and watermelon in early July and they are off to a good start. I was just being lazy cause I thought I would have to take soil sample from 6 beds. But they said just to submit one sample (with lots of little samples). So it will only cost me 7 bucks.

 

[obsessed]

I will send in my soil sample tomarrow and hopefully I is not too bad. I did talk to my extension agent again and he said some supprising things.

He said to never put the rabbit poop in the garden to compost it first. He said no to the grass clippings also. somthing about taking the nutrients from the plants to use in the decomposition process. He said all of this can make the soil sample reading inaccurate.

I also don't know how "accurate" my will be getting because I add stuff to the garden continously. Coffee grounda, grass clipping, bunny poop, little boy pee....You name it I add it.

So after alot of thinking (I am lying I am a very impatient person). I decided that I would do a cover crop this winter to help my soil. I picked a spring green manure mix from Johnnys ( they were so nice).

The saga continues

 

[Ridgerunner]

Instead of taking a sample from your garden, perhaps you could take a few samples from the immediate area and mix them but not where it has been amended. This will give you information on what your baseline starting point is based on your native rock type and soils. I've grown nitrogen fixing crops here and nitrogen users there, used this compost here and that mulch there, side dressed this but not that, so I would not be able to get a representative sample of the whole garden. At least you would know where you started. I read this suggestion to do this somewhere but I don't have a clue where.

 

[obsessed]

I am using raised beds of all imported soil. I actually dont have much soil in my garden. The native soil is just orange rusty looking sand with maybe (and I am being generous) an inch of topsoil/grass. My beds are anywhere from 8-12 inches. Under the beds I dug them out about a foot and in some places deeper(I got carried away). And put the compost, hay, bunny ness, but that was a year ago. Anyway I don't think that the surrround soil will be representative of the garden soil.