Hi - yes we are trying to replant the front lawn. We are paying a lot of money to water and have the grass cut, and it is so unhealthy. Circa 1980, my dad dug up all the sod, roto-tilled, and mixed in sand and redwood compost, then planted seed. No small feat since it is around 2,000 sq. ft. and he was 60 yrs. old! If we pay to have it done, they won't amend the soil and the estimate is $7,000. I hope we can do it ourselves!
I don't know much about lawns but as far as I know you need to poke holes in to the ground to alow air, water and nutrients to go to the roots of your grass. Also amend your lawn twice a year with little bit of compost. It should help in the long run. If you want I can send you a link of an RUclips video that I watched
I have terrible native clay soil. It’s difficult to dig into and bakes into a hard crust over Summer. I’ve been amending it by burying kitchen scraps and gypsum and now the soil in the areas I worked is crumbly and brown and teeming with fat worms. The combo of compost and gypsum really works well.
This is one of the most helpful videos I have come across in starting my garden and talking about clay soil. Thank you for spending your time making it. Keep going!
Finally!! An informative video on what I can do with my clay soil that actually shows what will happen with these different amendments which I was considering but had no clue which would be best. My plants were dying before and now I know what I need to do. Thank you so much!!
@@aongv I had such horrible dirt in my front and back yards, that I finally decided to call in a professional landscape company. At this point I was done with it! I basically gave the landscaper the instructions "Do what you have to do to make this soil work with plants so they don't shrivel and die" lol So they rototilled the dirt and amended it and planted flowers and bushes. Also drip line irrigation. So far so good. It's been a few years. Some plants still didn't make it this year because where I live this summer got extremely hot temperatures for many days in a row. I had put some flaxes in myself and they just couldn't take all of that heat.
Thank you from London for a very informative film. Over here we have heavy clay and I have worked on my soil for 32 years using horse manure. A couple of observations: it would be interesting to distinguish between different types of sand. Sharp sand behaves differently to fine sand. My own findings are that the amount of sharp sand that would need to be added would be so large as to be impractical. I would add that using compost or manure is great but after digging in use it as a mulch. Mulching protects the structure of the clay from the rain and slowly feeds the soil via worms. A fabulous video. Thank you.
Thanks for the feedback. I have in plan to do a similar test on sandy soil so probably will make again a test on different sand particles with clay to see if there is any difference. Yes compost as a mulch will do just fine. Will protect the clay from drying out and becoming hard like a rock.
You have answered SO MANY questions! Also, using old manure to the soil for plants has worked fantastic along with the compost! Thank you for an EXCELLENT video!
Excellent video! My compliments on your test methods. My experience is that composting every blade of grass, leaves, weeds, windfall apples, kitchen scraps and chipped branches has vastly improved the quality of my garden soil compared to the areas that are still original clay. However, it took 30 years and a lot of work. A small wood chipper is highly recommended.
I would have said the same thing that's been concluded in this video. I have tried sand, gypsum, and a combo of gypsum and compost. I'd say a combo of gypsum and compost seems to be the best fix for Clay soil.
Just to share what worked for me. I have 20 by 40 feet area. Clay, compaction and no drenage. Rented an auger with 8inch bid about 2 feet long. Drilled lots of holes. Filled the holes with leaves. Than made the beds. Every year give it a little compost and coffee grounds. Working great.
I add a little sand and a bag of compost and a bag of garden soil together in my garden cart, it is the best combination for my garden. I use it when planting or transplanting and all of my flowers are doing well. I even mix it into my clay soil. I do not grow vegetables so I cannot comment on that but my dahlias and roses love a little sand mixed in.
Now this is the way to demonstrate a soil test that is easy for anyone to understand. Our soil here in Texas is almost all clay, so this video was very helpful. Well done!
Solving my clay soil problem was a pain in the butt and involved a lot of digging up dirt and removing thousands of rock....a senior citizen gave me a huge garden style bathtub just to haul it away after her remodel so I use that as my soil mixing platform. I cut the soil with sand a bit of peat moss a cup of ashes and add a lot of compost and a lot of rich black crumbly dirt that used to be rabbit manure about 12 years ago....im in growing zone 7a in TN and I had a geologist tell me that about 760 000 years ago all of my area was once ocean floor....i believe it because when we went to install our septic system we hit sandstone after we dug down about 30 inches and barely got the tank into the ground...
I mixed peat, perlite, sand, and Miracle Grow garden soil to my very-clay patch for flowers. Cultivated that in. Don't know how things will grow, but it actually looks like real soil instead of a horizontal adobe house wall.
Thank you for your hard work in preparing this video. Can I just say that there is another way to consider, and that is using small sized gravel mixed into the soil. It will stop the clay clumping and improve drainage. Unlike sand it won't consolidate into a cement like texture. It can be used in combination with compost and will still be there in coming years when the compost has rotted away.
