We have an Amish colony near our town, they are terrific neighbors, very direct and happy to chat. Just the other day, 70 of them helped move a (non-Amish) neighbor’s house away from the riverbank where it is threatened by floods. It looked like the house had grown legs like a millipede- they were all inside it! Just picked it up with manpower and moved it.
There is a channel called Amish America that talks about the amish and he has a video that covers that. It just came out in the last day or two if anyone is interested in watching it.❤😊
My grandpa used to work for the Brooklyn botanic gardens in the 70s and this is one of the many things he taught me before he passed. I was only 12 when he was gone but it’s so interesting because now that I’m starting to become an empty Nester, I am really getting into gardening and remembering everything.🥰
@@farmersdaughter1000 oh my goodness, probably so many random things I could tell you. If there’s anything specific that you grow, let me know and I’ll see if he said anything. I did start a RUclips channel which I am really gonna be focusing on gardening with so maybe follow along because I do mention him in my videos which are mostly just on TikTok at the moment. Here’s one thing he did that I haven’t tried, after the spring bulbs flowered, like tulips, hyacinth, and daffodils, he dug them up and stored them in a paper bag in our garage and then replant them in the fall. I wish I could ask him whybut we ended up with the most gorgeous flowers every spring. Oh, and he used crushed dried leaves in the bottom of the holes when he planted the bulbs, but not oak leaves… Never leaves.
@@oliviastar3812 yes actually… He used to cut up banana peels and scatter them around the base of some leafy greens but also before he planted them, he did try to crumpled up some dried leaves even dead leaves from other plants and put them in the hole first. And when your green veggies start to die… Let them die in place so that they break down and go back into that soil.
If you want to get a rough idea of whether your soil is alkaline, acid, or neutral, gather some soil and divide it into two cups, and mix it with distilled water. Add vinegar to one cup, and baking soda to the other. If the soil with the vinegar fizzes, your soil is alkaline. If the soil with baking soda fizzes, it is acid. If neither of them fizz, it is neutral. I have no idea what it means if they both fizz, but I would probably choose a different site for my garden!👽
I've always said, when society falls apart, the Amish and the Hillbillies will be the only survivors because they know how to live off of the land. Knowledge we all should have, but few do.
The FDA currently is harassing the Amish and Mennonite who live with the earth using many of the same tactics they used on the Indians and other cultures around the world. Make their way of living scary (fear even if unwarranted) and presenting themselves as the saviors. When we bend to them, we surrender our power to them. If they are powerful, we gave it to them. The Amish and Mennonite need our help to preserve their way of life.
Put your dirt in a jar of water, shake it up then let it settle for a few hours. The ratio of silt, clay, and loam will be clearly visible and you will know what you need to amend it. Silt on bottom, clay middle, loam on top.
A lot of correction here. What ever your soil is made up of the bands will be clearly visible. My soil in Pa. It was mostly clay a little silt and loamy stuff organics like leaves, grass, cow manure. Here in Florida its all sand with no clay and a little bit of organics unless I amend it big time.
You can also look at how long materials like eggshells take to decompose. In some places, if your soil pH is too alkaline, they can last for years. In my soil, they disappear in a few months, so I know it's more acidic.
Ha, the egg shell test. I am going to try it. I have a reddish clay, a brownish powdery rock, black compost layer, potting soil, leaf mulch, etc. Makes sense the acid soil would dissolve the egg shells.
Would love to see an episode where you test this out. Match it with your homemade ph test method and an extension or formal test lab. As we MGs usually say, "test, don't guess!"
This would be a good video to see. In general, almost all vegetables in that we like to eat require alkaline soil. Berries, like acidic soil, which is why blueberries grow naturally in colonial pine forests.
I think this knowledge really only applies to where the Amish lives. Local biogeography can affect typical ph levels differently. E.g. if I would spot reddish soil in southern Africa, it would not imply alkalinity but presence of iron oxides. In northern Europe, brown soil, or rather hummus rich soil, would imply acidity. The important lesson is not that acidic or alkaline soil looks like this or that, but that you should spend some time and effort learning to read *Y-O-U-R* local environment, just like you learn to read your local weather patterns, water table, morning fog, frost dates, microclimate, drainage and shades. Every location will be different, and you should try to understand your own growing conditions.
Speaking of red soils, just look at Prince Edward Island, Canada, very famous for it's red soil. They grow the best potatoes for commercial use. Whenever I have purchased PEI potatoes in a grocery store and used them, rinsing under water has turned the water red.
True. Clay soils where I live tend to be acidic. Better indicator of pH are the native plants growing in the area. The guy should've prepared better and mention the caveats.
Now I know why there's a big bag of lime that was left in the barn when we bought this place. The soil is very sandy! This will be our first growing season here.
Hmmm. The sandy soil in Florida was always alkaline and we had to add sulfur to make it more acidic for azaleas. Here in Tennessee our chirt..red clay and rock is acid.
Aye - everything he's saying is very specific to his locality. I'm in VA, and we've got very acidic clay. Most clay is acidic - which is why they recommend lime to break it up.
My Dad was a wonderful gardener and he always said pick a handful up and squeeze it if it is squeezed and stays together it is good to plant in. Certain plants need the sandy soil too though.
That sound more like the Amish would do, but I really doubt they would have such scientific notions and use scientific terms such as PH. That's the thing about the Amish, they reject modernity and live like in the old days.
