Michael Cantrall

May Lotito wrote:Since you have different zones you can have different nutrient managements for each one. For the 2 acres of rehabilitation, leaves as is to let natural succession happen. The detritus and dead roots are slowly releasing nutrients and the abundant sunlight will be favorable for all kinds of pioneer niche plants. You may see years of beautiful wildflower meadow before the tree saplings take over. For the food forest, some type of hugel beds and deep rooted legume covercrops will help building soils and recycle nutrients for the perennial fruit trees. For the annual garden, the nutrient requirement is much higher so you may need to bring in compost or manure from outside. Techniques such as deep mulching, chop and drop and Ruth Stout type composting are all suitable for fast draining soils.

Ah your completely right, I totally forgot I can treat them all independently, I think I might go buy wom cheap landscape flags and start marking off zones. Thanks so much for this idea, it's truly how I want to handle it.

Christopher Weeks wrote:I look forward to seeing the advice you get. I garden on sand, though mine is more like 60' deep and I imagine my season is a lot shorter. I just mulch the hell out of everything. I brought in two dumptrucks of compost when I was starting and now I just use whatever I can produce plus all the chop-n-drop mulch plus all the woodchips I can get dropped off by a tree guy. The more I mulch, the better things grow. Also, everything grows more slowly. I've planted over a hundred apples and they simply don't put on the growth that I read about elsewhere. But they also don't seem nutrient deficient and they don't die. Now what I'm doing is using my best compost on annuals (because I can't afford to have them grow at half-pace) and letting the perennials grow at their own speed.

This is what I'm thinking, maybe not mulch but leaving the branches and stuff were they lay, grow buckwheat and chop and drop it in place. Let all this essentially large scale compost in place.

Terry Frankes wrote:What is the pH?  If you've got fern coming, you've likely got room to add some lime.  With the right lime, you can nudge that sand in the right direction.  Soil tests for N, P, and K are of no use to homesteaders.  They will always test low in poorly managed soils.  Once you transition to a living soil system, you'll have all the NPK you need and with none of the toxicity.  

6.2-6.4 ish, so what I'm hearing is there is a chance the nutrients could be fixed naturally as things start to appear and I plant want I want?

Hey Everyone,
New to all of this and having a little trouble navigating it.

Background: new to me 5 acres, eatonville Washington, 4-5% Southeast slope. It was clear cut by the previous owner 8 months ago. Lots of tree branches and bark covering the ground. Some small ferns and stuff starting to appear. Our hopes are to restore the forest in about 2 acres of zone 4/5, have about an acre of food forest, then a half acre or so of managed annual/biannual crops.

Scenario: Did some soil test and dug some holes. Very low nitrogen and phosphorus, solid pH and potassium levels. Looks like roughly 85% sand. Soil is 3-6 feet above bedrock. Had a biologist out who claimed the site would be full of plants by the spring.

Solutions:
1. I could leave the land as is but the high sand content I don't think will fix itself in any sort of reasonable time frame for me to garden
2. Planting white clover, yarrow, bigleaf maple to help stabilize nutrients
3. Planting a fast growing annual a long with these like buckwheat to get some organic material down.
4. I don't think swales are going to be effective as the soil just drains to well, maybe some hugels above where I'm going to garden.

I'm trying to balance between trying to make healthy soil without planting tons of plants that will take over and be unwieldy. I keep reading make small changes - but in this case small changes seem to equal bad soil for a long time.

I have seen all the sands to soil posts I guess I really just wanted to some opinions on where to draw the line.

Did a soil nutrient test to see where it stands. I did take these outside on natural light but I only had two hands for the picture. Looks like I'm missing some nitrogen and phosphorus.

We did some digging and across the property in 5 holes it appears I'm pretty shallow ranging from 4-6 feet above bedrock, which appears to be broken granite.

I did the soil stratification test and it is definitely heavy in sands, looking like at least 85%.

From these results I'm thinking I might want to get the following going:
White Clover - broadly add nitrogen to the soil.
Yarrow - helps pull phosphorus from the granite.

Before planting anything I need to spend more time to identify what is popping up and what they contribute to the soil.

John C Daley wrote:Have you though of closer smaller swales or the suggestion about the keyline workings?

Thanks for this, I'm going on am adventure learning about key lines now. Definitely considering, seems like could help dispersion without creating a massive mud puddle.

John C Daley wrote:I see the units of measure are in feet, so it looks like a fairly steep block to walk up, is that the case?
What do you have in mind that requires swales?
Planting?
Mud slides are a function of soil type, what is yours?
What do you call heavy rainfall?

From side to side it's about a 20 foot climb over 430 feet so 4.6% ish. The most eastern side is a bit steeper then the rest.

Rainfall is approx 50 inches a year 7 a month during the wet months and an inch during dry summers.

I put soil in a mason jar this morning, I'll let you know approximate %s, hopefully I can recognize them appropriately.

I want to rewild the east side and a border around the property and orchard the middle, small crop area mixed in somewhere.

Hello,
Working on a 5 acre project. The middle of the property holds water well, while the high elevation area seems more dry during rain and the steepest around the edges I'm worried about erosion and steepening of the terrain due to it. I was thinking about placing swales in the two blue lines, I'm new to most of this and would love anyone's two cents?

I'm in the Pacific Northwest, with the heavy rainfall we get is there ever a time where a swale could cause the ground to be so saturated I need to worry about mudslide or anything, as you can see I'm not on a very steep slope but thought I'd ask?

Just a picture of one of my 1500 Douglas Firs, may the odds be ever in your favor little guys.

I love this, they are so fluffy!