# What will grow in crappy soil?



## PrepN4Good (Dec 23, 2011)

Okay, assume sandy, rocky, pretty crappy soil is available for you to plant whatever you want on. Is anything - fruit trees, berry bushes, grains, veggies - even remotely able to grow in something like that without amending? Also assume zone 7, hot humid summers. Any ideas? :scratch


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## ras1219como (Jan 15, 2013)

PrepN4Good said:


> Okay, assume sandy, rocky, pretty crappy soil is available for you to plant whatever you want on. Is anything - fruit trees, berry bushes, grains, veggies - even remotely able to grow in something like that without amending? Also assume zone 7, hot humid summers. Any ideas? :scratch


Try looking at what naturally grows and what is being commercially grown. But honestly if you have bad soil the best bet would be to put in a raised bed with better soil to grow your garden.


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## LincTex (Apr 1, 2011)

Hauling dirt really sucks, but if you know what your soil needs and you can fix it with nearby soil supplements, its a good investment. Clay needs sand to loosen it up, sand needs clay to firm it up. Sandy loam is needed everywhere.

Same with raised beds - another winner.

You can do a lot with compost. 
Have any tree branches and leaves that needed to get shredded? Can you get some?

Look into lasagna gardening, and hugelkultur.


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## PrepN4Good (Dec 23, 2011)

This is a small field off an old disused road, so wouldn't be very convenient to haul in a lot of stuff. I was thinking maybe blackberry bushes, b/c they do grow wild in that area... :hmmm:

Ideally I wanted something hardy & tolerant of neglect.


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## Magus (Dec 1, 2008)

Polk Salad.
Mulberries.
Onions.
Irish potatoes.
Mustard greens.
One species of squash I forgot the name of but they're green and cream colored and get huge!


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## PrepN4Good (Dec 23, 2011)

Magus said:


> Polk Salad.
> Mulberries.
> Onions.
> Irish potatoes.
> ...


_That's_ what I'm talkin' about! Thanks, Magus! :kiss:


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## JayJay (Nov 23, 2010)

LincTex said:


> Hauling dirt really sucks, but if you know what your soil needs and you can fix it with nearby soil supplements, its a good investment. Clay needs sand to loosen it up, sand needs clay to firm it up. Sandy loam is needed everywhere.
> 
> .


I built my first raised bed and Bowling Green has a soil with sand, peat, etc. especially for raised beds.:factor10:


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## cowboyhermit (Nov 10, 2012)

Like Magus mentioned there are a lot of things that do well in sandy/gravelly soil but it depends on your climate. Look for plants that grow in your area and like "well drained" soils.

If you want to improve the soil over time and with minimal effort you can plant any unused portions into legumes like clover, sweetclover, or alfalfa. There are many native nitrogen fixers too but these are also climate specific, up here we have buffalo beans and wolf willows for instance that like sandy soil. Over a year or two these can add a lot of organic matter to your soil without much work on your part.


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## k0xxx (Oct 27, 2011)

We have very similar crappy soil also. But it would still okra, some beans, peppers quite nicely. We started blending in compost and built it up very nice, but every year we'd have a bumper crop of rocks. We eventually started building raised beds for most everything except corn, which is still grown in the large garden plot.


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## boomer (Jul 13, 2011)

It sounds like Rosemary would do well enough to grow it commercially, that is unless you get a lot of rain. The onions and garlic might like a little water now and again.


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## partdeux (Aug 3, 2011)

raised bed, Mel's Mix
1/3 of each by volume
Peat
Vermiculite or the easier to find Pearlite 
Compost (goal is 5 different kinds, but good luck finding more than 2)


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## weedygarden (Apr 27, 2011)

*Amend your soil*

You can have your soil evaluated by your local Extension Office. I have no idea what it costs, but every county in America has one, I think. Soils are different in different parts of the country. Some are clay, some are sandy, some are balanced. They will tell you what your soil needs.

Crappy soil exists in many places. I have clay so dense it chokes out many things I try to grow. Every year I amend the soil. I can literally sift out 10 gallons of smaller rock each year from one of the smaller beds. Each year my garden grows more rocks. Garden soil does get better if you keep at it.

