Soil Test results and recommendations

I just received my first soil sample results I've ever taken. The results are from Logan Labs.

The things that jump out at me are how different the two areas are but are fairly close in physical proximity with very similar soil types. The garden has been heavily tilled for about the past decade. Mainly kelp teas and fish hydrolysate have been applied, and I assume the reason for the radically different phosphorus contents, due to the phosphoric acid. Also, the high calcium levels, low potassium, and lack of "exchangeable hydrogen". Chemistry and pH mystify me, so I could use some help in that area. The "pasture" is about 3 acres and will be my main 'focus' for my permaculture set-up going forward. The "garden" area is fairly unproductive at the current, but it is being managed by my father who doesn't necessarily do things the way I will be doing in the future. Any help, comments, thoughts, or recommendations would be appreciated. What are your opinions on fish hydrolysate on the pasture and what other amendments would you consider?


By the jar tests, each soil was 25% sand, 35% silt, 40% clay - which would make it right on the clay/clay loam type.

......................................Pasture.............Garden
Exchange (M.E.)...............24.60................25.09
pH..................................7.80..................7.90
Organic matter.................5.11..................5.57
Sulfur..............................13....................19
M3 Phosphorus.................47....................344
Calcium...........................8333................8078
Magnesium......................548...................788
Potassium........................401..................493
Sodium............................39...................50
Calcium%........................84.68...............80.48
Magnesium%...................9.28.................13.08
Potassium%.....................2.09.................2.52
Sodium...........................0.35..................0.43
Other bases.....................3.60.................3.50
Exchangeable H................0......................0
Boron ppm.......................0.38.................0.4
Iron ppm.........................40....................96
Manganese.......................47...................67
Copper............................1.79.................2.7
Zinc................................0.68.................3.45
Aluminum........................312..................324


Thanks for any tips.
(I hope the format is ok, I'm not at my home computer and had to improvise. I'm also new to interpreting these tests, and am waiting on a few books to arrive to help me further.)

My philosophy, in soil ammending is the 'weakest link theory'. In that, you would want to start with phosphorous. The phosphorous is okay in the garden, definitely poor in the pasture.

Your choice on ammending material, with such low levels of P, and high pH, are going to be rock phosphate or mono-ammonium phosphate (MAP). I would read Steve Solomon's thoughts on MAP. I am sure it will get a poor reception here, but I have used MAP productively in a similar soil context. Neal Kinsey also advocates for MAP, as non-harmful to the soil, despite it not being 'organic'. Rock phosphate is simply not effective unless it is incorporated into the soil column in some way, which is pretty unrealistic in a pasture. MAP is not easy to locate locally, I had to ship mine.

After phosphorous, sulfur is super low. Like bankrupt. I have the same situation. Sulfur is cheap, like $18 for 50 pounds IIRC. Available at Paonia Supply. The low sulfur levels will really demonstrate themselves when you start grazing cows. Everywhere the cows urinate, the pasture will turn dark green. This is from the sulfure in the urine, and the lack of sulfur in the surrounding soil. I applied like 12 sacks of sulfure to my pastures this fall, and am excited for the results in the spring.

Finally your traces are all really low. Boron, zinc, copper, iron. Even sodium (not really a trace). Trouble is, the trace minerals are expensive. I would start, strange as this sounds, with applying Redmond Real Salt, as it contains salt and traces and is cheap. Available at Sissons in Delta. The other traces are not available locally, and cost a lot. Definitely apply them to your garden. That wont be too costly due to the small size. On the pastures, it will be expensive to remineralize, similarly with the phosphorous.

For now, I think your cation balance is fine. Nothing to do there. You could spread wood ash to boost the K, which would also add some traces. But overall you are fortunate to have good Ca:Mg ratio. You will never get hydrogen in your soil, which is fine. We have a fundamentally alkaline soil type, which will never change, and is not in any way a bad thing. Folks from out East are bewildered by our alkaline soils, but just know that there is nothing problematic about it.

Your organic matter is fine. It is not in any way a weak link. Sure it would be good to get it up around 8%, but this is not where I would place my focus for now. 5% is a level most farmers would be very jealous of, especially in a high calcium soil. Calcium and humus are what hold our nutrients, and you have excellent nutrient holding capacity. Whatever you ammend will hold in the soil well.

