Browse Forums Landscape & Garden Design 1 Jan 02, 2011 10:37 am Hello to you all out there. I'm located in Western Sydney (Woodcroft) and had layed Palmetto approx 8 weeks ago. All was looking fine until yesterday afternoon. I think yesterdays heat may have exposed a problem with my soil (soil preparation or lack of), I wish I had discovered Fu's post earlier. Most parts of my lawn are lush and green whilst other parts are dry and crunchy (sorry, only way I can describe it) and looking like it's dying. I have been watering weekly. I purshased a lawn aerator from bunnings this morning and i'm lucky if I can get the spikes deeper than 10mm (in dry bits). Was shocked to notice that the soil was bone dry even with all the watering. Can anyone suggest how to improve my soil? I really have no idea what to do to get the ball rooling in the right direction, especially with the turf already layed. I've purchased my Seasol and powerfeed but don't know if it will be a waste of time and money if i use them now or should I get the soil issues sorted first. Any assistance/advice is greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance and a happy & safe 2011 to you all. Re: Hard compacted soil 2Jan 02, 2011 12:26 pm I have the same problem in a few areas where the rotary hoe didn't rip it up properly. What i did was to use a sprinkler and very slowly apply water to soften the hard areas. I then jammed a garden fork in and it went in a lot further than before and opened up some holes. I then applied a wetting agent/seasol/powerfeed and plenty of h20. Since you have a corer you could fill the core holes with compost and to aid in breaking up the clay. Hard compacted soil 3Jan 02, 2011 5:00 pm In addition to BKs excellent advice I'd look to using compost teas and molasses diluted in water. Re: Hard compacted soil 4Jan 04, 2011 10:25 am Thanks guys Have taken your advice and what great advice it was. The rain over the past few days have made a world of difference. Aerator went in like a dream.... holes everywhere. I was out there last night applying the Seasol and Powerfeed. Boy does that powerfeed stink, obviously great stuff. Will sit back and see what difference this makes. Once again thanks for the great advice. Re: Hard compacted soil 5Jan 04, 2011 11:08 am Get a wetting agent in there if you can too. It will make better use of the water that penetrates into the soil which will get the quickest green up. Re: Hard compacted soil 6Jan 04, 2011 11:20 am Thanks again. Any suggestions as to which would be best (liquid/granular) for use on a lawn. As you can probably tell i've a bit of a brown thumb. Slowly getting greener with the help of the homeone forum. Re: Hard compacted soil 7Jan 04, 2011 11:56 am Fu the moderator recommends saturaid by debco (grandular & liquid). Have a search on the forum for more recommendations. Just recently i used a liquid agent by brunnings that i had ****** about to improve a few problem areas in my lawn as mentioned. IMO i reckon liquid agent might be the quickest fix for compacted clay. Re: Hard compacted soil 8Jan 05, 2011 2:57 am I beg to differ on that. Keep an eye out for more. UWA is about to start trials on the effectiveness of wetting agents just as they did mulches and you can expect some dramatic results again. I'm pretty confident Saturaid will be the best performer before they delve into soil amendments like zeolite and bentonite clay. Add zeolite to the soil also. This prevents or at least slows nutrient leaching in times of higher rainfall. Molasses will be very important for getting your soil to where you want it to be at. Seasol and powerfeed, even often, will do very little. However when they are used in conjunction with molasses and compost teas regularly you get very good results. Add dolomite of lime as well. Certified organic composts are extremely important too. Gypsum makes you feel better but dolomite will do a better job regardless of what books say at this point. Re: Hard compacted soil 9Jan 05, 2011 8:29 am When I said quickest fix/green up I meant as in getting water into the soil asap, long term is a different ball game all together. Re: Hard compacted soil 11Jan 05, 2011 10:27 am Thanks for the updates. I've located a produce shop that sells Molasses in Leppington and will be purchasing this weekend. I'm assuming I should treat the soil with the wetting agent first then apply the Molasses? Is that right? Thanks again. Hard compacted soil 12Jan 05, 2011 12:23 pm Yeah you can do that. If