It is an interesting point. The only thing I can see as a drawback is that small gravels are not fertile so you are loosing on that otherwise it could work but I would need to test it before confirm it.
You end up with super heavy soil that acts like concrete. The small rock doesn't seem to improve the situation at all. What does is lots of compost dug in and mulching way heavier than anyone normally recommends.
This video is exactly what I wanted to see as I was considering these soil amendment options. Thank you so much for saving me the time in conducting a similar experiment!
I used gypsum and compost in my backyard with good success. In the front I did use sand, manure,compost and peat moss. It worked really well. But areas that I had added fresh mulch every year for years is super rich and breaks up nicely.
Thank you for your kind words and helpful advice. I feel very comfortable about my soil conditions. I will definitely try and apply it in practical ways. Shafi. Houston. Texas.
Excellent work. Great to test all types in clay sand and explained very well. I am planning to add wood chips which has older than 6 months to convert my clay sand with the passage. I also ensure without wook sharp sticks should not be part of this mixture.
Heh, when planting seedlings, I dig up a hole in soil and add a few handfuls of compost or gardening soil. When seeding a row of plants, I dig a small ditch, put in seeds, then cover them with compost. This means I don't have to spread compost evenly, then till the soil and it seems to work. Interesting result about the sand. It seemed to make the soil drain faster, in my experience. When making holes in plastic, I set the metal rod on fire and when warm, it just slides in without force and creates a ring of plastic around the hole, strengthening it. With just hammering in a nail or something, plastic usually fractures.
Yes melting it can work but I prefer to not create any unnecessary gases that are formed when the plastic is burning. About the sand I will need to make a test with different sand types...
Perfect! I live in Taiwan and we have a lot of clay soil. Thankfully, I've been making compost for the last 3 years and I'm going to do what you have done. Appreciate the time you spent making this very informative video. Well done and all the best. New sub!
The soil not retaining moisture in the gypsum mixture is a good thing. It means the roots are drying and not rotting. Roots rot in clay soil because they are always wet. This just resulting in the death of 2 queen palms at my place. The jar soil test showed I have 100% clay soil.
Se here...the goal is to retain moisture and not water. Clay will retain water that is not good but compost will retain moisture and that is what we want :)
Very informative. Thank you for putting this video together showing us what these treatments do to clay soil. It's very clear now what I need to do to improve my very compacted clay soil.
Great video. My new home is built on a clay foundation making it impossible to landscape without using a soil amendment. Your video confirmed my suspension regarding using compost as the proper amendment.
The best video I found on this topic. Thank you for all the comparisons 🙏 and taking time to show all the results after watering and the drying process. I live in North Carolina, the soil here is clay ...hard clay and so difficult to work with. Thank you again for making this video.
Very great video, glad too that I seem to have got it right! I've been using a little gypsum and a lot of organic matter and my garden is growing well so far and I think will only improve over time. Thanks so much for taking the time and effort to show the results.
A perfect information sir iwas dealing with this clay soil problem and was looking for the information on this topic And i found the perfect solution for it thank you sir ,you made so much of effort to explain which really made me watch the full video and it was worth watching.
Thank you so much! We have been putting buckets of compost into our garden for years, but it is still rock hard. We’ll try gypsum and keep adding the compost.
God bless you. I also have clay soil so your experiments are well timed for me as I am doubling my garden this year. Your experiments are inspiring and informative. Cheers from Canada
Thanks for applying the scientific method to a contentious issue. While adding compost is clearly the best, I'm left wondering what'll happen when that compost breaks down. Will the soil revert back to clay? My hope is that, once improved, plant roots, worms and top dressing with soil and compost will keep the soil healthy permanently.
Sand does help drainage in clay but you need to add way more than you did, most sand is around 30% air. So you need to add enough sand to make the total mixture less than 30% clay. It depends how much clay is in your native soil.
Good explanation. Now I would like to see one using pumice/lava rock. Everything I’ve tried in my clay turns to brick balls. At the rate I’m going I won’t be planting until the next century. Thank you
@@SmallGardenQuest Both, I have fruit trees in the perimeter of the back yard & all lawn in the front. The backyard is the worst, the ground cracks in the summer like desert soil.
Thank you so much for doing this study. I live in Las Vegas Nevada, I have non-typical Las Vegas yard-meaning-they are lush and green! And you are correct, I have found that mixing compost and Gipson with the current soil I have great success! I moved here from Huntington Beach California soooo Lol it took me a while (and plenty of dead plants) to figure this out.
Thank you for thinking of this way to show the differences between the three different amendments. What a clever way to show the drainage and soil quality over time. I would have thought sand would totally be the answer, but I was wrong. Many thanks!
Great video. I love how the answer is ALWAYS "add more compost". Soil to dry? Add more compost. Soil to wet? add more compost. Too much clay? Compost. Too much sand? Compost.
