Thank you Casey for your very informative video. It's take me quite a while to finally work out that feeding my soil is the key to making gardening in WA easier. Dsatco products have been brilliant and I'll be adding the clay you suggest. Is the Piggypost suitable for native plants too?
Such a pleasure! It took me several years too, to realise that it’s just false economy to not put effort into the soil. I reckon you’ll see a big difference with the clay too! Hmm for native plants I’m honestly not the best person to ask - the piggy post is likely too strong. Green life soil co has a native plant soil mix that I’ve heard good things about, maybe give them a call and see? :)
Charmaine that makes me so so happy to hear!! I was recently talking to an environmental scientist about why soil wetter doesn’t work in our soils - super interesting stuff! Might be worth a follow up newsletter to explain it all! For now though I’m so glad you’ve been having some success improving your soil! ☺️☺️
Hmm ok so for grass it depends if you have couch grass or buffalo - any idea what yours is? Buffalo is much easier to keep out of beds than couch, so if it’s buffalo you could go for bricks, limestone blocks, coffee rock, metal edging - anything really. Couch grass has deeper roots and is much more invasive, so for couch grass you’d want deep edging that can be buried close to half a meter deep to make sure the couch doesn’t get in!
I think you could squeeze those trees in if you did it ASAP, mulched well and were super diligent with watering them most days all through summer!
We have a whole garden of dead grass and sandy soil, would I be best to buy trick loads of clay and poo and improve the whole thing, or just in holes for plants?
Hi Anna! good question! It depends what plants you're wanting to grow - what are your hopes for the garden? veggies? flowers? trees? For trees you can get away with just improving where you'll plant the trees (especially if they are tough trees), but for the rest I'd be aiming to slowly improve the soil in every bed
Hey Casey, any suggestions on how to improve the workability of more clay based soils? My soil is pretty dry and hard at the moment and is predominantly clay based - thankfully its not super moisture repellant and when doing a water soaking in test in does soak in pretty fast (within a couple of mins) but its super hard to dig through so I worry about delicate little plant roots trying to push through.
Ohh heavy clay soils are so tough (literally)! I'd recommend looking into charles dowding if you havent already - he has heavy clay soil and uses a no dig method plus heaps of organic matter to improve and loosen his soil. Adding organic matter, planting tough plants with tap roots to help break up the soil (fennel, parsnips, daikon etc) and leaving plants roots in the ground to break down after they've finished for the season can all help too! :) you're gonna get the strongest arms ever btw!! haha
Ah awesome! Thanks for the tip, I’ll check him out. I’ve been researching as I think my problem is more the soil compaction rather than the clay per se at this stage but it seems it’s a similar approach to fixing it! Lots of organic matter and getting the worms back moving!
Hey Casey! How about soil improvement for grassed verges. Mine are extremely dry and the grass in some areas are non existent. Can you just throw on the clay and manure and rake it over? I'm guessing maybe spiking it all over with something like a pitchfork then adding the above mentioned? then maybe adding grass seed when more improved? Thanks :)
Hey Catherine! Good question! For lawns I've never actually added clay... I think I'd be more inclined to top dress with a very light compost/manure mix... maybe like DSATCO piggypost in very small quantities?? Is your verge irrigated?
Thank you Casey for your very informative video. It's take me quite a while to finally work out that feeding my soil is the key to making gardening in WA easier. Dsatco products have been brilliant and I'll be adding the clay you suggest. Is the Piggypost suitable for native plants too?
Such a pleasure! It took me several years too, to realise that it’s just false economy to not put effort into the soil. I reckon you’ll see a big difference with the clay too! Hmm for native plants I’m honestly not the best person to ask - the piggy post is likely too strong. Green life soil co has a native plant soil mix that I’ve heard good things about, maybe give them a call and see? :)
Hi Casey, I watched your video on improving your soil. For years I spent a lot of money on wets soil and it really didn’t do a lot.
Followed your instructions and adding clay absolutely works a treat.
Thank you 🙏
Charmaine that makes me so so happy to hear!! I was recently talking to an environmental scientist about why soil wetter doesn’t work in our soils - super interesting stuff! Might be worth a follow up newsletter to explain it all! For now though I’m so glad you’ve been having some success improving your soil! ☺️☺️
Hi Casey, I'm really enjoying your emails and feel inspired after reading each one!
I have a couple of questions.
1. What garden edging do you recommend to keep grass out of the beds?
2. Do you think it's a bit too late to plant fruit trees (avo, mango and apple)? Should I rather wait for winter?
Hey Katie! Aw I’m so glad you’re enjoying them! 🥰
Hmm ok so for grass it depends if you have couch grass or buffalo - any idea what yours is? Buffalo is much easier to keep out of beds than couch, so if it’s buffalo you could go for bricks, limestone blocks, coffee rock, metal edging - anything really. Couch grass has deeper roots and is much more invasive, so for couch grass you’d want deep edging that can be buried close to half a meter deep to make sure the couch doesn’t get in!
I think you could squeeze those trees in if you did it ASAP, mulched well and were super diligent with watering them most days all through summer!
Hi , Casey,
We have a whole garden of dead grass and sandy soil, would I be best to buy trick loads of clay and poo and improve the whole thing, or just in holes for plants?
Thanks Anna
Hi Anna! good question! It depends what plants you're wanting to grow - what are your hopes for the garden? veggies? flowers? trees? For trees you can get away with just improving where you'll plant the trees (especially if they are tough trees), but for the rest I'd be aiming to slowly improve the soil in every bed
Loved the video Casey! Thanks so much x
Thanks Lynette! I'm so glad you enjoyed it!
Hey Casey, any suggestions on how to improve the workability of more clay based soils? My soil is pretty dry and hard at the moment and is predominantly clay based - thankfully its not super moisture repellant and when doing a water soaking in test in does soak in pretty fast (within a couple of mins) but its super hard to dig through so I worry about delicate little plant roots trying to push through.
Ohh heavy clay soils are so tough (literally)! I'd recommend looking into charles dowding if you havent already - he has heavy clay soil and uses a no dig method plus heaps of organic matter to improve and loosen his soil. Adding organic matter, planting tough plants with tap roots to help break up the soil (fennel, parsnips, daikon etc) and leaving plants roots in the ground to break down after they've finished for the season can all help too! :) you're gonna get the strongest arms ever btw!! haha
Ah awesome! Thanks for the tip, I’ll check him out. I’ve been researching as I think my problem is more the soil compaction rather than the clay per se at this stage but it seems it’s a similar approach to fixing it! Lots of organic matter and getting the worms back moving!
Hey Casey! How about soil improvement for grassed verges. Mine are extremely dry and the grass in some areas are non existent. Can you just throw on the clay and manure and rake it over? I'm guessing maybe spiking it all over with something like a pitchfork then adding the above mentioned? then maybe adding grass seed when more improved? Thanks :)
Hey Catherine! Good question! For lawns I've never actually added clay... I think I'd be more inclined to top dress with a very light compost/manure mix... maybe like DSATCO piggypost in very small quantities?? Is your verge irrigated?