For the pure chemical ammendments (gasp, horror!) I have found Alpha Chemical in Missouri to be the best source. Shipping isnt cheap, but their fertilizer is the best price I have found by a longshot. They are your source for MAP, zinc sulfate, and iron sulfate. Copper sulfate (along with sulfur) can be bought at Paonia Supply, and boron can be bought at the grocery store as laundry borax.

Given cost constraints, you might want to start with a complete remineralization program on your garden, where you can see the results without bankrupting yourself. When you add up the costs of remineralizing your pastures, you will probably conclude that you could just buy a lifetime supply of grassfed beef for the cost. Of course, the permie way is going to tell you that planting comfrey and rotational grazing will make it all happen, but this really is in defiance of physical reality.

The best way to look at it is that remineralization is a long-term investment. You will not re-deplete your zinc and copper any decade soon, once they are back to healthy levels, in a calcium rich soil with low rainfall. Fertilizer is getting much more expensive every year, I have seen huge increases, like several fold since I started eight years ago. Never a better time than now to invest in the mineral future of your soil.

good luck Johnny!

Thank you, Adam! Very appreciated. Also for mentioning the local places to acquire them. I hate shipping costs, but sometimes I guess are necessary. What are your thoughts on fish hydrolysate and spraying the field with that? There's a guy up on the mesa which distributes it.
I'm waiting for the books currently, but they should be here soon, which I will definitely study and cross reference with what you suggest.

The Dr Fish guy, yes I know his product. I would say that it is great for your garden, especially until you have an abundant supply of good compost. The fish emulsion will feed your plants, but wont build your soil nutrient levels. Or if you used enough of it to build your levels in the soil, it would be cost-prohibitive.

Liquid fish is great stuff for what it is, that is true. I currently only use it as a foliar on my seedling transplants, since the growing medium I use is low in nitrogen. Otherwise I rely upon compost and legumes for my nitrogen needs in the pasture and garden.

Far better than spraying your fields with liquid fish, would be spraying BD 500 biodynamic prep. The biodynamic preps innoculate soil bacteria that make soil nutrients bio-available. The cost of applying BD sprays is small, and cost to benefit ratio is quite favorable. BD preps for spraying your field can be bought locally through Pat Frazier, or nationally through JPI. Regardless of your soil remineralization program, I would recommend spraying BD preps to promote optimal soil microbiology. Good soil microbiology will make your mineral nutrients more available to your plants, so the BD increases your fertility indirectly, but significantly.

Ehrenfried Pfeifer's book Soil Fertility does an excellent scientific job of explaining this. Highly recommended text.

Adam Klaus wrote:

Finally your traces are all really low. Boron, zinc, copper, iron. Even sodium (not really a trace). Trouble is, the trace minerals are expensive.

Tut, tut, Adam! Trace minerals are cheap. See my post about composting alkaline batteries. Get a pound of boric acid (roach killer) at the dollar store, save vegetable cans for the iron, and sort through your change for pre-1982 pennies for the copper. How expensive is that? Let's not be helpless here when it comes to making our own trace mineral chelated metal fertilizer.

Thanks, John. I'll give that thread a look. I may have to shift some thinking to put some of your recommendations into action. I've never thought of batteries as sources I'd want in my garden, but I guess maybe it deserves some consideration.

John Elliott wrote:
Tut, tut, Adam! Trace minerals are cheap. See my post about composting alkaline batteries. Get a pound of boric acid (roach killer) at the dollar store, save vegetable cans for the iron, and sort through your change for pre-1982 pennies for the copper. How expensive is that? Let's not be helpless here when it comes to making our own trace mineral chelated metal fertilizer.

I think you'd have to acknowledge that it all depends on scale. Also free time versus available money. How long is it going to take a person to collect 5 pounds of pre-1982 pennies? In Johnnys case, he'd be the biggest penny collector West of the Mississippi before he had his soils ammended to decent levels. I think he'd be better off working a few hours, earning a little money, and buying some copper sulfate.

So I've been thinking about the soil results more, and it brings up some more thoughts...

As I understand, and I'm no expert, fall is the best time to apply most amendments. Would it be advisable to wait until next fall, or should I try to get it down early in spring, when the snow melts? I'm not sure if the ground will be bare until then, just depends on weather, but snow covering is normal all winter.