@@catalinaserbanescu1687hmm maybe not such a bad idea. They work together and help one another. They grow organic unaltered food supply so, no one goes hungry. Make their own clothing, yes- all wear the same style clothing. That may be a little hard but, don’t know, could be a good thing. No more “ I’m better than you or I have more money so… I can buy expensive things”. As in school clothing. Gets rid of envy, jealousy and the I deserve it attitude! Not dependent on gas or electricity, thus- no skyrocketing bills!! If, the power grid goes down- not a problem. Gas prices go up not a problem. A house needs to be built- no problem. We all have learned- the science can be manipulated as the food so… Growing your own medication as how it was done before vitamins and big p came in. I have a lot of respect for the Amish, the homesteaders. Going back to the basics is just what we need! I like it!
Our lost older generation truly were a walking book of useful knowledge. Kids of today really need to ask and gather information from what one day will be lost and gone forever.
1-1.5 ph range is big as it is a log scale. That being said, I have never had a problem with ph as I find the added compost almost always keeps it about neutral (most stuff in the garden is not that sensitive as long as you are near to neutral) ---- even though I add a lot of peat with it. The only time I ever worry about ph is with Hydrangea (for their color) and some berries (as they love the acid) --- in this case, I use one of those cheap electric meters (which are not super accurate, but at least puts me in the right ballpark).
@@shirley7137 I don't do that many berries that require very acidic soil (e.g., blueberries) anymore. I mostly grow day-neutral strawberries and prime ark freedom blackberries which both do fine around neutral ph. I am finding a trend that a lot of the more modern berries that are being bred as not as sensitive to ph (no empirical data on this, this is just based on my few recent plants and talking with a local strawberry farmer). We have red clay here and so my berry plots were all prepared mixing in a lot of peat moss and compost (heavy on the peat moss to lower ph). I luckily live in the south now (one of the reasons I don't grow blueberries anymore) and so I will place pine straw (which I have easy access to) on their beds in the winter. The pine straw will slightly lowers the ph given time and enough moisture. I have observed about a .5-1 decrease over 3 years (based on my little meter) --- so very slow, but I didn't need it fast. When I did do things like Blueberries while I was living in the northeast, I would add a little sulfur or extra peat moss. Sulfur was the only way I could get the big drop I wanted fast.
I bought a big pot of hydrangeas with white snowball blossoms. I wanted blue, but they only had white. At home I dumped a bucket of water on it that had leaves soaking in it for a week or so (I just forgot about it.) Next day all the petals were blue and purple. I was so happy. It's all sickly now though, I am going to repot it and see if that helps.
Seems common sense. But you said so yourself, the background pH of a region's soils has a strong effect. Maybe a good approach would be to get pH info from a county extension agent, and then use that as a starting point for the visual test.
Learned a lot and l garden like crazy 360. Love gumbo, the gray and the red. Plenty of both in and around Houston. I cut it w plain, sandy top soil ftom store, grass, leaves-oak, rotted oak wood, chicken litter and cow chips, kitchen scraps. Just layer a 30 gallon planter, add my buddies-earthworms and sit tub in shade, water when it's between rain, let alone and in 4 months turn over onto a sheet. Collect the buds and whatever is rough, start a new tub. The soil is beautiful. Loamy, dark and smells great. Makes best compost and dressing for all l grow. Like to have a neutral ph. May add some pine for roses. I see the bare trees in the back. Its 80° here today, 12-17. Yikes. Tom plants blooming like May. One thing for sure, l do not know enough gardeners! 🥗
“ Rocked your world “ that old school gardening has worked for thousands of years without technology intervention ,please . the Amish farmer has yrs of experience ,,, a Great place of knowledge , to keep it simple
Love this. An Amish person would say, though, that they center their lives on being friends of Jesus and their love for the natural systems God put in place stems from a joyful acceptance of his directive to be caretakers and stewards of the Earth. Take care of the soil biome and it takes care of you. Those who understand this are and infinite source of wisdom. Thanks for continuing to be a lifelong learner and sharing things like this. I love such a simple perspective VS fiddling with a $24 kit.
Like the Indian Nation did. Only taking what they needed for food, I’m talking about food in nature . God gave us food to eat. It tells us that He gave us plants with seeds so, we could have an endless supply of food. For our convenience we now have seedless grapes, watermelon, oranges etc. If, we continue down that line we will leave ourselves without food. So, with a little inconvenience and unaltered plants, we can still have an endless supply of food. We must look to our future and the future of generations to come.
This is the first time that I saw your posts. Thank you! I also live near an Amish community and really appreciate it. Thank you for your suggestions. I look forward to future posts to help our gardens thrive. We live off of our gardens, so the more we know the more we will succeed.
you dont have soil in your raised garden bed. it's pine bark. thanks for the tip. clay in a boggy area can be acidic, from sulfides. alkaline clay in more normal conditions can be caused by salinity. btw i just put several large bags of hydrated lime (super high ph) and mixed thoroughly into both veggie patch and borders. not even acid loving plants complained. I did this because over summer my soil in some places became gutless silt that doesnt drink water and in other places (with recent rains) i had poor drainage. turns out i also had root knot nematodes in several different crops, which is a different story, but digging over the soil and adding lime also kills the buggers. High amount of calcium added to heavy clay, actually makes it friable and able to form crumbs. Non calcareous sand has low ph not because it breaks down, as silica material dissolves extremely slowly, but because it doesnt hold onto any other positive charged nutrient molecules, which just leaves negatively charged hydrogen as dominant ph driver, from water. For a highly watched channel, you could put a bit more into rigorous research, rather than spreading inaccuracies.
