Compost tea to help sandy pinelands "soil"

Welcome Eric. I am eager to learn all I can to aid in growing anything in my sandy pinelands "soil"!

aid in growing anything in my sandy pinelands "soil"

Thanks for the welcome Rita.  Your soil sounds interesting what is the altitude where you are, and what do you like to grow ?

eric fisher wrote:

aid in growing anything in my sandy pinelands "soil"

Thanks for the welcome Rita.  Your soil sounds interesting what is the altitude where you are, and what do you like to grow ?

We have 7 shady acres in Burlington County NJ, 39' above sea level. Our property is located over the Kirkland Cohansey Aquifer, about 45 minutes from the Atlantic Ocean at Long Beach Island,  We recently had a forest stewardship plan done, and the report says we have Evesboro and Lakewood sand(interestingly those are names of towns nearby) Both sands are described as coarse textured , moderate to low fertility,acidic,well drained, good for pine and oak( which we have a lot of!). In the front of the house (only semi sunny area-plans are to make it sunnier with selective tree removal) we have put in raised beds with some basic topsoil we had trucked in. We would like to grow some vegetables, (major goal to get asparagus going) berries and maybe pawpaw. I have fenced in a small area (heavy deer population) on the south side of the house for my gooseberries, currants, blueberries. I put my serviceberry  in the ground with some soil remediation and it still  looks very sad. We are currently supplying the local hummingbird population with sugar water via 4 feeders, and would prefer to grow perennials  that would support them and other pollinators.
Thank you!

I put my serviceberry  in the ground with some soil remediation and it still  looks very sad.

Hi Rita,

I am surprised that your serviceberry is struggling, they are pretty tough. You have that radiative cooling thing where you are I think; maybe try and set up a bit of micro-climate, wind shields etc. add some more organic matter because your soil is very sandy and will leach a lot of nutrients. I guess you'll have good chances with the blueberries.  Do you have access to manure ?

It just occurs to me that regarding your serviceberry it might be a VAM thing (Vesicular Arbuscular Mycorrhiza).  Go and find a healthy and thriving serviceberry a get some soil from nearby the roots (you could take a cutting while you are at it...).  You can also get VAM online then the fun part is trying to get it to interact with your serviceberry.

Good luck with your project.