Would a 'deep plowing' be advisable, to try to bring up and mix some sub-soil into the top few inches? My sub-soil is an alluvial sand of widely varied parent material, below a layer of caliche. This would be maybe possible with my family's 1960 John Deere 730, or I could hire it out one-time given it's not astronomical cost. Bonus, it would make seeding a lot more effective and help the perennials get established in the now grass dominated pasture.

This also brings up a past topic of mine, breaking up the abundantly available basalt rocks for free trace minerals. I know 'flour' is best, but I think some sand/gravel would help build the soil long-term, especially when added to my working composts. What are the thoughts on volcanic/glacial rock dusts to add to trace mineral amounts? I hate the thought of shipping costs associated with sand getting across the country though. I'm gonna try out the fire/water method, when I get some free time and wanna play pyro.

I call it a 'pasture' as it is now, but my long term plans is to make this a permaculture planned forest, food forest, fruit trees, bushes, vines, perennial medicine, food, and annual veggies. A cow or two is a goal, but that would be down the road a few years. Chickens this year, for sure. Goats in the next couple years. The 'garden' area will be worked for the next few years, but depending on future plans, the property may be divided and the current house sold with a portion of the land that contains the now 100'x100' garden area.

Thanks again for any replies!

Johnny-
For comparison's sake, here are my soil numbers from my most recent test-

This is for my orchard, which is pretty similar to my pasture, just a little bit better. Also my garden, which has seen more focus over the years. Hope this is somehow interesting or insightful-


......................................Orchard.............Garden
Exchange (M.E.)...............31.83................31.24
pH..................................7.30..................7.40
Organic matter.................10.41.................7.68
Sulfur..............................8........................19
M3 Phosphorus.................932....................663
Calcium...........................6638................6212
Magnesium......................749...................904
Potassium........................460..................493
Sodium............................20...................31
Calcium%........................78...................75
Magnesium%...................15....................18
Potassium%.....................3......................3
Sodium............................0.2..................0.3
Other bases.....................4.....................4
Exchangeable H................0......................0
Boron ppm.......................1.04.................1.45
Iron ppm.........................95....................112
Manganese.......................20...................32
Copper............................3.88.................7.91
Zinc................................18.1.................12.81
Aluminum........................118..................298

After I got these test results back, I applied biodynamic compost, monoammonium phosphate, sulfur, gypsum, borax, manganese sulfate, copper sulfate, zinc sulfate, and redmond real salt in November. I should see a nice bump in levels with my next test. It wasnt cheap, but fertilizer is a cost of farming, IMHO. Farming without fertilizer is a nice idea theoretically, and a good goal to aim for; but a surefire path to bankruptcy in the short term. To me the bad thing is relying on fertilizer for your yearly plant fertility. In contrast, using fertilizer to rebuild soil mineralization is a wise investment.

I have older tests from when I first got on the land, but they were from a different lab, so not exactly comparable. Hopefully this is useful info for you.

Adam Klaus wrote:J Hopefully this is useful info for you.

Absolutely!!

Do you know how my soil compares to anyone else up on the mesa?

Johnny Niamert wrote:
Do you know how my soil compares to anyone else up on the mesa?

No not really, though I am meeting with another farmer tomorrow, who lives on Pitkin Mesa, essentially right between you and I, to look at his soil test results.

Paging Linc Vannah to the white courtesy phone....you're here sometimes I know.

Adam's got a point there, somebody has to keep the copper mines in business by buying their copper sulfate. However, collecting pennies is far less work than busting up basalt rocks, which Johnny seems to be willing to do.

The only problem with crushed basalt is that while it has minerals, they are all oxides -- shot out of a volcano and pretty much inert to weathering. And it is that weathering that coaxes the micronutrient metals out of the rock matrix and makes it available to plants. If you have a lot of pea gravel size basalt in the soil, it may analyze out that the Mg and Ca and Fe are there, but their bioavailability is another matter. You need some acid rain that will leach out the metals or a healthy amount of soil fungi that are releasing peroxidase enzymes to make the metals bioavailable.

Which brings us back to my chelating suggestion. If you look at this reference from the University of Wisconsin extension service, you will see that their application rate for chelated copper is only 1/6th the rate of copper sulfate. I'll cut Adam some slack because his time is money, but I'm a retired tinkerer and have nothing better to do with my time than think of ways to turn waste streams into fertilizer.