Excellent! Im in the middle of planting a succulent garden. Unfortunately I live in Zone 10B where my garden gets plenty of hot sun and my soil turns into clay soil so quickly :( succulents thrive in airy soil so id love to fix mine and found your video super helpful!! off to create my own compost!
Prepare beds right over the hard clay. 1st layer either free cardboard (remove any tape staples etc...) or 3 sheets of brown construction paper from Depot. 2nd layer about 2 inches of wood mulch. 3rd layer optional 1 inch straw. Final layer 2 to 3 inches compost. Happy planting.
@@SmallGardenQuest , I love your video because you are striving to really understand how the dirt behaves, and how adding different things changes it. I will be trying lasagna gardening this year - never heard it called that way! First time I heard of it was almost a decade ago when my Aunt used it called "sheet mulch" and entire back yard in urban area. She got phenomenal results. It became like a lush wild prairie with garden rows wherever she and my uncle put them.
Thank you for taking to perform these experiments and to prepare this video. I had been told to add sand to my clay soil but I see that that advice was mistaken.
Which compose company did you use or it doesn't matter. My friend told me that I can have some of his cow manure. So I will be picking that up this week. I finally got all of the rise beds for my rise bed garden last week and yesterday I dig about a 6-10 inch trench in the bottom of 3 of the 7 beds. I'm hoping to assemble the rise this week and filled the trenches with tree branches. next I'm going to add some wood chips. The 3rd layer will be cow manure. I have to put this layer under the soil so as not to stink up the neighborhood being that I live in the city. The 4th layer will be a mix of my clay soil and compost that we get free from our local compost center plus I have been purchasing some bags of Black Kow and other bags of everything under the sun. I am going to add some sand as I plan on putting a worm tower in each of the beds and they need the sand for their diguesting systen to produce good worm casting. Then the icing on the cake will be my rabbit manure and straw to cover the bed for the winter. I'm hoping this plan works and this coming spring 2020 I can have a good crop
You can do it as you told. It will be fine. Which compost it doesn't matter. You can also simplify by just adding compost clay soil and cow manure well mixed and use the wood-chips for the mulch layer. I think this would be better. You can watch my video on 5 benefits of mulching.
I live in Georgia- so much red clay- I had a pretty big garden last year in which I added some black garden soul and quite a bit of sand. Some veggies did excellent like egg plant. Tomatoes sis not so well. Pumpkins only did ok. I dealt with mildew and worms on the tomatoes. I think I will try adding compost/ gypsum this year to the mix.
I watched another video on this earlier and I remember the guy said don't add gypsum, but I don't remember WHY NOT. Last year a guy in a video said he grew tomatoes in containers that were half clay, half grass clippings, but I don't know if he meant by weight or volume. I mixed up a bucket anyway, I figured in two weeks it should be ready. Also, when I moved into this house a neighbor told me the previous owner had dumped truckloads of sand trying to improve the "wetland marsh" backyard but it didn't help. As I dig I do find big chunks of concrete down under the ground. Not sure what he tried to do, pave the mud, or what. An old man said he would dig a trench across my yard and put in a French drain for 3500 bucks but I dug a little trench myself and it filled up with water. Going to throw branches and garden waste in the ditch when the summer sun dries the water up. Might do hugel culture on top.
What an excellent video!! You have been so thorough. Thank you for your laborious efforts. I'm about to prepare a wide garden bed for the planting of a hedge. I will buy MUCH more compost. Thank you again. 🦘
I needed this information now as I’m tired after digging sweet potatoes from a bed of garden soil that has more clay then another bed that I used bagged potting soil similar to mel’s mix. I’m going to do the compost and some peat moss to improve the alkaline ph. Plus my compost is limited.
Great work testing these different soil mixtures, only thing is that you didn’t use mulch on top of these soils which would make all the difference. Soil exposed to bare sun will make that hard rock
@@SmallGardenQuest It was more than helpful. It was an organized scientific experiment. Refreshing for me as a viewer. Also, a high value content, you spared me and I'm sure others like me, a "tone " of broken bones :D and many more broken shovels.
Thank you. I was considering adding sand because it seemed the logical thing to do. After watching this, glad I didn't. I can see the benefits of using compost instead. (In SE England we live on a layer of solid clay that must go to the centre of the earth.)
@@SmallGardenQuest yes. I have very heavy red clay and the East side of my house stays wet. I will amend with compost and add plants that love water. Thanks!
Thank you for your test. Should I dig up the whole yard and mix the clay soil with compost then? I can't dig very deep though. Probably just the first 3 inches?
@@SmallGardenQuest I've been doing research on putting mulch over septic drain fields and lots of resources say it is not a good idea. I guess it really depends on the soil type and if it is clay soil which is already terrible for drain fields, then mulch will make it better. Do you think that's the correct assumption?