That's great information. Trying to garden in between errands and house chores, being able to make a quick decision before I put something in the garden is a help. It's definitely better than never having time to plant.
Depends on your location. Maybe this works for the Midwest or Central North America. I have bright red clay soil and it's super acidic. It is more volcanic than the soil where you are though.
Although some gardeners talk about the importance of ph for fruit growing etc, I have never considered it worth the effort and especially didn’t want to have to buy testing strips etc. But now with this great tip I will be more aware of my soil ph in an easy way, I grow all my food in pots & tubs as I don’t have a garden. I make all my own compost which is always rich and dark which is great cos now I know it is nuetral ph, and everything I grow in it does really well from Grapes & Tomatoes to Veg and Herbs. Thanks for this great tip much appreciated! 🌻✌🏽🌎
Luke, my head hurts from all the knowledge you’ve been putting out this week! I’m mending my beds (zone 5b) planting this weekend. I hope I took good enough notes!
thankyou for some good common sense gardning tips- I have thought over the last few years that many are deterred from gardening because they they think they can't keep up with the now a day Gardners- that begun a few years back- gardening was made simple by God-
This is our second year with our new home and garden. All info is appreciated. Our soil is heavier can you recommend what a newby needs to add to the garden soil because it does gets quit muddy. Thank you any info is appreciated.
You just gave the plant everything it needed to grow in the pine bark mulch. The mulch will acidify as they brake down. The roots will literally attach to the decaying bark. Could you do the planting without the bark and just the grass? That would support your position. Pine bark is around 4 to 5 pH as it brakes down.
I needed to hear this, thank you! Takes away the helpless mystery of knowing what's going on in the soil for someone like me who doesn't have a soil tester / doesn't want to send out for results.
That is awesome information! Thank you so much for sharing!! I live a stones throw from Houghton Lake so I have extremely sandy soil. Until your video I did not know that sandy soil was acidic!
Looking thru the other comments, it seems that the information is regional. You'd have to know what each state (level) looks like for your particular region.
Thanks for the tips. You can also tell soil PH by what grows in your native soil. Where we are we have lots of Slash Pines and Live Oaks growing everywhere, AKA acid soil.
Wonderful provocative video thanx a lot !! .. so many comments with more precious nuggetts of info .. may I add mine which is something we did at our Ag High School in Australia: pH buffering capacity of organic matter in soil .. we had test-tubes and pipettes and test strips and soil samples and made up mixes in our school chemistry lab and learnt lots .. the jist of it being that heaps of organic matter in the soil tends to ameliorate whatever pH towards neutral .. ie add more organic matter in any case !!! .. I went on to flunk chemistry at college :)
This is really hard to wrap my head around. I guess the organic material in the dark soil serving as a buffer could make sense, maybe? I'm struggling to link the clay soil to a lack of hydrogen ions though. I think I'm going to start playing a game: each time I send a soil sample out for the lab to test, I'll try to guess the pH and see how close I am when the results come back. :)
@@jmodified I'm not near the coast so not sure it would apply (but the Earth has been here and changing for a real long time haha) but honestly I've not had it tested yet. Now I will not assume though, thanks!
Hmm, here in northern NJ, we have lots of clay but our soil is definitely acidic, slightly acidic. But the clay is deep, underneath the top soil, which is acidic, I guess because of all the leaves. We never rake our leaves. And we do not have grass. We have a Japanese style rock garden with three ponds. There are actually 5 ponds going from our house to our neighbor, as our house used to be dentist's office, which was owned by the neighbor.
There are numerous pH test kits available to give you an accurate pH reading. There are also numerous and cheap pH meters available that are accurate to 0.1. Texture and color in no way determine pH. Nutrient availability is highly pH dependent. It is also important to take readings down the soil profile, not just the top 10cm.
I'm curious to what you would think about the Garden Tower 2. It's supposed to allow for fresh compost for vertical gardening to be constantly added. I feel like there should be a cheaper version but haven't found one. One of the concerns I had was making sure the ph stayed more neutral when adding more compost.
Excellent video, Luke! This information definitely encorages us to be more OBSERVANT! It helps when we know what we're hoping to see, and do see. Thanks!
There is a lot of clay in my yard. Over the years I’ve continually added organic matter and now have a fairly deep level of good quality soil. However, if I dig much below that I run into heavy clay. When it’s moist I can make a 6 inch ribbon from the clay. I’m in Nebraska and continue to learn from you and ither RUclips gardeners.
That’s very interesting, makes perfect sense, I’m surprised the Amish know what PH is😂 (btw, that’s not a knock, they are very talented farmers, just a reference to them focusing less on technology). As long as you have high organic matter and good microbiology PH becomes less important IMO.
This is great info. My well water consistently is at a 10 on the ph scale. I spent lots of time trying to figure out why my garden always failed. Once I learned that small bit of info, I was able to adjust the ph with vinegar. Just enough to bring down the ph. I don't do it with every watering. I also have had my best garden using pure mushroom compost. Unfortunately, the company that produced it in my area shut down. This video will certainly help me stay on top of the nutrients needed for my garden. Thanks.
