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Joliet, IL

my soil has a higher clay content and this was the best
method i figured to loosen it up deeper than the 10" my
tiller reaches.

starting at one end, i laid 2-3'wide x 8' long boards four
feet behind from where i was digging. i then dug a 4'x 8' by
1 spade length deep section, placing the removed soil on
top of the neighboring boards. i then used a potato fork
(like a thickened straight pitch fork) and pushed it all
the way into the underlying layer of soil rocking back and
forth, loosing soil, then pushing the handle down, lifting
the loosened soil up. do this over the entire underlying
soil section until nice and loose.

then take the soil on the boards and shovel it back into
the area you worked. the boards make it easier to do this.
you have a hard surface that makes it easy to chop up dirt
chunks with a flat end shovel. and you can snow
plow it back into the hole. much easier on the back.
if you put too much soil in one pile on the
boards, just chop it up and spread it out some before
pushing it back in. then keep working backwards with out
stepping on your completed sections.

it is a lot of work, but i found it was also good to see
the underlying soil composition of my patch. one area had a
lot of buryied flagstone at about 14" deep that i removed.
one area was tightly bound with tree roots that i removed.
also, areas that had higher clay content were treated with
gypsum and shredded leaves along with some better black
dirt from other areas of the garden.

i wish i had a horse and plow like don q., but if the
neighbors in my subdivison saw that, they might send me
to a different kind of farm...the funny farm.

10/26/2003 10:22:53 AM

New Brunswick

Our ground is rocky...very rocky. We piled plain old horse manure on top of unbroken soil. It is about two feet deep. Talk about some nice soil to grow pumpkins and squash in. Absoloutly no rocks, great drainage. I bet horse manure if you can get some, would help your clay problem. Horse manure isn't all that smelly either. Would get along nice with the neighbours. *grin* What is this "grpsum" you mention?

10/26/2003 5:03:36 PM