If you have drainage problems I would mix the compost with your clay soil. I think adding compost as mulch will solve the problem in the long run but to do it faster you need to mix it in
@@SmallGardenQuest Thank you! The backyard, especially the septic drain field is quite soggy whenever it rains. There is no standing water but when I step onto the soil, it feels like a spongy and water appears. I searched online and people all say putting mulch onto the septic drain field is bad because it blocks air and retains water, but I really feel like that depends on what soil is currently on the drain field. For clay soil, it is already so bad for the septic drain fields that adding mulch should help, right?
How do you amend your soil?
Go to Greg’s video on his RUclips channel Some Room To Grow! Link: ruclips.net/video/RO14owgBgkE/видео.html
Hi - yes we are trying to replant the front lawn. We are paying a lot of money to water and have the grass cut, and it is so unhealthy. Circa 1980, my dad dug up all the sod, roto-tilled, and mixed in sand and redwood compost, then planted seed. No small feat since it is around 2,000 sq. ft. and he was 60 yrs. old! If we pay to have it done, they won't amend the soil and the estimate is $7,000. I hope we can do it ourselves!
I don't know much about lawns but as far as I know you need to poke holes in to the ground to alow air, water and nutrients to go to the roots of your grass. Also amend your lawn twice a year with little bit of compost. It should help in the long run. If you want I can send you a link of an RUclips video that I watched
The best video I have seen on this subject.
Thank you! You don't know how much it means to me to know that I can help. Wish you a marry Christmas and a happy new year!
Really helpful and scientific study. Thank you so much. You've really helped me and saved a lot of time and effort x
yeah...you right...better use text on video,.. :)
Ditto... The best YT video on this subject, by far...
I have terrible native clay soil. It’s difficult to dig into and bakes into a hard crust over Summer. I’ve been amending it by burying kitchen scraps and gypsum and now the soil in the areas I worked is crumbly and brown and teeming with fat worms. The combo of compost and gypsum really works well.
Yes it is a great combo :)
I've been looking at clay improvement videos for a couple days and this is by far the best one I've seen. Great info, excellent job!
Thank you :) I appreciate the comment. If you have any other tests in mind about gardening that I could do just ask :)
Yeah this guy shown actual reaults
This is one of the most helpful videos I have come across in starting my garden and talking about clay soil. Thank you for spending your time making it. Keep going!
Thank you for stopping by and commenting. If you have anything ales you would like to know just let me know and maybe I will do another video 😉
Excellent job with the tests! I appreciate that you took the time to thoroughly test all three amendments. Very helpful info!
Finally!! An informative video on what I can do with my clay soil that actually shows what will happen with these different amendments which I was considering but had no clue which would be best.
My plants were dying before and now I know what I need to do.
Thank you so much!!
Great I am very happy I could help someone!
Did it help?
@@aongv I had such horrible dirt in my front and back yards, that I finally decided to call in a professional landscape company.
At this point I was done with it! I basically gave the landscaper the instructions "Do what you have to do to make this soil work with plants so they don't shrivel and die" lol
So they rototilled the dirt and amended it and planted flowers and bushes. Also drip line irrigation.
So far so good. It's been a few years. Some plants still didn't make it this year because where I live this summer got extremely hot temperatures for many days in a row.
I had put some flaxes in myself and they just couldn't take all of that heat.
@@dcool2u2 Wow, thank you so much for the response. Good luck!
Thank you from London for a very informative film. Over here we have heavy clay and I have worked on my soil for 32 years using horse manure. A couple of observations: it would be interesting to distinguish between different types of sand. Sharp sand behaves differently to fine sand. My own findings are that the amount of sharp sand that would need to be added would be so large as to be impractical. I would add that using compost or manure is great but after digging in use it as a mulch. Mulching protects the structure of the clay from the rain and slowly feeds the soil via worms. A fabulous video. Thank you.
Thanks for the feedback. I have in plan to do a similar test on sandy soil so probably will make again a test on different sand particles with clay to see if there is any difference.
Yes compost as a mulch will do just fine. Will protect the clay from drying out and becoming hard like a rock.
This is a really underrated RUclips video! Great video, man!
Thank you Emiliano! Have a great 2020!
You have answered SO MANY questions! Also, using old manure to the soil for plants has worked fantastic along with the compost! Thank you for an EXCELLENT video!
Glad it was helpful!
Excellent video! My compliments on your test methods. My experience is that composting every blade of grass, leaves, weeds, windfall apples, kitchen scraps and chipped branches has vastly improved the quality of my garden soil compared to the areas that are still original clay.
However, it took 30 years and a lot of work. A small wood chipper is highly recommended.
Great point! Yes composting is a must and it needs to be done as soon as possible :) Nothing in gardening is immediate.