Iron oxide has a ph of between 6 and 7. Great for blueberries. You can make your own by adding rust to the soil around plants. Throw some old nails,nuts,and bolts,screws, washers, basically anything that rust into a bucket of water, when the water gets all red, when you swish it, water your plants with the red water.
So, if I'm understanding you correctly, sandy soil is at the bottom of the spectrum (acidic), and clay soil is at the top (alkalinity), and compost (natural materials) will amend (raise/lower) either?
Thanks! I only knew what "good dirt" looked like 😂. My grandpa showed me years ago because we harvested our garden dirt for pots from the woods. We would peel back the leaves and start taking the top layer down till it mixed with clay. Mix it together and it was perfect. In Mississippi we have a layer of topsoil, then sandy dirt then clay layered naturally in a lot of our woods and virgin farm land. The right mixture can create well draining nutrient rich potting soul, naturally perfect for peas, peppers, potatoes and beans atleast that's what I have the best success with, without having to adjust topsoil to sand/clay ratios at all.
Australian here. If in Australia, use a test kit. The soils in my area certainly do not follow this guide one bit. We've had our soil tested and we're sitting at around 5-5.5ph. That's both the clay soils and the very dark soils, with little to no difference between the colour/type. variations in our soil's ph is usually a location thing. My veggie patch has clay soils at one end and near black soil at the other. they have the same ph. And the claim about damp sand not forming a ball is not true.
Is there a simple chart you can post that will tell us exactly what grows well in acidic vs neutral vs alkaline dirt and what we can add to the different soils to change or go from say acid to alkaline if needed. Ty so much- I am a beginner.
⚖ *Love this lesson!* @MIGardener Luke, thanks for sharing these tips about average pH from soil color and make-up. _Great content and please keep up the awesome work._ 🙌
Very good tips for assessing your soil and what that means in terms of PH. Building soil is a yearly thing for us. We aim for a nice loam with our additions and in general our PH follows.
I have read as you go east to west the soils in the east are acidic and in the west the soils tend to be alkaline. The reason for this is the east has more rain than the west, the extra rain causes the acidity and the lack of rain results in alkalinity
We have an Amish colony near our town, they are terrific neighbors, very direct and happy to chat. Just the other day, 70 of them helped move a (non-Amish) neighbor’s house away from the riverbank where it is threatened by floods. It looked like the house had grown legs like a millipede- they were all inside it! Just picked it up with manpower and moved it.
There is a channel called Amish America that talks about the amish and he has a video that covers that. It just came out in the last day or two if anyone is interested in watching it.❤😊
You must live near me in Central Montana 😊. That was an awesome story about what they did!
@@lorimiller9895 nope, I'm in utah. I still watch the channel though because I like learning about the amish.
@@lorimiller9895 it was the new Amish Colony down in tiny Roberts between Red Lodge and Laurel. What a great addition to the community they’ve been!
@@weirdsweetcoolplants I saw that and it is kind of an odd channel but I’m surprised they have one at all!
My grandpa used to work for the Brooklyn botanic gardens in the 70s and this is one of the many things he taught me before he passed. I was only 12 when he was gone but it’s so interesting because now that I’m starting to become an empty Nester, I am really getting into gardening and remembering everything.🥰
Any tips you could pass on?
@@farmersdaughter1000 oh my goodness, probably so many random things I could tell you. If there’s anything specific that you grow, let me know and I’ll see if he said anything. I did start a RUclips channel which I am really gonna be focusing on gardening with so maybe follow along because I do mention him in my videos which are mostly just on TikTok at the moment. Here’s one thing he did that I haven’t tried, after the spring bulbs flowered, like tulips, hyacinth, and daffodils, he dug them up and stored them in a paper bag in our garage and then replant them in the fall. I wish I could ask him whybut we ended up with the most gorgeous flowers every spring. Oh, and he used crushed dried leaves in the bottom of the holes when he planted the bulbs, but not oak leaves… Never leaves.
@@CottageontheCorner Anything for veg like greens?
@@oliviastar3812 yes actually… He used to cut up banana peels and scatter them around the base of some leafy greens but also before he planted them, he did try to crumpled up some dried leaves even dead leaves from other plants and put them in the hole first. And when your green veggies start to die… Let them die in place so that they break down and go back into that soil.
@@CottageontheCorner
I think you meant Hyacinths⁉️🤔
If you want to get a rough idea of whether your soil is alkaline, acid, or neutral, gather some soil and divide it into two cups, and mix it with distilled water. Add vinegar to one cup, and baking soda to the other. If the soil with the vinegar fizzes, your soil is alkaline. If the soil with baking soda fizzes, it is acid. If neither of them fizz, it is neutral. I have no idea what it means if they both fizz, but I would probably choose a different site for my garden!👽
Good info. Thanks
Tnx
Thank you
Thanks.💜
@@sandrahbradley1511 😄
We can learn a lot from the Amish. They are full of knowledge.
I've always said, when society falls apart, the Amish and the Hillbillies will be the only survivors because they know how to live off of the land. Knowledge we all should have, but few do.
tasty too
What's tasty?
Amish wisdom comes from above Jesus Christ
The FDA currently is harassing the Amish and Mennonite who live with the earth using many of the same tactics they used on the Indians and other cultures around the world. Make their way of living scary (fear even if unwarranted) and presenting themselves as the saviors. When we bend to them, we surrender our power to them. If they are powerful, we gave it to them. The Amish and Mennonite need our help to preserve their way of life.
