How are the permanent beds doing?

Blutranes

I'm not sure whether that would work or not. What are clay ends? If clay ends are just leftover clay, it might be ok, if you can pulverise it enough so it'll absorb water again. If it has already been fired, I don't think it would work. I may be wrong, but I think the heating process changes the structure.

Too bad we can't just mix my soil and yours and split it between us.

Leaving beds untilled is a new thing for us so we'll see...I'm sure it'll help, some...
No, I'd never put in fired clay, and yes - if only there was a Freecycle for large quantities of soil!
By clay ends I mean, I'd ask her to save 'green' pottery that's gone wrong but hasn't dried out completely.

Actually, there is a site out there for free soil and fill. I have looked at it in the past, but did not save the link. The listings ran the gamut from topsoil to stuff like broken up concrete. Most of them were "if you come get it, it's free". But there were some that charged as well. You might do a search for "free dirt" or "free soil".
I didn't use it cause I live in the sticks and all of the listings were far, far away.
Good luck with it....

Kristi

I'm trying to remember where you live Paul, but I think it's CB so this might not be of any use to you. Just in case, if you ever find yourself close to Windsor and the Avon River, bring a few buckets and fill them up with some of the most beautiful clay ever at low tide. Just don't get stuck in the stuff because the tide comes in pretty quick when it starts coming up the river.

My ancestors, the Acadians used the clay from the river in the 1700s to build the dykes in the valley along the river and the Minas Basin so as to be able to farm on the salt marshes. As a youngster I remember taking family trips to gather some on outings and use it to make pottery.

Define what you mean by greens and do you till the greens' area?

Great minds Paul. :~) See the link below for a thread I started recently asking the same question. I'm going to try earthenware.

Here is a link that might be useful: clay experts

Spooky! I see it dropped off just over a week ago. Looks like lots of good information there.

I was a student potter in a past life and vaguely recall that clays can have metal constituents which come out/react to glazes as a result of firing - you mention aluminum - wouldn't want to add such clays to our soil. What I'll do is ask the potter which clays she uses and if she isn't aware of all the constituents, look them up. Also read through your thread again.

Earthenware sounds like a sensible choice. Let us know what happens. A long term project!

By greens I mean lettuce, chard, arugula, beets. These grow slowly, the bugs eat the seedlings, we replant two or three times, and the lettuce gets bitter before it's really lush - actually it never gets lush. It grew well the first year here and has gone downhill since. We've given supplemental feedings of liquid organic fertilizer but that doesn't seem to make much difference. Wherever we grow greens, including between rows of asparagus where we never till, they grow very slowly.

Our neighbours 200 feet away have entirely different soil, garden in what used to be horse pasture, and grow everything faster and lusher than we do.

"I didn't use it cause I live in the sticks and all of the listings were far, far away." - same here

That clay would make a lot of pots! Tiffy that's a beautiful landscape, I always especially liked passing by Windsor. Or the dykelands nearest Acadia U. I spent a year commuting between Cape Breton and Kentville.

One of the things I learned many years ago with sand is that tilling introduces so much air, and gets the soil bacteria so stimulated, that all of the organic mater you introduce yearly will be totally digested with no residual, humus, left. The only way I started to see OM build up in my sand is by not tilling, just letting the Soil Food Web take care of getting the organic matter into the soil.
Adding some clay is not going to harm anything but do not expect any improvement in moisture holding capability unless you add enough clay to equal 25 percent by volume of your soil. That will be a lot of clay, many tons, many cubic yards, for one 4 x 4 plot that would be roughly 0.66 cubic yards, depending on if you get enough depth. A couple of inches of clay worked into the top soil is not going to do much.

Most of the roots activity only need a few inches of soil. If you turn the top
4 inches or so of soil into some nice loam by mixing in clay it will be an
improvement from b4.