Thanks for the compliment :)
I would have said the same thing that's been concluded in this video. I have tried sand, gypsum, and a combo of gypsum and compost. I'd say a combo of gypsum and compost seems to be the best fix for Clay soil.
Just saw this video and was literally going to the big box store to buy some sand to mix with my clay! You saved me some money today, thank you!
Glad I could help!
Just to share what worked for me. I have 20 by 40 feet area. Clay, compaction and no drenage. Rented an auger with 8inch bid about 2 feet long. Drilled lots of holes. Filled the holes with leaves. Than made the beds. Every year give it a little compost and coffee grounds. Working great.
Thanks for sharing your experience!
Just bought a house in Georgia. Great piece of land but it’s all red clay soil. So excited to watch this!
I hope you will amend your red clay with some compost and grow whatever you feel like it :D
Brother this is no doubt the best video out there!!!! Helped me wonders, thank you!😎😎
This is science! Finally a good video where all the information about soil around the internet makes sense!
I add a little sand and a bag of compost and a bag of garden soil together in my garden cart, it is the best combination for my garden. I use it when planting or transplanting and all of my flowers are doing well. I even mix it into my clay soil. I do not grow vegetables so I cannot comment on that but my dahlias and roses love a little sand mixed in.
Now this is the way to demonstrate a soil test that is easy for anyone to understand. Our soil here in Texas is almost all clay, so this video was very helpful. Well done!
Thank you! Apriciate the comment 😊
Solving my clay soil problem was a pain in the butt and involved a lot of digging up dirt and removing thousands of rock....a senior citizen gave me a huge garden style bathtub just to haul it away after her remodel so I use that as my soil mixing platform. I cut the soil with sand a bit of peat moss a cup of ashes and add a lot of compost and a lot of rich black crumbly dirt that used to be rabbit manure about 12 years ago....im in growing zone 7a in TN and I had a geologist tell me that about 760 000 years ago all of my area was once ocean floor....i believe it because when we went to install our septic system we hit sandstone after we dug down about 30 inches and barely got the tank into the ground...
Don't dig to deep or you will find a fish fossil :D
Now this is what I like to see, a great test with a control data. Thanks for making this.
Glad you liked it!
Wow! This was so informative. Thank you for all your work and all the time you put into this video! I appreciate you! And so does my garden!
I mixed peat, perlite, sand, and Miracle Grow garden soil to my very-clay patch for flowers. Cultivated that in. Don't know how things will grow, but it actually looks like real soil instead of a horizontal adobe house wall.
You practically made a new soil mix that is similar to mel's mix. Great!
To see the demo speaks volumes. Thanks - you cannot argue with proof!!!
Thank you this was very helpful, I plan to add some compost and some mulch (pine woodchips) to my heavy clay soil.
Thank you for your hard work in preparing this video. Can I just say that there is another way to consider, and that is using small sized gravel mixed into the soil. It will stop the clay clumping and improve drainage. Unlike sand it won't consolidate into a cement like texture. It can be used in combination with compost and will still be there in coming years when the compost has rotted away.
It is an interesting point. The only thing I can see as a drawback is that small gravels are not fertile so you are loosing on that otherwise it could work but I would need to test it before confirm it.
You end up with super heavy soil that acts like concrete. The small rock doesn't seem to improve the situation at all. What does is lots of compost dug in and mulching way heavier than anyone normally recommends.
A proper balanced experiment clearly showing us viewers the results. That took time and was very interesting. Thank you.
Glad you enjoyed it!
This is the best video I ever seen from a genuine gardener ....
Thanks! Easily the best and most thoroughly tested, hands on results
For many years I have used 1/3,clay, 1/3 organic compost and 1/3 sand. It works great and root crops love sand
This is the best video I found to help me with improving my clay soil. Thank you so much for all that effort. This video is just great!
Your video is the best results and fixed my problem . Thanks
Great to hear!
This video is exactly what I wanted to see as I was considering these soil amendment options. Thank you so much for saving me the time in conducting a similar experiment!
Your welcome that was my goal! Wish you all the best in amending your soil and please report back with a feedback so I know how it worked for you 😉
Thank you for your video! This is perfect! I live in NE Dallas and have black sticky clay! Compost in progress.
Go for it. Compost saved my life :)
I used gypsum and compost in my backyard with good success. In the front I did use sand, manure,compost and peat moss. It worked really well. But areas that I had added fresh mulch every year for years is super rich and breaks up nicely.
Thank you for your kind words and helpful advice. I feel very comfortable about my soil conditions. I will definitely try and apply it in practical ways. Shafi. Houston. Texas.
Thank-you. This video is helpful to me as we decide what to do next for the garden. Thank-you again. May God please Bless your kindness!
Glad it was helpful! And I wish I could help you in the future :)
Excellent work. Great to test all types in clay sand and explained very well. I am planning to add wood chips which has older than 6 months to convert my clay sand with the passage. I also ensure without wook sharp sticks should not be part of this mixture.
