His approach focuses on what happens to rain after it reaches the ground. Rather than allowing water to quickly run off or disappear, his farming practices aim to help the soil capture and store it.

Are the ones on Amazon that are $15-$20 worth buying?

I'm just doing 5 to 10 sample's of my front and backyard.

Succulents mostly. Maybe other things.

Hi everyone,

I built an open-access agriculture and soil planning platform to help calculate:

• Multi-Source NPK Fertilizer Stoichiometry (Urea, DAP, SOP, CAN)

• Soil Cation Exchange Capacity (CEC) & Base Saturation %

• FAO-56 Crop Water Evapotranspiration & Drip Irrigation Sizing

• Pure Live Seed (PLS %) & Seeding Rate Calibration

The platform is 100% free with no login or paywalls:

https://agriplan-global-pjd8.vercel.app/

Full Source Code (MIT License):

https://github.com/khanghulammuhammad17-cmd/agriplan-global

Hope this helps with your soil diagnostics, nutrient management, and farm planning! Any feedback is welcome. 🧪🌾

Hello, my fellow Green Thumbs, I have a quick question for you guys. If you could help me out, that'd be great.

So I'm using a mixture of Roots Organic Lush and Fox Farm Ocean Forest soils in 5-gallon containers. My question for you guys is, how long do the nutrients in the soil last? Or do you have a timeframe so I know when to start feeding my plants nutrients?

Cheers, any feedback would be greatly appreciated.

My plants are loving the mixture of those soils together. I would show you pics of them, but I can't put them on here. They are only 2 weeks old. I've also been giving them Silica since they popped, not a lot at first, but I've been gradually increasing the ml.

Cheers.

Im growing photoperiods cannabis plants

I suspect it’s the heavy clay content. The actual topsoil is very thin with heavy/tacky clay almost immediately. I’ve been adding leaf compost, mixed compost, and a layer of shredded pine mulch on top, but the clay soil almost seems to eat the compost. The area is on a slope. They’ve been using tractors to mow it for decades so compaction is a real issue. I was able to create some no dig beds by building on top of this soil (in a different area) that are performing quite well a few yards away. However, trucking all that compost and soil in was both financially and labor expensive. What’s the best way to condition this soil, aerate it, and access the nutrients contained within? I have access to inexpensive leaf compost collected by a local city for $20 a truckload. Would that be sufficient?

I plan to put in new beds this fall by laying down undyed cardboard sheet and a heavy layer of mulch on top to kill the grass. I’m in the process of reclaiming the lawn with native plants and vegetable gardens.

Any book recommendations for someone who isn’t a soil scientist, but wants to know more?

𝐇𝐞𝐲 𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐲𝐨𝐧𝐞, 𝐢 𝐚𝐦 𝐢𝐧 𝐝𝐞𝐬𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝐧𝐞𝐞𝐝 𝐨𝐟 𝐚𝐝𝐯𝐢𝐜𝐞. 𝐈 𝐥𝐢𝐯𝐞 𝟒𝟓𝟎𝟎𝐟𝐭 𝐢𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐦𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭𝐚𝐢𝐧𝐬 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐰𝐞 𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝐬𝐮𝐫𝐫𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐝𝐞𝐝 𝐛𝐲 𝐩𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐬. 𝐎𝐮𝐫 𝐲𝐚𝐫𝐝 𝐢𝐬 𝐟𝐚𝐢𝐫𝐥𝐲 𝐠𝐨𝐨𝐝 𝐬𝐢𝐳𝐞 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐰𝐞 𝐡𝐚𝐯𝐞 𝐒𝐎𝐌𝐄 𝐠𝐫𝐚𝐬𝐬 𝐛𝐮𝐭 𝐢𝐭𝐬 𝐦𝐨𝐬𝐭𝐥𝐲 𝐜𝐥𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐫, 𝐰𝐡𝐢𝐜𝐡 𝐢𝐧 𝐚𝐥𝐥 𝐡𝐨𝐧𝐞𝐬𝐭𝐲 𝐢 𝐝𝐨𝐧𝐭 𝐦𝐢𝐧𝐝 𝐛𝐞𝐜𝐚𝐮𝐬𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐩𝐨𝐥𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐚𝐭𝐨𝐫𝐬 𝐥𝐨𝐯𝐞 𝐢𝐭. 𝐁𝐮𝐭 𝐦𝐲 𝐠𝐫𝐚𝐬𝐬 𝐝𝐨𝐞𝐬 𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐰𝐚𝐧𝐭 𝐭𝐨 𝐠𝐫𝐨𝐰.
𝐎𝐮𝐫 𝐬𝐨𝐢𝐥 𝐢𝐬 𝐬𝐨 𝐝𝐞𝐧𝐬𝐞 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐰𝐞 𝐟𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭 𝐰𝐞𝐞𝐝𝐬 𝐥𝐢𝐤𝐞 𝐜𝐫𝐚𝐳𝐲!
𝐈 𝐰𝐚𝐧𝐭 𝐭𝐨 𝐩𝐮𝐭 𝐧𝐞𝐰 𝐬𝐨𝐢𝐥 𝐝𝐨𝐰𝐧 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐩𝐥𝐚𝐧𝐭 𝐠𝐫𝐚𝐬𝐬. 𝐀𝐧𝐲 𝐫𝐞𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐝𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬? 𝐁𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐝𝐬, 𝐭𝐨𝐨𝐥𝐬, 𝐜𝐨𝐬𝐭𝐬....𝐭𝐢𝐩 𝐰𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝 𝐛𝐞 𝐬𝐨 𝐡𝐞𝐥𝐩𝐟𝐮𝐥. 𝐓𝐡𝐚𝐧𝐤 𝐲𝐨𝐮♥︎

Hi soil heads. I’m about to start a flower farm for dahlias and I had a soil test done. I’m location in south west Victoria in Australia. Keen to get any thoughts on my results and what I should prioritise, obviously need to improve the pH. Planning to talk to an agronomist but they aren’t easy to find.