John Elliott wrote:However, collecting pennies is far less work than busting up basalt rocks, which Johnny seems to be willing to do.

What could be better than a Saturday afternoon, building a giant hours-long raging fire atop basalt rocks, then throwing red-hot rocks into barrels of water and watching them fracture?

Hell, that sounds like fun, not work!

There was this guy up on Redlands, who was really into nut trees, I think his name is David. Anyways, he used a simple rock tumbler o pulverize the basalt into a rock dust. His tumbler was about a quart in size, and he used these one inch diameter steel balls. He would run the little tumbler at a slow speed for a day or two and get basalt dust. Really nice, fine, silky smooth rock dust. He was really into this stuff for use in his Biodynamic compost making, so he was using it more like homeopathy than as a direct ammendment. Nevertheless, he was convinced that it was really good stuff, used along with cow manure and eggshells. I think this is the basic Maria Thun Barrel Compost recipe.

Phosphorus, sulfur and iron are unavailable at high pH. All of the soil tests in this thread show calcium levels that are too high, but there's nothing you can really do about it. All of the soil tests in this thread additionally show zero available hydrogen, meaning if you added potassium or magnesium it would have nowhere to go.

I looked up 'mono-ammonium phosphate', and it's described as being an unstable chemical that isn't used for anything. Diammonium phosphate is frequently used as fertilizer, but it's unstable in high pH soils like yours. High P fertilizers can prevent root symbionts from growing but poultry manure or similar can add phosphorus effectively. P becomes bound to Al and Fe in soil, which yours is low in, and in calcareous soils like that rock phosphate is pretty much useless because it's entirely unavailable.

I don't see anything particularly wrong with iron sulfate, copper sulfate etc. Chelates are probably expensive, they contain toxic gick like EDTA and they're too available to be used as a long term or fertility building tool. If you balanced your metals using all sulfates you'd probably get sufficient sulfur in the process.

One thing I do notice is that, given the low organic matter and high calcium levels I would be willing to bet that WATER and not random micro-minerals is probably your biggest limiting factor for plant growth. The fastest way to build soil in water-limited areas is to improve water retention and usage.

Marc, with all respect I think you are not understanding the subtleties of farming in a naturally calcerous, alkaline soil. I *highly* recommend reading Steve Solomon's book The Intelligent Gardener, where he discusses the specifics of growing in these soil types. Most ag authors are not familiar with calcerous soils, and have some highly inaccurate presumptions about them and their characteristics.

Marc Troyka wrote:Phosphorus, sulfur and iron are unavailable at high pH. All of the soil tests in this thread show calcium levels that are too high, but there's nothing you can really do about it. All of the soil tests in this thread additionally show zero available hydrogen, meaning if you added potassium or magnesium it would have nowhere to go.

They are not unavailable. Their availablity is limited, but still there. Maintaining good levels of phospohrous is just as critical in an alkaline soil. If it were 'unavailable', then plants wouldnt grow at all properly in alkaline soil. Which is not the case. Our region of Western Colorado is an excellent fruit growing region, winning the Chicago World's Fair for our apples and peaches. This was done in alkaline soils. Phosporous is still a critical plant nutrient in our context, like all growing contexts.

Marc Troyka wrote: I looked up 'mono-ammonium phosphate', and it's described as being an unstable chemical that isn't used for anything. Diammonium phosphate is frequently used as fertilizer, but it's unstable in high pH soils like yours. High P fertilizers can prevent root symbionts from growing but poultry manure or similar can add phosphorus effectively. P becomes bound to Al and Fe in soil, which yours is low in, and in calcareous soils like that rock phosphate is pretty much useless because it's entirely unavailable.

Reputable soil agronomists, notably Neal Kinsey disagree. Mono-ammonium phospate is an acid extracted phosphorous fertilizer. It numeric value is 11-52-0. Neal Kinsey, Steve Solomon, and other experts in the field consider it to be a particularly useful phosphorous source in calcerous, alkaline soils. It is considered to do no harm to soil biota, due to its low ammonia levels. I would recommend reading Hands on Agronomy by Neal Kinsey as another excellent resource on soil ammendment.