Hi, Paul! I don't have constructive advice regarding your problem, but I do wonder if the clay might contain anything that would jeopardize your organic certification. Here it seems there are very stringent regulations about it. Anyway, I just wanted to pop in and say hello. I'm so glad you have established your business. I remember a couple years ago when you were trying to decide.

Best regards,

Sherry

In theory, adding clay to a sandy soil would work well. In practice, it can be very problematic.

The fact that you can grow some things on your soil indicates it has a substancial amount of silt in it. Few things will get a gardener in trouble faster than mixing silt and clay. How much clay, and how it is added, will lead to success or a nightmare. Start small and go slow.

It's hard to make suggestions without knowing a lot nore about your soil and the clay to be added.

Remember that a nice loam may have only 10% clay, and it is in very tiny pieces thoroughly mixed and coated with the silt and sand. It will take quite a time, or quite an effort, for any clay you add to reach that condition.

Fired clay is a perfectly good thing to add to soil, but for increasing drainage. You would crush to a size suitable for your purpose. Try it in pots with succulents, it is lighter than grit, holds more air, and retains nutrients better.

Sherry you're a sight for sore eyes. How are things Over There (does Over There still exist?) You too pls8xx and Shrubs.
We did well this past summer, for a first year. A few people with big demand for - and much appreciation of - organic produce, including the chef at the local resort. Lots of demand is for lettuce though, thus the challenge.

This thread is a precis of the earlier one, for which I'm grateful.

If we weren't under a foot of snow I'd go out and take another sample for a jar test. And will recheck our soil test of 2 years ago. A new test is due.

I think it would be a great experiment, one that we are going to try on some of our sandy soils. Recently I found out that one of our neighbors works for a local quarry. They sell truckloads of clay left from washing sand. I imagine it to be friable (can clay be friable?) and not in clumps. I know that he added it to a small garden on his property. The price is $15 a dumptruck load plus trucking costs. Basically free plus trucking. As previous posters have noted, you are going to need a lot to make a noticable difference and clay is HEAVY. Make calls, ask locals, you want a source of large quantities and then you need to figure out delivery. Good luck and let us know how it goes if you give it a try.

David B.

Paulns, instead of pounding the dry stuff, why not soak it in a 5 gallon bucket and work the slurry into the garden or compost? You can get a lung disease called silicosis or potters rot from inhaling dry clay dust. Your potter friend will know about it.

Hey, Paul. There is still 'Over There.' Honestly, it's a bit boring and I miss actual discussions about soil and compost! So here I am. Hearty congratulations on your business. I was thinking recently about your bird's nest bin and wondering if it completely disappeared.

Sherry

What about Turface? It's a clay product with great water holding characteristics. It actually has a high CEC, too, which your fired clay probably doesn't.

I did a few years of pottery and ceramics competition back in high school. I have no idea what clay "ends" might be, as it's a malleable material rather than a stock block like wood, but everything gets recycled. You have leftovers- it gets thrown into what's called a "pug mill" which kneads the air bubbles out of the clay and incorporates it back into one mass (or you can do that by hand- which is what we did in class). Dried up pieces- just add water. That can be made into "slip", which is just watered down clay that is used as a glue of sorts when joining pieces, or it can be reconstituted, but in general- you don't let much get to that state unless there's cracking before it's fired (which you reduce by wrapping in dampened paper towels, controling temp and humidity, etc.). Once it's fired... well, then it's cerami and useless to you anyway, I guess.

Lots of good suggestions, thanks....David I hope you post here if you do the experiment.

The potter is away, will have to wait to ask her questions. If she has something that sounds safe I'm going to do a test plot ~6'x10' for greens.

I don't remember the pottery rejects being recycled, nor tossed out either...

Thanks Sherry. And good luck to you and your Meconopsis. The birds' nest bin is now a ring of dry grey brush. It looks like it'll be useful for another year, maybe two, although the height has lessened considerably, it's only about a foot high now.

I like the company of familiar strangers, myself...