Put your dirt in a jar of water, shake it up then let it settle for a few hours. The ratio of silt, clay, and loam will be clearly visible and you will know what you need to amend it. Silt on bottom, clay middle, loam on top.
Soil is sand, clay, silt.
Proper ratio is loam
Sand on the bottom, settles immediately. Silt settles in a short while. My clay floats for days and weeks. It's all clay unless I add something.
Why don't they sell bags of silt or loam?
A lot of correction here. What ever your soil is made up of the bands will be clearly visible. My soil in Pa. It was mostly clay a little silt and loamy stuff organics like leaves, grass, cow manure.
Here in Florida its all sand with no clay and a little bit of organics unless I amend it big time.
@@hermanhale9258It's normally trucked to nurseries, or professional landscapers.
You can also look at how long materials like eggshells take to decompose. In some places, if your soil pH is too alkaline, they can last for years. In my soil, they disappear in a few months, so I know it's more acidic.
Ha, the egg shell test. I am going to try it. I have a reddish clay, a brownish powdery rock, black compost layer, potting soil, leaf mulch, etc. Makes sense the acid soil would dissolve the egg shells.
Would love to see an episode where you test this out. Match it with your homemade ph test method and an extension or formal test lab. As we MGs usually say, "test, don't guess!"
Can you do a video of what plants need what kind of soil ph. At least the basics please. Thank you 😊
This would be a good video to see. In general, almost all vegetables in that we like to eat require alkaline soil. Berries, like acidic soil, which is why blueberries grow naturally in colonial pine forests.
@peachykeen7634 that's not true at all. Most prefer slightly acidic
@@magnumxlpi well we have to heavily lime all our veggies, even at a pH of 6.2
I love learning new ways "which are really the old ways" from our Amish neighbors.
I think this knowledge really only applies to where the Amish lives. Local biogeography can affect typical ph levels differently. E.g. if I would spot reddish soil in southern Africa, it would not imply alkalinity but presence of iron oxides. In northern Europe, brown soil, or rather hummus rich soil, would imply acidity.
The important lesson is not that acidic or alkaline soil looks like this or that, but that you should spend some time and effort learning to read *Y-O-U-R* local environment, just like you learn to read your local weather patterns, water table, morning fog, frost dates, microclimate, drainage and shades. Every location will be different, and you should try to understand your own growing conditions.
I know - I have clay soil and it's very acidic!
excellent points
I have heavy clay soil and know it is very alkaline
Speaking of red soils, just look at Prince Edward Island, Canada, very famous for it's red soil. They grow the best potatoes for commercial use.
Whenever I have purchased PEI potatoes in a grocery store and used them, rinsing under water has turned the water red.
True. Clay soils where I live tend to be acidic. Better indicator of pH are the native plants growing in the area. The guy should've prepared better and mention the caveats.
Now I know why there's a big bag of lime that was left in the barn when we bought this place. The soil is very sandy! This will be our first growing season here.
Hmmm. The sandy soil in Florida was always alkaline and we had to add sulfur to make it more acidic for azaleas. Here in Tennessee our chirt..red clay and rock is acid.
Aye - everything he's saying is very specific to his locality.
I'm in VA, and we've got very acidic clay. Most clay is acidic - which is why they recommend lime to break it up.
My Dad was a wonderful gardener and he always said pick a handful up and squeeze it if it is squeezed and stays together it is good to plant in. Certain plants need the sandy soil too though.
My grandfather was born in 1900 and he could put a pinch of soil in his mouth and taste it and tell my cousin what the should grow in that file.
That sound more like the Amish would do, but I really doubt they would have such scientific notions and use scientific terms such as PH. That's the thing about the Amish, they reject modernity and live like in the old days.
Be careful you could wind up with worms putting dirt in your mouth.
@@catalinaserbanescu1687hmm maybe not such a bad idea. They work together and help one another. They grow organic unaltered food supply so, no one goes hungry. Make their own clothing, yes- all wear the same style clothing. That may be a little hard but, don’t know, could be a good thing. No more “ I’m better than you or I have more money so… I can buy expensive things”. As in school clothing. Gets rid of envy, jealousy and the I deserve it attitude! Not dependent on gas or electricity, thus- no skyrocketing bills!! If, the power grid goes down- not a problem. Gas prices go up not a problem. A house needs to be built- no problem. We all have learned- the science can be manipulated as the food so… Growing your own medication as how it was done before vitamins and big p came in. I have a lot of respect for the Amish, the homesteaders. Going back to the basics is just what we need! I like it!
Thats great! Most people are no longer in touch with nature... let alone know how to tell what soil is good for what! lol
light is sometimes very alkaline (colorado) add a bit of vinegar and watch it react. lime,gypsum,kaolin bases
This is why I wish I had asked my questions of my Great Uncle with his garden. He had a huge garden with so many great tasting fruits and veggies. 😢
Our lost older generation truly were a walking book of useful knowledge.
Kids of today really need to ask and gather information from what one day will be lost and gone forever.
OMG, I just learned a whole lesson. 😊 thanks a Million
1-1.5 ph range is big as it is a log scale. That being said, I have never had a problem with ph as I find the added compost almost always keeps it about neutral (most stuff in the garden is not that sensitive as long as you are near to neutral) ---- even though I add a lot of peat with it. The only time I ever worry about ph is with Hydrangea (for their color) and some berries (as they love the acid) --- in this case, I use one of those cheap electric meters (which are not super accurate, but at least puts me in the right ballpark).
