I have another question. We dug the holes twice as wide, same depth. I see different directions on different websites regarding the soil we pack the rootball with. Some say to use amended soil but not fertilize it, some say native soil only. What do we do? (Considering the fact that our soil is a very poor soil. And what is an amended soil?

Also can I mix the native soil with Earthworm Castings Organic Fertilizer?

For me, I would not dig at all into the ground to plant them. Instead, I would make a moundof good soil mix on top of the undisturbed/packed/dense/non-draining soil and place the plant's root ball inside of the mound.

If I had such bad drainage, I would dig the hole much deeper and wider. I would then backfill with in ground potting soil. Plant the tree high above the ground for settling.

Digging a crater hole into dense/packed/non-draining ground and filling it with less-dense/less-packed organic goodies to enrich the area for roots to enjoy...........is fine. Until water from too many rainy days over weeks fully fills all the less-dense/less-packed organic goodies and thus makes a swimming pool to drown tree roots. Like filling a bucket with organic goodies and planting a wonderful plant in the filled bucket. As long as the moisture content of the organic goodies is carefully managed, the bucket plant is in good shape. But when the bucket is left outside and it rains "too much" water into the non-draining bucket, roots that thrived in moist organic goodies....will drown in a sloppy, wet, saturated bucket pool. Yep, I have drowned some along the way when 'rain-rain-go away' did not make it go away, and the unfortunate plants that I had planted in dug-out craters in dense clay and had filled with organic goodies .....ended up being a death trap waiting for enough water to come along to make it drown heretofore healthy roots........Planting totally on top of undisturbed dense clay in mounds or inside some elevated structure has never caused any plants here to suffer when the rain would not go away. Summary: Plants crater in water-filled craters.

It has long been known in the citrus industry when planting a citrus tree, back fill only using the dirt that was removed when making the hole. It has also long been now that the hole dug is approximately as large as the trees root ball. If he area where the tree is to be planted has bad drainage, then plant the tree on a mound or better yet on a raised bed. - -Silica

Copingwithclay: How do you manage irrigation with the mound technique?

I grew up in an area with very hard adobe soil. The man next door was a PHD in Botany and he and I planted over 30 citrus trees between the two homes. Peter taught me to always dig a huge crater of a hole and then backfill it with a mixture of 50% native and 50% good "store bought" soil. Sprinkle in a little granulated citrus fertilizer while mixing the 5 gallon buckets manually over and over again. Great workout also! lol Worked fine for us and I still use that method today even though my soil near the beach is sandy until you get down past about 24 inches deep.... then it's hard clay!

Was really surprised after joining this forum and finding out that many of you use native soil and don't dig a huge hole. Completely shocked and silent until now.

Of course we normally don't get huge rainfall totals in my part of California so I might tend to listen to Clay's advice if you get a lot of rain as you might tend to in Kern County.

Interesting conversation. I wonder why it is preferable to use native soil for citrus.

I have clay soil and I typically use the crater technique you describe, PKG (not for citrus, but for my lilacs and rose bushes) and have never had a problem, although I understand copingwithclay's explanation. But I suppose it would take truly torrential rains to cause the pool effect he described.

m,

You are in Bakersfield. Very likely you have a hardpan layer that prevents drainage. I would try diggin a hole 3-4 feet deep, filling it with water and wait 24-48 hours to see if it drains. If it does drain, refill the hole, adding about a third of worm castings if you have them (worm castings are never bad)... and a tea made from worm castings is a prime fertilizer for citrus. Do you know what the pH of your soil is? You might want to add some soil sulfur in your hole if the pH is over 7.5. Aside from that, in Bakersfield you can more or less ignore the above advice generously given, but without knowledge of Bakersfield. If you call the City they can likely give you the pH of your water; if it is over 7, I would add a little sulfuric acid to the water if you can to lower the pH.

Redundantly stated, "normal" precipitation is not the concern. As long as a clay crater does not get the CONTINUAL REFILLING OVER MANY DAYS/WEEKS, my overstressed point about roots glug-glug-glugging while submerged in water....does not apply at all. Sort of like crying "WOLF!!!" only only only when there is a wolf. Not the one-time 'fill the crater with water and see if it drains in 24-48 hours', but rather fill it again and again every few days and see if it will be able to drain out again and again over several weeks. Clay expands when saturated and makes a pretty good pond liner to greatly slow down water loss as gravity pulls downward on the heavy water sitting on top of it.....Well, I guess that this topic is absolutely overdone. By the way, my house is currently surrounded by record level flood water, and has been flooded for 5 days. Since saturated clay simply does not drain it all away, unlike the way that a sandy soil would have already done days ago.

To cure drainage problems like this properly needs major work involving laying pipes under the garden layer -big job. But what I would do is make raised beds or just use big containers.

Clay, hope that things are drying out for you. We actually had a "dry El Nino" year down here where I'm at. Folks up north had much more rain. Very strange year weather wise.

I solved my problems with clay soil using cactus mix, a huge hole, and the tree mounded up high off ground level. It sure drains fast to the bottom of the hole, but the "bathtub effect" can be created if i water too much.