Re: Clay/Raised beds
From: "Title, CDR Lynn A." <titlel@spawar.navy.mil>
I gave up on the local Maryland clay years ago and built up not down; all
my beds (mostly shade, and freeform heaps vice bordered/bounded) are made of
equal parts old horse manure, leafmulch, and broken bags of topsoil I get
for $5 a pallet-load from Home Despot, with some sand mixed in, plus broken
bags of pelleted animal feed I get cheap from a local feedstore, and frozen
dead goldfish from the area petstore (Squanto rules!) I heap this up about
2' deep in the fall, then plant into it next spring, mulching all beds with
another 3" of leafmulch. I get the mulch free from the County, and barns
about 20 minutes down the road are glad to get rid of the manure.
Three years ago I put in several "real" raised beds (only a foot deep,
4'x8', 3 rows of landscape timber) aimed at irises, with essentially the
same mix but more sand. The fish, pellets and manure I spread on the clay
base, then filled up with the less-rich mix. There's a thin layer of sand on
top of that, per Iris List advice. Everything since has shot up great guns,
and both bloom and rebloom have produced well (for a site that gets less
than half a day sun) but the rhizomes are getting packed pretty tight, so
next weekend I plan to dig 'em all up, pull off the top layer, relay the
rich base, and reseat big pieces. The spares will go to the area AIS sale
the next weekend.
I've been real happy with soil made this way, but if I do this major dig,
should I forget about rebloom this fall? Or is there something I should do
to encourage rebloom?
Lynn - it's 94 degrees, 80% humidity, but no rain for days!
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