Wow that was one of the best videos for learning I have ever seen. Fantastic results... thank you for posting.
Heh, when planting seedlings, I dig up a hole in soil and add a few handfuls of compost or gardening soil. When seeding a row of plants, I dig a small ditch, put in seeds, then cover them with compost. This means I don't have to spread compost evenly, then till the soil and it seems to work.
Interesting result about the sand. It seemed to make the soil drain faster, in my experience.
When making holes in plastic, I set the metal rod on fire and when warm, it just slides in without force and creates a ring of plastic around the hole, strengthening it. With just hammering in a nail or something, plastic usually fractures.
Yes melting it can work but I prefer to not create any unnecessary gases that are formed when the plastic is burning.
About the sand I will need to make a test with different sand types...
Perfect! I live in Taiwan and we have a lot of clay soil. Thankfully, I've been making compost for the last 3 years and I'm going to do what you have done.
Appreciate the time you spent making this very informative video.
Well done and all the best. New sub!
Welcome and thank you. I'll do my best to put more tests out. I have one in mind 😁 and yes compost is the best especially if you make it yourself.
The soil not retaining moisture in the gypsum mixture is a good thing. It means the roots are drying and not rotting. Roots rot in clay soil because they are always wet. This just resulting in the death of 2 queen palms at my place. The jar soil test showed I have 100% clay soil.
Se here...the goal is to retain moisture and not water. Clay will retain water that is not good but compost will retain moisture and that is what we want :)
very useful info....the best experient about clay soil, nothing else need to research, thanks for the great work. 👍
Glad it was helpful!
You have demonstrated the comparison on different mix soil. Very informative. To see is to believe. Thank you
Very informative. Thank you for putting this video together showing us what these treatments do to clay soil. It's very clear now what I need to do to improve my very compacted clay soil.
Great to hear that. I am always happy when I hear that I was able to help somebody!
Great video. My new home is built on a clay foundation making it impossible to landscape without using a soil amendment. Your video confirmed my suspension regarding using compost as the proper amendment.
The best video I found on this topic. Thank you for all the comparisons 🙏 and taking time to show all the results after watering and the drying process. I live in North Carolina, the soil here is clay ...hard clay and so difficult to work with. Thank you again for making this video.
Glad you enjoyed it! The whole point of the video was to show and help everyone that has the same problem as me... clay soil :(
Very great video, glad too that I seem to have got it right! I've been using a little gypsum and a lot of organic matter and my garden is growing well so far and I think will only improve over time. Thanks so much for taking the time and effort to show the results.
Good stuff! Thanks for sharing your experience :)
A perfect information sir iwas dealing with this clay soil problem and was looking for the information on this topic
And i found the perfect solution for it thank you sir ,you made so much of effort to explain which really made me watch the full video and it was worth watching.
Love to hear I could help!
Thank you so much! We have been putting buckets of compost into our garden for years, but it is still rock hard. We’ll try gypsum and keep adding the compost.
Great comparison. Always like to see a test driven approach to prove a point.
That is my goal to share applicable knowledge that came from reliable tests :)
Totally agree with previous comments... the best and most informative video I’ve seen on clay soil.
Wow, thanks! I am glad I can help so many of you!
This is the most clear, best video on this subject. Thank you so much.
Glad it was helpful! I am planning on doing an update to this test. I will need to test all the recommendations I got from the comments :)
God bless you. I also have clay soil so your experiments are well timed for me as I am doubling my garden this year. Your experiments are inspiring and informative. Cheers from Canada
Wonderful! Best of luck in your extension :) What you will grow on it?
Very good!!!! Thank you so much!!! I can see that I started doing the right thing in my garden!!!😃😄🙌🏽
Wonderful!
This Video was the best guide I've found on this topic. Thank you!
Thanks for applying the scientific method to a contentious issue. While adding compost is clearly the best, I'm left wondering what'll happen when that compost breaks down. Will the soil revert back to clay? My hope is that, once improved, plant roots, worms and top dressing with soil and compost will keep the soil healthy permanently.
Great video.. it helped me decide what I’ll do for my clay..
Glad I could help :)
I was searching for this information for long time. I will dedenetly get the compost for my clay soil lawn garden. Thank you very much!😊
You are most welcome!
Excellent video, extremely helpful!! So glad I found your channel!!
Sand does help drainage in clay but you need to add way more than you did, most sand is around 30% air. So you need to add enough sand to make the total mixture less than 30% clay. It depends how much clay is in your native soil.
This information is priceless. Grateful for the rest of my gardening life )) Thank you for sharing!
Glad it was helpful!
Good explanation. Now I would like to see one using pumice/lava rock. Everything I’ve tried in my clay turns to brick balls. At the rate I’m going I won’t be planting until the next century. Thank you
Great suggestion! Will try to include it in the next test :)
Great video. Well produced and super informative! Thank you for your kind effort. 😎
Glad it was helpful!