laying turf immediately after, I would not use the wetting agent. With a few weeks up your sleeve you'll be fine Re: Hard compacted soil 14Jan 24, 2011 12:32 pm Hello Fu, BK Just wanted to personally thank you both for your advice regarding my soil and turf issues. I've followed your advice and am happy to say that the lawn has improved much quicker than I anticipated. I've aerated, used the Seasol/powerfeed combination, molasses/water combo has been watered in as has the Saturaid granular. I've purchased a worm farm and have applied my first dose of the diluted worm tea. I've only had the farm for 2 weeks and they've already produced 500mls of pure worm wee. My girls (5 & 2) are having a blast feeding & watching the worms work and collecting the worm wee. My next question is how frequent should I be repeating the above applications. The brown patches in my lawn are so much smaller and the good majority of lawn is so green and lush. So much greener than the neighbours (love the friendly neighbour competition between our new lawns). A walker stopped by whist I was applying the second feed of molasses. He was impressed with the lawn colour and asked for my advice. Can you believe it. Asking me with my brown thumb for advice. Was also reading in the forum on the effective use of Seamungus Green and Sudden Impact for Lawn. What's the difference and any suggestion as to which would be better to use and how often. I think my next step will be to order some organic top soil and rake it over the top. i've 150 square of turf and not sure how much top soil to order. Once again, any suggestions? Thanks again to you both. Im so proud of the look of my lawn. I'll post pictures once I figure out how. Jatts74 Re: Hard compacted soil 15Jan 24, 2011 1:10 pm Mate great to hear. BK and I do spend a great amount of time and effort to make sure you get the best advice from a non-commercial unbiased perspective. To have folks stop and ask you is really what it is all about. I don't own the info I offer here. It is free and to be shared for a far greater good Now you can go and teach those around you about it all. Keep reading here and the rest of the garden is going to flourish! You are now in the business of feeding the organisms in the soil, not directly feeding the plant processed minerals. Have a squiz in the forum feed back section to find out how to post photos fast and easy 2-3m3 of compost for an area that size will do wonders. If you do that every few years, after doing only a few times, you'll never really need to again. Soon you will be able to do away with the catcher and just let the clippings decompose back into the soil. This is very sustainable and has the perfect nutrient balance for the lawn because it was the lawn This method isn't so successful when using common lawn care methods of lawn beetle killers, fungicides, heavy impacting high nitrogen fertilisers as they all combine to harm the organisms that will do those wonderful things you are seeing Re: Hard compacted soil 16Jan 24, 2011 3:45 pm Thanks Fu. Last question (for today) I swear. What are your thoughts about the Seamungus Green v's the Sudden Impact for Lawns. Are they essentially the same? Is one better than the other? Bugger! That was 3 questions. Is it advisable to use even though the turf has started to come good? Double bugger! That was one more. Thanks again Fu. Hard compacted soil 17Jan 24, 2011 11:34 pm No they are different and even nutrog themselves don't seem to get what it is, this thing about feeding the soil. Lawns should never be suddenly impacted by anything the Green crumble will do a far better job but it isn't about using just that. It's what happens when an entire new way of caring for your garden and lawn is applied. Ignore the old and embrace the new. combined with organic composts (instead of traditional top soils and dresses) molasses, compost teas. It is a lovely thing you'll get success where others won't. Hard compacted soil 18Jan 24, 2011 11:53 pm Sudden impact for lawns is probably better suited to commercial turf management. Re: Hard compacted soil 19Jan 25, 2011 4:50 pm Fu - is dolomite of lime the same as agricultural lime? After 4 years - we're in! 5 7317 Thanks for your reply. I will just wait and see I guess. Trying to get some more information from our builder. 9 11742 I am not sure whether Perth has its own way of doing things in regards to this. Most of Perth has class A (sandy soil), except for some areas near rivers or hills. 2 8284 |