Very cool, thank you for sharing
What do you use on your berries to make the soil more acidic? TY
@@shirley7137 sand
@@shirley7137 I don't do that many berries that require very acidic soil (e.g., blueberries) anymore. I mostly grow day-neutral strawberries and prime ark freedom blackberries which both do fine around neutral ph. I am finding a trend that a lot of the more modern berries that are being bred as not as sensitive to ph (no empirical data on this, this is just based on my few recent plants and talking with a local strawberry farmer). We have red clay here and so my berry plots were all prepared mixing in a lot of peat moss and compost (heavy on the peat moss to lower ph). I luckily live in the south now (one of the reasons I don't grow blueberries anymore) and so I will place pine straw (which I have easy access to) on their beds in the winter. The pine straw will slightly lowers the ph given time and enough moisture. I have observed about a .5-1 decrease over 3 years (based on my little meter) --- so very slow, but I didn't need it fast. When I did do things like Blueberries while I was living in the northeast, I would add a little sulfur or extra peat moss. Sulfur was the only way I could get the big drop I wanted fast.
I bought a big pot of hydrangeas with white snowball blossoms. I wanted blue, but they only had white. At home I dumped a bucket of water on it that had leaves soaking in it for a week or so (I just forgot about it.) Next day all the petals were blue and purple. I was so happy. It's all sickly now though, I am going to repot it and see if that helps.
Well, here in NC we have a red Clay that due to the pines tends be acidic. Azaleas, rhododendrons, etc grow everywhere
LOVE and appreciate this tip SO much!! Thank you for sharing 😊
Seems common sense. But you said so yourself, the background pH of a region's soils has a strong effect. Maybe a good approach would be to get pH info from a county extension agent, and then use that as a starting point for the visual test.
I love ALL MIgardener videos!
Learned a lot and l garden like crazy 360. Love gumbo, the gray and the red. Plenty of both in and around Houston. I cut it w plain, sandy top soil ftom store, grass, leaves-oak, rotted oak wood, chicken litter and cow chips, kitchen scraps. Just layer a 30 gallon planter, add my buddies-earthworms and sit tub in shade, water when it's between rain, let alone and in 4 months turn over onto a sheet. Collect the buds and whatever is rough, start a new tub. The soil is beautiful. Loamy, dark and smells great. Makes best compost and dressing for all l grow. Like to have a neutral ph. May add some pine for roses. I see the bare trees in the back. Its 80° here today, 12-17. Yikes. Tom plants blooming like May. One thing for sure, l do not know enough gardeners! 🥗
The clay in my region of northern PA is acidic and requires high-Mg limestone.
“ Rocked your world “ that old school gardening has worked for thousands of years without technology intervention ,please .
the Amish farmer has yrs of experience ,,, a Great place of knowledge , to keep it simple
Love this. An Amish person would say, though, that they center their lives on being friends of Jesus and their love for the natural systems God put in place stems from a joyful acceptance of his directive to be caretakers and stewards of the Earth. Take care of the soil biome and it takes care of you. Those who understand this are and infinite source of wisdom. Thanks for continuing to be a lifelong learner and sharing things like this. I love such a simple perspective VS fiddling with a $24 kit.
Like the Indian Nation did. Only taking what they needed for food, I’m talking about food in nature . God gave us food to eat. It tells us that He gave us plants with seeds so, we could have an endless supply of food. For our convenience we now have seedless grapes, watermelon, oranges etc. If, we continue down that line we will leave ourselves without food. So, with a little inconvenience and unaltered plants, we can still have an endless supply of food. We must look to our future and the future of generations to come.
Beautifully spoken, thank you
This is the first time that I saw your posts. Thank you! I also live near an Amish community and really appreciate it. Thank you for your suggestions. I look forward to future posts to help our gardens thrive. We live off of our gardens, so the more we know the more we will succeed.
you dont have soil in your raised garden bed. it's pine bark. thanks for the tip. clay in a boggy area can be acidic, from sulfides. alkaline clay in more normal conditions can be caused by salinity. btw i just put several large bags of hydrated lime (super high ph) and mixed thoroughly into both veggie patch and borders. not even acid loving plants complained. I did this because over summer my soil in some places became gutless silt that doesnt drink water and in other places (with recent rains) i had poor drainage. turns out i also had root knot nematodes in several different crops, which is a different story, but digging over the soil and adding lime also kills the buggers.
High amount of calcium added to heavy clay, actually makes it friable and able to form crumbs.
Non calcareous sand has low ph not because it breaks down, as silica material dissolves extremely slowly, but because it doesnt hold onto any other positive charged nutrient molecules, which just leaves negatively charged hydrogen as dominant ph driver, from water. For a highly watched channel, you could put a bit more into rigorous research, rather than spreading inaccuracies.
Thanks for sharing your knowledge and daily tips!
That's great information. Trying to garden in between errands and house chores, being able to make a quick decision before I put something in the garden is a help. It's definitely better than never having time to plant.
Wonderful information; thanks for sharing! Blessings to all 🤗🇨🇦
Depends on your location. Maybe this works for the Midwest or Central North America. I have bright red clay soil and it's super acidic. It is more volcanic than the soil where you are though.