Awesome video! I almost added sand to my clay soil in California. Thank you for keeping me from making that terrible mistake!
Glad to help! Luckily for you you watched my video in time :D Are taking care of your lawn or garden soil?
@@SmallGardenQuest Both, I have fruit trees in the perimeter of the back yard & all lawn in the front. The backyard is the worst, the ground cracks in the summer like desert soil.
Thank you so much for doing this study. I live in Las Vegas Nevada, I have non-typical Las Vegas yard-meaning-they are lush and green! And you are correct, I have found that mixing compost and Gipson with the current soil I have great success! I moved here from Huntington Beach California soooo Lol it took me a while (and plenty of dead plants) to figure this out.
Thank you for confirming what I found out!
Thank you for thinking of this way to show the differences between the three different amendments. What a clever way to show the drainage and soil quality over time. I would have thought sand would totally be the answer, but I was wrong. Many thanks!
Your welcome. I am glad I could help. Do you have a small garden or are you looking to improve your lawn?
@@SmallGardenQuest I added sand to my clay soil, I think it will suffer from compaction, I am not sure, but what do you think?
Great video. I love how the answer is ALWAYS "add more compost". Soil to dry? Add more compost. Soil to wet? add more compost. Too much clay? Compost. Too much sand? Compost.
Yes, exactly compost is the best amendment of them all! Do you make your own?
@@SmallGardenQuest Yes I do. 😊
Great! How big of a system you have?
Thank you for a great test! It clears up a lot of questions.
Thanks for the great testing. Very useful for all of us dealing with clay soil.
Great to hear that. This pays off all the hard work I made for the test 😊
Excellent! Im in the middle of planting a succulent garden. Unfortunately I live in Zone 10B where my garden gets plenty of hot sun and my soil turns into clay soil so quickly :( succulents thrive in airy soil so id love to fix mine and found your video super helpful!! off to create my own compost!
Great! Wish you best of luck!
Thanks very much sir.. Very very informative and would contribute for better humanity.
Prepare beds right over the hard clay. 1st layer either free cardboard (remove any tape staples etc...) or 3 sheets of brown construction paper from Depot. 2nd layer about 2 inches of wood mulch. 3rd layer optional 1 inch straw. Final layer 2 to 3 inches compost.
Happy planting.
I heard about lasagna gardening but never tried it. It is an option but you would amend clay soil you would avoid it completely :D
@@SmallGardenQuest , I love your video because you are striving to really understand how the dirt behaves, and how adding different things changes it. I will be trying lasagna gardening this year - never heard it called that way! First time I heard of it was almost a decade ago when my Aunt used it called "sheet mulch" and entire back yard in urban area. She got phenomenal results. It became like a lush wild prairie with garden rows wherever she and my uncle put them.
Thank you for taking to perform these experiments and to prepare this video.
I had been told to add sand to my clay soil but I see that that advice was mistaken.
Thank you for stopping by. Yes in my experience adding sand is not the best idea :) But now you know :)
This video was GREAT! I have clay soil as well and have been back and forth on what to do to improve it. Definitely going with compost now.
Glad it was helpful!
Which compose company did you use or it doesn't matter. My friend told me that I can have some of his cow manure. So I will be picking that up this week. I finally got all of the rise beds for my rise bed garden last week and yesterday I dig about a 6-10 inch trench in the bottom of 3 of the 7 beds. I'm hoping to assemble the rise this week and filled the trenches with tree branches. next I'm going to add some wood chips. The 3rd layer will be cow manure. I have to put this layer under the soil so as not to stink up the neighborhood being that I live in the city. The 4th layer will be a mix of my clay soil and compost that we get free from our local compost center plus I have been purchasing some bags of Black Kow and other bags of everything under the sun. I am going to add some sand as I plan on putting a worm tower in each of the beds and they need the sand for their diguesting systen to produce good worm casting. Then the icing on the cake will be my rabbit manure and straw to cover the bed for the winter. I'm hoping this plan works and this coming spring 2020 I can have a good crop
You can do it as you told. It will be fine. Which compost it doesn't matter. You can also simplify by just adding compost clay soil and cow manure well mixed and use the wood-chips for the mulch layer. I think this would be better. You can watch my video on 5 benefits of mulching.
I live in Georgia- so much red clay- I had a pretty big garden last year in which I added some black garden soul and quite a bit of sand. Some veggies did excellent like egg plant. Tomatoes sis not so well. Pumpkins only did ok. I dealt with mildew and worms on the tomatoes. I think I will try adding compost/ gypsum this year to the mix.
Yes go for it and let me know how it goes :)
Amazing video with excellent results of testing. I don’t see anyone has done such testing! Thank you.
