Heavy Clay Soil

Posts

• steephill Posts: 2,841

  20 January

  It will be an expensive plan. Work out the cost of new topsoil and the cost of disposal of your current clay soil for the volume you want to replace. Be aware that holes dug in heavy clay are likely to just become sumps for water to collect in and that you might be making the problem worse.
  

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• Fire Posts: 19,096

  20 January edited 20 January

  fionafortson49576 said:
  

  My initial thoughts are to hire a micro digger/operator to dig/remove the clay soil and replace the void with topsoil/compost/mulch etc. Basically just sort it out quickly.
  

  It depends how big an area you are plotting. And what the budget is. With a small area or a large budget, you might be fine. What is the contouring like? How does the water move off the land?
  
  

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• GardenerSuze Posts: 5,692

  20 January

  @fionafortson49576 You might want to take a look at my new garden. If you go to 'Garden Design'. Then 'Gardener Suze OAP garden'. Some comments may be helpful, good soil can take years to achieve.
  Perhaps when you know where your borders are going to be concentrate on those areas.
  If you have drainage issues a lawn will also have problems. Poorly drained in winter, dried out in summer.
  The one positive is clay is full of nutrients.

  I have worked as a Gardener for 24 years. My latest garden is a new build garden on heavy clay.

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• Busy-Lizzie Posts: 24,043

  20 January

  I think it should work, but will cost quite a lot. 
  
  I have made a round rose bed 3m across. When I started preparing it I found that under the first 6 inches was clay and down about 18 inches you could have made pots with it. I removed 3 barrow loads of clay and added a barrow load of manure from previous owner's donkey, a barrowload of leaf mould and 8 40L bags of compost which I dug in and mixed with the existing soil. 
  
  I planted it with roses 2 years ago and have mulched it twice since and it has been fine. We had loads of rain in the last 2 or 3 months and parts of the lawn were really boggy. I had to dig up the rose in the centre of the bed because it turned out to be a climber and not the rose I'd ordered. I found the soil was heaps better than it had been, not as boggy and claggy,  although there was still clay at the bottom. There weren't any worms before and now there are lots.

  Dordogne and Norfolk. Clay in Dordogne, sandy in Norfolk.

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• Rubytoo Posts: 1,630

  20 January edited 20 January

  Also bear in mind working on heavy clay soil in wet winter conditions with a piece of heavy machinery with tracks ( albeit a small mini digger) will compact the ground underneath even further.
  
  If you can wait, consider doing it when the ground is drier and weather is better.
  
  If you have a stoney rocky layer beneath the clay, lucky you , I would not go any further than that. Probably leave a bit of clay layer break up and chuck improvers in that then add your topsoil ass deep as you can afford.
  If it really is half a metre down no need, most planting of whatever you want to grow would do perfectly well in a half metre depth of soil.
  
  Just thinking I am 5ft 7 and mixing measurements,  I know it is one metre from ground to my belly button. 
  Although it would be nice to have waist deep topsoil,  I don't think it is needed.
  Of course you can if you wish and can afford it
  
  Good Luck and have fun making your new garden.

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• Allotment Boy Posts: 6,774

  20 January

  I think it will be expensive.  Do not underestimate the quantity of  materials you will need to do this even to a depth of 30cm (1 ft). 

  AB Still learning
  
  

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• timhayes00149025 Posts: 9

  21 January

  wow! have you any idea how much a skip is to hire?
  if i was you id play to my strengths there are loads of nice plants that love claggy wet soil you could dig a pond and have loads of moisture loving plants around it you can use the spoil for landscaping and put raised beds in for vegetables.
  Good Luck Tim.

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• Fire Posts: 19,096

  22 January

  I don't know why people are making assumptions about budget - as they often do on the forum. We maybe speaking to someone who owns a castle or an island, ten acres of land or a thousand. They just asked for perspectives and options. Some people spend tens of thousands on landscaping projects. They are not going to be worrying about the cost of hiring a skip. "Expensive" is a relative term.
  

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• youngalistairyoung4K0pr0XO Posts: 27

  22 January

  fionafortson49576 said:

  The soil in my new garden is very heavy solid clay and is a blank canvas with just  grass/decking/patio. 

  I used to live near RHS Wisley and had amazing soil in which virtually anything grew. 
  

  I’d like to design some flower beds for plants/vegetables with shallow, medium and deep roots and possibly trees. 

  My initial thoughts are to hire a micro digger/operator to dig/remove the clay soil and replace the void with topsoil/compost/mulch etc. Basically just sort it out quickly. I don’t want to ‘work’ the soil over a period of years and risk what I plant dying!
  I was thinking of digging down about a metre but there may be stones similar to the ones we have on the beach about 1/2 metre down so not sure if I can go as deep as one metre. I don’t want to build raised beds.
  Please can anyone advise:
  1. If this is a good or bad plan?
  2. How deep should I dig down?
  3. What proportion of compost/topsoil/mulch, manure I should use for trees, shrubs, perennials, vegetables etc
  Thank you. 

  I lived in knaphill and many years ago there was a brick factory so you know what the soil was like. The problem with replacing your soil is that it will always return it's the natural soil that exists there I dug mine out about 2ft and it returned in 3 years so I wish you luck it will never be great rotting plants in winter extra bulbs will always be a struggle but not impossible. Raised beds is probably the best solution. Shrubs are no problem Philadelphus, lilac, rhododendron, cornus, cherry ,roses, weigela, hibiscus, fuchsia, Paulownia, helianthus.miscanthus.One thing I did when growing plants was not did a hole too deep as this will act like a basin and rot the roots. I once did an experiment by digging 2ft hole tipping a bucket of water in it and wait to see how long it to drain I went back the next day about half was still there.

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• Dovefromabove Posts: 88,147

  22 January edited 22 January

  The only way to do it successfully is to improve the soil over the whole area … digging beds and adding better draining materials in what is effectively a trench will simply create sumps as has already been said … that’s how farmers’ traditional land-drains work. :-/

  
  Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
  
  
  
  
  
  

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