Although some gardeners talk about the importance of ph for fruit growing etc, I have never considered it worth the effort and especially didn’t want to have to buy testing strips etc. But now with this great tip I will be more aware of my soil ph in an easy way, I grow all my food in pots & tubs as I don’t have a garden. I make all my own compost which is always rich and dark which is great cos now I know it is nuetral ph, and everything I grow in it does really well from Grapes & Tomatoes to Veg and Herbs. Thanks for this great tip much appreciated! 🌻✌🏽🌎
Luke, my head hurts from all the knowledge you’ve been putting out this week! I’m mending my beds (zone 5b) planting this weekend. I hope I took good enough notes!
pH is such an important part of our health and our plant response.
Appreciated a much calmer episode...
Valuable info. Thank you. Generational knowledge is so important.
thankyou for some good common sense gardning tips- I have thought over the last few years that many are deterred from gardening because they they think they can't keep up with the now a day Gardners- that begun a few years back- gardening was made simple by God-
This is our second year with our new home and garden. All info is appreciated. Our soil is heavier can you recommend what a newby needs to add to the garden soil because it does gets quit muddy. Thank you any info is appreciated.
We have a High water table so we put in raised beds, and it has worked wonderfully. No more mud!
You just gave the plant everything it needed to grow in the pine bark mulch. The mulch will acidify as they brake down. The roots will literally attach to the decaying bark. Could you do the planting without the bark and just the grass? That would support your position. Pine bark is around 4 to 5 pH as it brakes down.
In Florida we have a sandy soil, but it’s over 8 ph.
I needed to hear this, thank you! Takes away the helpless mystery of knowing what's going on in the soil for someone like me who doesn't have a soil tester / doesn't want to send out for results.
That is awesome information! Thank you so much for sharing!! I live a stones throw from Houghton Lake so I have extremely sandy soil. Until your video I did not know that sandy soil was acidic!
Looking thru the other comments, it seems that the information is regional. You'd have to know what each state (level) looks like for your particular region.
Thanks for the tips. You can also tell soil PH by what grows in your native soil. Where we are we have lots of Slash Pines and Live Oaks growing everywhere, AKA acid soil.
It's always good to learn something new and unique. I did. Thanks Luke. 👍
Wonderful provocative video thanx a lot !! .. so many comments with more precious nuggetts of info .. may I add mine which is something we did at our Ag High School in Australia: pH buffering capacity of organic matter in soil .. we had test-tubes and pipettes and test strips and soil samples and made up mixes in our school chemistry lab and learnt lots .. the jist of it being that heaps of organic matter in the soil tends to ameliorate whatever pH towards neutral .. ie add more organic matter in any case !!! .. I went on to flunk chemistry at college :)
Very informative! Thanks so much. Farmers have been raising crops successfully for thousands of years without aid of a laboratory.
When everyone farmed, everyone knew this. Also, we can identify ph by what plants are growing there.
All good information.
That's what my grandfather used to say. He could tell the PH by what weeds were growing in his lots.
The comment I was looking for. Thanks.
That's what I use. I can recognise hundreds of weeds /herbs as a result.
❤ Thank you for always having interesting content. Love to learn new things.
Our red soil is sandy loam… nearly no clay lol. 6.0 pH roughly
This is really hard to wrap my head around. I guess the organic material in the dark soil serving as a buffer could make sense, maybe? I'm struggling to link the clay soil to a lack of hydrogen ions though. I think I'm going to start playing a game: each time I send a soil sample out for the lab to test, I'll try to guess the pH and see how close I am when the results come back. :)
That guy has obviously never been in the Southwest deserts. Extremely Sandy, alkalinity of 8.5 to 10.
Obviously no Amish farmers in the Mohave.😂
@@highdesertoffgrid4225😂😂😂
derp moment
That's the lime in the soil, not the sand itself, causing the alkalinity. That's why you don't see the Amish in the southwest... they would starve. 😂
This vid is pretty dumb
Thank you for sharing the knowledge you gained from your friends. Bless you.
The Amish know....thanks Luke!😊
Makes sense! I've read that the soil here in Florida (VERY sandy) is on the acidic side.
Sandy soil that is full of shell and bits of shell can be quite alkaline. The original soil in my Florida yard is about 7.8.
@@jmodified I'm not near the coast so not sure it would apply (but the Earth has been here and changing for a real long time haha) but honestly I've not had it tested yet. Now I will not assume though, thanks!
Makes total sense, thanks for taking the time to explain it to us....
Hmm, here in northern NJ, we have lots of clay but our soil is definitely acidic, slightly acidic. But the clay is deep, underneath the top soil, which is acidic, I guess because of all the leaves. We never rake our leaves. And we do not have grass. We have a Japanese style rock garden with three ponds. There are actually 5 ponds going from our house to our neighbor, as our house used to be dentist's office, which was owned by the neighbor.
. Thanks Luke. Gives me a greater appreciation for areas of my yard/garden that are sandy.
It makes sense in hindsight. Thank you.
My soil is solid red clay and I have been adding organic matter to it for years but it still has clumps of hard as brick chunks when it dries out! 🥺
There are numerous pH test kits available to give you an accurate pH reading. There are also numerous and cheap pH meters available that are accurate to 0.1. Texture and color in no way determine pH. Nutrient availability is highly pH dependent. It is also important to take readings down the soil profile, not just the top 10cm.