Glad you liked it! Yes I didn't found it anywhere so I did it :)
Sir, thank you for this science. I can start composting to improve my soil. Great job🤗
Yes start composting as soon as possible and if you need some tips I have a great video about composting :) Thank you for stopping by and commenting!
I watched another video on this earlier and I remember the guy said don't add gypsum, but I don't remember WHY NOT. Last year a guy in a video said he grew tomatoes in containers that were half clay, half grass clippings, but I don't know if he meant by weight or volume. I mixed up a bucket anyway, I figured in two weeks it should be ready. Also, when I moved into this house a neighbor told me the previous owner had dumped truckloads of sand trying to improve the "wetland marsh" backyard but it didn't help. As I dig I do find big chunks of concrete down under the ground. Not sure what he tried to do, pave the mud, or what. An old man said he would dig a trench across my yard and put in a French drain for 3500 bucks but I dug a little trench myself and it filled up with water. Going to throw branches and garden waste in the ditch when the summer sun dries the water up. Might do hugel culture on top.
Yes do it :)
What an excellent video!! You have been so thorough. Thank you for your laborious efforts. I'm about to prepare a wide garden bed for the planting of a hedge. I will buy MUCH more compost. Thank you again. 🦘
Glad it was helpful!
I needed this information now as I’m tired after digging sweet potatoes from a bed of garden soil that has more clay then another bed that I used bagged potting soil similar to mel’s mix. I’m going to do the compost and some peat moss to improve the alkaline ph. Plus my compost is limited.
Great work testing these different soil mixtures, only thing is that you didn’t use mulch on top of these soils which would make all the difference. Soil exposed to bare sun will make that hard rock
I usually use mulch. I wanted to see what will amend the soil and didn't wanted to donate any additional help :)
Loved it! Thank you! My garden is entirely a huge hill of clay. I needed that.
Glad it was helpful!
@@SmallGardenQuest It was more than helpful. It was an organized scientific experiment. Refreshing for me as a viewer. Also, a high value content, you spared me and I'm sure others like me, a "tone " of broken bones :D and many more broken shovels.
Thank you for this informative, well done video!!!!
This is a very helpful video. Thank you for all the time you put into preparing it.
Any time! Glad you found it helpful.
Thank you. Very Scientific. I Love it. !!
Glad you enjoy it!
Are you going to try different combinations now? I am intrigued by how gypsum and compost would work together.
Maybe this year... who knows :)
THIS is how problems lead to solutions... great and helpful video. This should be standard protocol.
For me is standard protocol to test things :) This year I am testing the best way to fill raised beds :)
Thanks for preventing me from making a BIG mistake!.
I almost did it too 😁
Big thanks. That was very instructive.
You're welcome!
nothing like hard science to get an answer. thank you.
Science rocks!
Fantastic video and great information! Your methodology was impressive. I will put this info to use on my clay/glacieral soil!
Glad it was helpful! I did my best to provide the best content possible :)
Thank you. I was considering adding sand because it seemed the logical thing to do. After watching this, glad I didn't. I can see the benefits of using compost instead. (In SE England we live on a layer of solid clay that must go to the centre of the earth.)
Glad I could help!
I can imagine a clay layer like that :D
Best video on fixing clay soil (which we have a lot of in Los Angeles) wish me luck, I'm off to buy compost.
You can do it! Best of luck!
Thank you for all the careful work you did. This is very helpful.
I am glad I could help :) Hope you learn something new today :)
@@SmallGardenQuest yes. I have very heavy red clay and the East side of my house stays wet. I will amend with compost and add plants that love water. Thanks!
Great video. Very clear and informative. I'll be digging the contents of my compost bins into the veggie beds this autumn. Thanks, SGQ
Your video is a science very good experiment no doubt about it. thank you for your time to make this video.
Thank you for such a wonderful comment! Wish you all the best!
Thank you for your test. Should I dig up the whole yard and mix the clay soil with compost then? I can't dig very deep though. Probably just the first 3 inches?
Mix 3 inch of clay with 3 inches of compost. 6 inches is all you need 😊
@@SmallGardenQuest I've been doing research on putting mulch over septic drain fields and lots of resources say it is not a good idea. I guess it really depends on the soil type and if it is clay soil which is already terrible for drain fields, then mulch will make it better. Do you think that's the correct assumption?
If you have drainage problems I would mix the compost with your clay soil. I think adding compost as mulch will solve the problem in the long run but to do it faster you need to mix it in
@@SmallGardenQuest Thank you! The backyard, especially the septic drain field is quite soggy whenever it rains. There is no standing water but when I step onto the soil, it feels like a spongy and water appears. I searched online and people all say putting mulch onto the septic drain field is bad because it blocks air and retains water, but I really feel like that depends on what soil is currently on the drain field. For clay soil, it is already so bad for the septic drain fields that adding mulch should help, right?
Wow this video is genius ❤ thanks neighbor