Re: More on double-digging

In a message dated 3/27/00 2:12:03 AM Eastern Standard Time, mtalt@clark.net 
writes:

<< Agree, however, that all plants benefit from deep digging - well, at
 least in clay soil,  >>

I'm sure of that too, Marge.  I can't speak for all plants, but daffodils are 
the ones I dig up and examine the most.  Our Ohio clay soils can easily 
become impenetrable and I notice when I dig daffodil bulbs that they all tend 
to sit right on the hard pan with very tiny, short roots.  I'm sure other 
plants must also find it difficult to get deep root growth.  Then when we 
have summner drought, as we have here in SW Ohio the past three years, the 
shallow-rooted plants really suffer.  

This observation has spurred me to start double-digging, at least, when I 
make a new bed or remake an old one.  Last year, I dug out a section two feet 
deep and with the sand/leaf compost/mushroom compost mix I added I now have a 
bed raised about 15".  

I've also learned from experience that all these nice organic additives do 
not stay in the soil long.  I had a lovely bed once and didn't keep adding to 
it and now it's as if I hadn't improved it at all.  Funny how these lessons 
learned through experience "take" better than the ones read in books.
Bill Lee

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