Marc Troyka wrote: I don't see anything particularly wrong with iron sulfate, copper sulfate etc. Chelates are probably expensive, they contain toxic gick like EDTA and they're too available to be used as a long term or fertility building tool. If you balanced your metals using all sulfates you'd probably get sufficient sulfur in the process.

My experience, from testing and ammending my soils over the last eight years, is that copper sulfate is highly effective at raising the nutrient levels in the soil long term. Using copper sulfate, I have raised my parts per million of soil copper from 0.5 ppm to 9.1 ppm. That seems like a pretty significant remineralization, IMHO. I can chart the improving soil levels over 8 years, with slow but steady ammendment using copper sulfate. I have seen similar long term fertility building with zinc sulfate as well.


Remineralizing our soils is a noble and valuable effort. It is unfortunate that many seem afraid or opposed to tools like soil testing and mineral ammendment. I have seen great improvements in my soil nutrient balance through targeted nutrient applications. Along the way, my soil organic matter has risen from 5% to anywhere between 7-10%. Good stewardship and good farming depend on many parameters, and by utilizing well-made compost, biodynamic and fungal innoculation, and mineral application, we can be the best possible farmers, growing the most nutritious and delicious food. That is my goal, to be the best farmer possible, using all available tools to promote success.

So, I'm definitely no expert, by any means. Let me state that to start. Sorry if I sound like an ignoramus with the rest of this. I definitely enjoy the discussion going on. I'm also used to the taste of my foot.

I have paid little to absolutely zero attention to soil pH for most of my gardening life. I have lived in CO and dealt with alkaline soils my entire life. Granted the whole of that experience is a hobby/home-gardener, but I think that still has some value in learning the local soil type here. Some of my earliest memories are helping pops in the garden in spring. We always grew our own veggies my entire childhood. Once I bought a house, the first thing I did on the first day of having the keys was plant veggies in the backyard. Before I even moved any furniture, I moved my plants I started at my old rental place. But, like I mentioned, this is the first ever soil test I've ordered.

One big 'problem' I have with soil pH, is that it completely discounts the rhizosphere and the very complex and intricate interactions between all the tiny's and the roots. Granted, for example, phosphorus could be completely unavailable to plants and 'locked up' with Al, Fe, Mg, and Ca in a sterile alkaline soil. However as I understand it, through the bacterial, fungal, and other actions present, P can be made readily available to plants even in such alkaline soils, given a healthy and diverse microbial population. So even if rock-P is 'unavailable' to plants in soils like we have, the microbes could/can/will make it available to plants given a chance. I would even think the more 'locked up' the P is, the friendlier it would be to soil microbes that have to work to get at it and trade it with the plant for what they want. I've heard high P fertilizers will limit symbiotic fungal growth, if not harm it. But I haven't really yet read the books Adam mentioned, that may contradict this notion as he mentioned.

I'm big on "letting the plants and the microbes figure it out", so to speak. One book I like, and which speaks to me, is Teaming with Microbes by Lowenfels and Lewis. It may not be the most in-depth soil chemistry book, but it made the impression with me that if the "base ingredients" are present, than the microbes should figure it out with the plants to make things grow. My biggest challenge or goal, is to supply the base ingredients that may be lacking and an attractive environment for microbes to thrive. After I bring together the ingredients and provide ample housing, all the acids, wastes, enzymes, proteins, sugars, films, chelating agents, etc from bacteria, fungi, and higher soil life-forms, humic and fulvic acids, and more things I can't remember will make 'locked-up' macro and micro nutrients and minerals readily available to plant life. I know this is a fairly simple understanding of what happens, but I'm looking to learn further.

One thing I've learned in my back-yard gardens is that mulch, composts, organic matter, and increasing water-retention of the soils is possibly the biggest factor to making a more fertile soil, given the challenges that CO presents. Dry, wind-swept, sun-baked, clay alkaline, somewhat devoid young soils are harsh to these tiny's. Making their world more habitable and friendly; but also providing the correct ingredients for them to 'eat' has given me the biggest rewards over-time in my back-yard. I can only think that doing both these things on a larger scale would lead to similar results for the field I'm planning on devoting myself to. In my old garden, which was 30'x30', I could afford to buy and indiscriminately apply a lot of high-cost amendments. On a 3+ acre field, I would go broke doing it the way I did it at my old-house. Hence, my desire to test and more logically apply nutrients and the 'macro' trace-minerals.