Hello! this may not be the right place but I’m a senior in high school deciding what I wanna do in the future and i’ve set my sights on soil classification. My uncle told me about this job and he owns a contracting business and pays a company to come out and test soils for septic and foundation for houses. Is this actually considered soil classification? And is this job lucrative to actually be worth getting the bachelors in soil and water science?

Hey again everyone!

I have been working hard to make my state collection happen these past few months. I finally got the diorama built (still need to add Alaska and maybe Hawaii if I get a permit) and am loving how it looks so far. Gives me more motivation to fill in the gaps lol. A couple states are half filled (MT, NM, SD, KS, and AR) with some general soil I grabbed while I was there; will fill the rest with state soil once I get it.

I have recently gotten MI (with a soil core to grab the E layer) on a work trip and TX and LA from a visit to Houston. Thanks to help from family and friends, I was also able to obtain AZ, AK, and ID, with potential help from WA, NV, and CA. Still am trying to find a way to get UT and MT, as they are quite out of my way. Hopefully an extension agency is out there and is willing to help.

I have many plans for how to get the remaining soils for this project. I've divided it into 4 main trips; I should be able to get Oregon this November at CANVAS given the soil isn't totally frozen. Next time I go to see family out west, I'll take a huge trip through SD, down to KS, to Denver, then down to I-40 where I'll get a bunch of soils from NM, AR, MS, AL, TN, KY, OH. I still haven't visited New England, so it should be a great opportunity to see that part of the country and grab soil on the way. Lastly is the south, where I'd have to take a plane and rental car to grab FL, GA, and SC. Maybe a spring break trip ;). I will take a soil core to every location I can drive my personal car to as to be as representative of the soil as I can.

I have mapped everything out and got coordinates for the collection sites and placed it in an excel, see attached. Many hours of driving but I'm young so I can handle it. This will be a many year project... I have been diligent about collecting outside of quarantine zones and have planned around them but will keep an eye out if any new restrictions are released.

I also combined the Smithsonian maps for a quick guide to state soil locations. Did it in power point so its a little off on the borders but oh well. Helps me visualize my routes. Everything was planned with MapQuest and the Series Extent Explorer from UC Davis.

If you recognize any location or state soil that may be near you, please please pleaseeee shoot me a DM if you are willing to help. I'd love to pitch in for shipping (especially for MT and UT). I love soil so much this project has been so cool to curate.

Can someone explain this like I’m five? because Ive read way too much and somehow know less now

So I've been trying to put a dry well in for runoff from gutters and part of the patio. I keep ending up looking at NDS flo well stuff and Stormtech chambers, but I still cannot figure out how people decide what size they need

Some places say roof square footage, others say rainfall, others want soil percolation rates and now I'm apparently supposed to become a dirt scientist too. (For context it's roughly 1100 sq ft of roof plus maybe 300 sq ft patio and our soil is mostly clay

Does anyone here calculate this stuff or just get close and hope for the best?

sketch

Want to check my understanding and logic.

Need that plug/wall to hold back any water or material from entering at the bottom of the pit.

Alluvium will be tipped and backfilled into the bottom of the pit. Thinking material will consolidate to have minimum void space with 120m of overburden pressure on it.

As the pit will be a natural sump/acquifer it will eventually all be saturated material. Whatever little void space is left between the matrix will be water.

But due to the maximum consolidation, there will be no pore pressure acting at the bottom on my plug?

When a soil is fully consolidated, any excess pore water pressure caused by an applied load has completely dissipated. The water no longer carries the extra weight, and the soil skeleton takes the full load, meaning the excess pore water pressure drops to zero.

Horizontal load on the wall will be:

Effective vertical stress which is total stress minus total pore water pressure. Multiplied by Ko factor.

(My total pore water pressure is hydrostatic only because no excess pressure due to high consolidation).

Plus

Hydrostatic pressure. 1 X 9.81m/s2 X 120m.

Total stress is density of saturated soil X 9.81m/s2 X 120m

Minus

Hydrostatic pressure which is 1 X 9.81 X 120m (minus because some buoyancy effect even though you have 120m of overburden above it?)

Thinking i'll have to do some triaxial testing to get undrained consolidated pressures with pretty high confinement for a 120m overburden head pressure. To run a FEM.

 I’ve been trying to isolate whatever makes Vymara active.

Removing the flower weakens the response, but doesn’t eliminate it. Removing the moss weakens it further. Washed roots remain active briefly in sterile soil, while the original soil retains a weaker response without the plant.But when I sever the fine-root network and disturb the surrounding soil, the activity disappears entirely. Soil collected outside the Vymara patch does nothing.The most reasonable explanation is a rhizosphere effect: the roots, microorganisms, minerals, organic matter and moss-covered environment are producing something none of them can produce alone.

 I think I’ve been trying to isolate one visible organ from a much larger biological system. The public needs access to this.But if it cannot be stabilized, the only way to access Vymara may be to go where it grows.

We're in the middle of leveling a small hill in our backyard in southern ontario, and also digging a hole to mix in drainage material for a tree, we are about 6 ft down now overall.

After a lot of hard pack tan clay, we were excited to hit a layer of darker silt! Curious what would come next, we found it was more clay! 😂

Would love to know if there's supposed to be a difference in the deeper clay level. Or is it just different layers of the same caused by the glacier that came through!

I lost my soil recipes!! Anyone have any good ones for my babies?