Add compost. Add aged manure. If you have clay, add claybuster. I have a friend that adds peatmoss. I have tried it but that really doesn't seem to have done anything for my garden. When I clean up the leaves and dead plant growth in my yard I compost some of it and till some of it right into the garden.

Make your own compost. Start a pile and dump all of the plant matter that you pick, rake, of clean out of your property. I have a friend that puts lots of wood in his compost. But all of his kitchen scraps go in. Coffee grounds, peelings, egg shells are all good. Leaves are great! Same friend drives around in the fall and picks up as many bags of leaves as he can carry in his vehicle for his garden. Scrap paper can go in, but certain inks are not good.

Turning the compost pile helps it to break down faster.

You have to work with what you've got and learn how to make it better.
If you watch and work it, you can find some of these things for free on craigslist. I have gotten manure for free. I have gotten lots of good mulch for free.

I had lots of weed trees in my yard and had lots of work to do to get rid of them. They shaded the garden and the roots would grow a new tree after I cut the old one off. I have taken around 20 of these roots, digging down around 3 or 4 feet for most, much deeper for one.

Gardening is work, but your garden will produce more when the soil is optimum. Think of it as an investment.


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## Viking (Mar 16, 2009)

We too have crappy soil, mostly red clay and highly acidic. Over the years I've tried amending it with lime and other things but lack of irrigation water is also a problem so I ended up planting apple, cherry and nut trees which do extremely well in the poor soil. Also I've planted peach trees but this is also a bad area for leaf curl problems, but we're not giving up as I found a nursery that has leaf curl resistant peach trees. Elephant garlic grows great in our soil and I have a 10' X 30' patch that's been producing without replanting for about 20 years. I have a couple of raised beds for vegetables and will add more as we can afford to do so as they are far less hard to water than the gardens we tried in flat ground.


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## weedygarden (Apr 27, 2011)

*Clay?*



Viking said:


> We too have crappy soil, mostly red clay and highly acidic. Over the years I've tried amending it with lime and other things but lack of irrigation water is also a problem so I ended up planting apple, cherry and nut trees which do extremely well in the poor soil. Also I've planted peach trees but this is also a bad area for leaf curl problems, but we're not giving up as I found a nursery that has leaf curl resistant peach trees. Elephant garlic grows great in our soil and I have a 10' X 30' patch that's been producing without replanting for about 20 years. I have a couple of raised beds for vegetables and will add more as we can afford to do so as they are far less hard to water than the gardens we tried in flat ground.


The best product I have found for clay is claybuster. Compost will also help with clay soil.


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## LincTex (Apr 1, 2011)

Viking said:


> I have a couple of raised beds .....they are far less hard to water than the gardens we tried in flat ground.


Huh, for some reason I thought raised beds needed more water than flat ground?


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## PrepN4Good (Dec 23, 2011)

Thank you for all the thoughtful replies.

Maybe I should have given more background. In my _own_ backyard, I only grow in raised beds (yes, rock-hard red clay), except for a few fruit trees.

However - I have _access_ to a small lot off an old road, nowhere near my personal house. That's why I'm not willing to spend a lot of money or effort to add compost, etc. Just looking to grow something that might actually, well, not die (if not flourish) in that kind of soil. :flower:


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## ContinualHarvest (Feb 19, 2012)

Grapes will take some neglect. But If I wanted to grow much else, you're gonna have to work and build the soil. Select a 3x3 meter plot and dig down about 18 inches. Remove large rocks from the soil as you turn it. Mix in compost and maybe even plant some cover crops like clover. Let it fallow the rest of the year. Turn it over in the spring and keep adding organic matter.

A free/cheap and virtually effortless idea is to tell your local country roads crew that they can dump shredded trees limbs/leaves damaged during storms there for the next season. Then LEt it rot for a year or two. You'll have some nice compost.


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## goshengirl (Dec 18, 2010)

Given the situation (location, not putting time/$ into it), I'd maybe consider a couple seasons of cover crops just to build the soil a little bit (alfalfa, buckwheat, rye). They wouldn't need any attention, just live and die and add to the soil. Then I think your brambles idea would be a really good one. But I'm partial to brambles. Especially right now when ours are flowering.


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