I'm curious to what you would think about the Garden Tower 2. It's supposed to allow for fresh compost for vertical gardening to be constantly added. I feel like there should be a cheaper version but haven't found one. One of the concerns I had was making sure the ph stayed more neutral when adding more compost.
Excellent video, Luke! This information definitely encorages us to be more OBSERVANT! It helps when we know what we're hoping to see, and do see. Thanks!
There is a lot of clay in my yard. Over the years I’ve continually added organic matter and now have a fairly deep level of good quality soil. However, if I dig much below that I run into heavy clay. When it’s moist I can make a 6 inch ribbon from the clay. I’m in Nebraska and continue to learn from you and ither RUclips gardeners.
Thank you for this valuable info! Happy gardening from 🇨🇦
6.4 is the bomb! For the soil and us!
Last three videos, including this one have been fantastic…….
I really enjoy following you you’re brilliant!!
That’s very interesting, makes perfect sense, I’m surprised the Amish know what PH is😂 (btw, that’s not a knock, they are very talented farmers, just a reference to them focusing less on technology). As long as you have high organic matter and good microbiology PH becomes less important IMO.
This was the best info I've every gotten from you, and it's all been good. Thanks!
This is the best explanation I've seen online. Thank you for sharing!
I love it. One of those things that makes perfect sense in retrospect, but I never noticed it.
Thanks Luke. I had no idea😊
Sandy soil in West Texas tends to be alkaline. Maybe so in most arid soil. Or so I thought.
This is great info. My well water consistently is at a 10 on the ph scale. I spent lots of time trying to figure out why my garden always failed. Once I learned that small bit of info, I was able to adjust the ph with vinegar. Just enough to bring down the ph. I don't do it with every watering. I also have had my best garden using pure mushroom compost. Unfortunately, the company that produced it in my area shut down. This video will certainly help me stay on top of the nutrients needed for my garden. Thanks.
Have you done a Video on how you prepared your walkways or paths around your beds as yours look a lot better that some I've seen.
Makes sense no wonder my blueberries aren't growing with the clay we have.
If your clay is like mine, you will need to add a cupfull of pelleted sulpher around each blueberry plant. Mid-Missouri zone 6b
@@charlesdevier8203 thank you!
Iron oxide has a ph of between 6 and 7. Great for blueberries. You can make your own by adding rust to the soil around plants. Throw some old nails,nuts,and bolts,screws, washers, basically anything that rust into a bucket of water, when the water gets all red, when you swish it, water your plants with the red water.
Can't give you enough thumbs up for this one! 🤯 Thank you!
So, if I'm understanding you correctly, sandy soil is at the bottom of the spectrum (acidic), and clay soil is at the top (alkalinity), and compost (natural materials) will amend (raise/lower) either?
I value your contribution. Very worthwhile watch. Thanks! Practical and easy!
Thanks! I only knew what "good dirt" looked like 😂. My grandpa showed me years ago because we harvested our garden dirt for pots from the woods. We would peel back the leaves and start taking the top layer down till it mixed with clay. Mix it together and it was perfect. In Mississippi we have a layer of topsoil, then sandy dirt then clay layered naturally in a lot of our woods and virgin farm land. The right mixture can create well draining nutrient rich potting soul, naturally perfect for peas, peppers, potatoes and beans atleast that's what I have the best success with, without having to adjust topsoil to sand/clay ratios at all.
Thank you
Australian here. If in Australia, use a test kit.
The soils in my area certainly do not follow this guide one bit. We've had our soil tested and we're sitting at around 5-5.5ph. That's both the clay soils and the very dark soils, with little to no difference between the colour/type. variations in our soil's ph is usually a location thing.
My veggie patch has clay soils at one end and near black soil at the other. they have the same ph.
And the claim about damp sand not forming a ball is not true.
Is there a simple chart you can post that will tell us exactly what grows well in acidic vs neutral vs alkaline dirt and what we can add to the different soils to change or go from say acid to alkaline if needed. Ty so much- I am a beginner.
❤ so neat!! Thank you for sharing!!
Thank you that's was a good video,real simple I like simple!
Thank you. This has been added to my library of knowledge . And my order of strawberries are doing great
Thanks very much Luke
Excellent video. Really helpful. Good to know that all the organic matter in my garden is keeping the ph in the neutral range.
⚖ *Love this lesson!* @MIGardener Luke, thanks for sharing these tips about average pH from soil color and make-up. _Great content and please keep up the awesome work._ 🙌
Very good tips for assessing your soil and what that means in terms of PH. Building soil is a yearly thing for us. We aim for a nice loam with our additions and in general our PH follows.
not me during the first 30 seconds of the video fully expecting you to say we have to eat it to test the pH hahahaha
😂
If it looks like wet brownie mix, it is good soil. I learned that from CaliKim. Haha. Just kidding.
Thank you so much !
Very interesting especially living near Lancaster, Pa my entire life. Thanks for sharing!
Thank you for the tip.
I have read as you go east to west the soils in the east are acidic and in the west the soils tend to be alkaline. The reason for this is the east has more rain than the west, the extra rain causes the acidity and the lack of rain results in alkalinity
Thank you! Realy useful informations as usual on your chanel!
I was also taught that the presence of dandelions may indicate a more alkaline soil
You are awesome for sharing this. I subscribed and look forward to learning more from your videos. God bless you.
that is really interesting, thanks
Great information 🙏🏻🙌🏻 thank you