That's one reason I keep bringing up rock-dusts. The soil tests analyze the macro trace-minerals, but I believe a lot of the 'random micro-minerals' add immensely to a healthy soil, and a healthy me, even if they are little studied or understood in relation to soil studies. It's also the reason I'm big on adding rock dusts to composts. I may as well 'jumpstart' the microbial action needed to make these micro-minerals ready.

I realize typing this out that I need to do a re-read of Teaming. I'm gonna work on that over the next few days as I wait for the guy in the brown truck to bring the books Adam has recommended. I also am going to have to research into what has been recommended. A lot of the element specific mineral supplements are new to me, so I need to familiarize myself with them before I feel good about putting them down. I hope the discussion continues, as it helps continue my education.

Marc Troyka wrote:I don't see anything particularly wrong with iron sulfate, copper sulfate etc. Chelates are probably expensive, they contain toxic gick like EDTA and they're too available to be used as a long term or fertility building tool. If you balanced your metals using all sulfates you'd probably get sufficient sulfur in the process.

I hope you're not to terribly concerned about EDTA, because most likely you've eaten some today. Pick up a jar of mayonnaise and look at the list of ingredients. You'll see it listed. EDTA is an excellent wait to help solubilize metallic nutrients like iron in the soil, because it keeps them solubilized at pH's far higher than normal. The simplest way to correct the metal deficiencies, and also correct the pH is to add elemental sulfur to the soil. In my own case, I dropped the soil pH of my suburban home's soil from 8.6 down to 6.5 (optimal) in just a few seasons. A second way is to use the commercial product "Ironite", which is a rich source of micronutrients made in the proportions needed by plants. This is far better than screwing around with iron cans and copper pennies, which you might bring copper to toxic levels.

Johnny Niamert wrote:One big 'problem' I have with soil pH, is that it completely discounts the rhizosphere and the very complex and intricate interactions between all the tiny's and the roots. Granted, for example, phosphorus could be completely unavailable to plants and 'locked up' with Al, Fe, Mg, and Ca in a sterile alkaline soil. However as I understand it, through the bacterial, fungal, and other actions present, P can be made readily available to plants even in such alkaline soils, given a healthy and diverse microbial population. So even if rock-P is 'unavailable' to plants in soils like we have, the microbes could/can/will make it available to plants given a chance.

Johnny, you need to know that even microbes have an growth optimal pH, and it is very well documented at what pH's most plants do best at. Of course, this has to be an interaction between both the soil and the plants, the soil and the microbes, and the microbes and the plants. By optimizing the pH of your soil for what plants you want to grow, you are also optimizing the microbial environment too. Focus some attention on getting your soil's pH down into the 6.5 to 7.0 range, and you'll be making the best environment for both your plants and your microbes. There's no reason to be re-inventing the wheel here. Soil and plant scientists have been working on this for decades now, and was already common knowledge among them back in the 50's.

I'm going to re-open this topic and see if I can get some additional recommendations. This is from Logan Labs and I already got recommendations from Solomon's worksheet.

Two soil tests, garden and field. Field is just a new garden that's 5 times less productive.



The first thing I wonder is why my Cation Exchange Capacity is so low given my clay soil. Could be that the clay got rained on a lot (which it does here)... Or that I can't tell a clay from a sand?


So far I've come up with this:

- trace minerals: Solomon recommends azomite or kelp but maybe mulching with my local seaweed will do the trick
- soft rock phosphate (calcium and phosphate): 46 lbs per 1000 sq ft
- Borax: 6oz/1000 sqft
- Ag- lime (for the low pH field only): 14 lbs per 1000 sq ft


Solomon recommended potassium sulfate, 2lbs per 1000 sq ft, but I wonder if I could manage to do that with compost, wood ash, sea weed.

He also recommended manganese sulfate, biomin copper (better than copper sulfate it seems), and zinc sulfate. But it looks to me that the levels of those might be OK from other readings (except maybe zinc in the field)

If I don't apply those, I might have to replace the sulfur with gypsum... Not sure how much. Now I'm worried that the sulfur would leach the magnesium in the field. I guess I could test again next year.


Thanks for any feedback!