Author Topic: How would you prepare a hole for planting years later?  (Read 3131 times)

BonsaiBeast

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How would you prepare a hole for planting years later?
« on: October 25, 2018, 02:57:42 PM »
So I have some spots in my yard selected for planting Garcinia trees.

However my trees are only a few months old right now. I will keep them in pots for the next couple of years in order for them to develop in protected conditions.

So, in the mean time, I have a few spots with nothing growing.

My question is:

What should I do to prepare my soil for the garcinia trees? Currently, my soil is on the alkaline side, and I need to get it more acidic. What would you all recommend? Should I plant anything to try and make deposits back into the soil? What crops?

Thank you

skhan

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Re: How would you prepare a hole for planting years later?
« Reply #1 on: October 25, 2018, 03:43:27 PM »
My experience with growing a few garcinias over the last few years is that they require a lot of water.
I have a drip line to each of them now and they are doing fine (full sun).
My first attempt, in the shade of a 15ft pigeon pea tree and heavily mulched, nearly killed all my trees.
Most of the leaves dropped, eventually, I dug them up and repotted them. (did fine after)

So, I'd experiment with making the area hold more water.
Tree trimmer mulch that decayed in my yard turned into a wet peat moss type texture that my plants are loving.
If you get the same results there I'd dig a hole and backfill it with mulch, topping it off every time it decays.
Then plant the Garcnina in that hole once its ready

BonsaiBeast

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Re: How would you prepare a hole for planting years later?
« Reply #2 on: October 25, 2018, 03:51:17 PM »
My experience with growing a few garcinias over the last few years is that they require a lot of water.
I have a drip line to each of them now and they are doing fine (full sun).
My first attempt, in the shade of a 15ft pigeon pea tree and heavily mulched, nearly killed all my trees.
Most of the leaves dropped, eventually, I dug them up and repotted them. (did fine after)

So, I'd experiment with making the area hold more water.
Tree trimmer mulch that decayed in my yard turned into a wet peat moss type texture that my plants are loving.
If you get the same results there I'd dig a hole and backfill it with mulch, topping it off every time it decays.
Then plant the Garcnina in that hole once its ready

Awesome advice! Should I also be adding a nitrogen source like fresh leaves? I was thinking of making a really deep lasagna of wood chips, green leaves, soil, wood chips, green leaves, soil in that order.

pineislander

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Re: How would you prepare a hole for planting years later?
« Reply #3 on: October 25, 2018, 04:24:22 PM »
Build compost piles on each site & the soil underneath will benefit. Organic matter will bring ph closer to neutral. The disturbance of turning the piles will eliminate weeds. In two years you should have several batches to work with.
18 day compost:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uyqtnk60U_8
You might try using rings of fence wire to hold each pile together like this:

http://whatcom.wsu.edu/ag/compost/Wire%20ring%20bins.htm

Zpusher

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Re: How would you prepare a hole for planting years later?
« Reply #4 on: October 25, 2018, 06:21:12 PM »
Build compost piles on each site & the soil underneath will benefit. Organic matter will bring ph closer to neutral. The disturbance of turning the piles will eliminate weeds. In two years you should have several batches to work with.
18 day compost:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uyqtnk60U_8
You might try using rings of fence wire to hold each pile together like this:

http://whatcom.wsu.edu/ag/compost/Wire%20ring%20bins.htm
This^
 did this in a corner of my yard a few years ago here in North Texas where we have hard clay, to this day it's still nice and loose.  Avoid disturbing the soil until you plant.

achetadomestica

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Re: How would you prepare a hole for planting years later?
« Reply #5 on: October 26, 2018, 04:35:41 AM »
Earlier this year a member had a Luc's Garcinia that was very large for it's
age and flowering. Some other members doubted the tree was only 4-5 years old.
The member said the location was previously where chickens were raised and the
dirt was very rich and black. I understood that Garcinia have a long tap root which must
develop before the lateral roots. So far all the Garcinia I have attempted to grow in pots
barely grow. I wondered if they would grow quicker if they were in the ground earlier so
the tap root doesn't get hindered? I planted a yearling Luc's Garcinia recently and will
compare it to the 4 I have in pots. I did get some extra deep pots to put my Garcinia in.
Another thing to consider is that if your chosen spot gets too much direct light you could put a temporary
cover over them until they get 4 feet or so.

skhan

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Re: How would you prepare a hole for planting years later?
« Reply #6 on: October 26, 2018, 07:57:20 AM »
My experience with growing a few garcinias over the last few years is that they require a lot of water.
I have a drip line to each of them now and they are doing fine (full sun).
My first attempt, in the shade of a 15ft pigeon pea tree and heavily mulched, nearly killed all my trees.
Most of the leaves dropped, eventually, I dug them up and repotted them. (did fine after)

So, I'd experiment with making the area hold more water.
Tree trimmer mulch that decayed in my yard turned into a wet peat moss type texture that my plants are loving.
If you get the same results there I'd dig a hole and backfill it with mulch, topping it off every time it decays.
Then plant the Garcnina in that hole once its ready

Awesome advice! Should I also be adding a nitrogen source like fresh leaves? I was thinking of making a really deep lasagna of wood chips, green leaves, soil, wood chips, green leaves, soil in that order.

The lasagna method you described seems like it would work.
I've only used it for raised beds for gardens.

The main thing is if you have the time, use it to build your soil.
I personally wouldn't only do it on soil level, I'd go deeper or mix it in.
Garcinias suffered enough drought stress here in my climate, assuming San Diego is drier, I'd take as much precaution as i can.

Or just run a drip line out like I ended up doing.


BonsaiBeast

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Re: How would you prepare a hole for planting years later?
« Reply #7 on: November 20, 2018, 04:06:36 PM »
So I went ahead and dug out a pretty big hole and filled it back in with the lasagna method of branches and woodchips (and food scraps). Here are some photos, the hole is about 25 feet long, 5 feet deep, and about 3 feet across.











DurbanDude

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Re: How would you prepare a hole for planting years later?
« Reply #8 on: November 20, 2018, 05:13:54 PM »
I would advise against putting organic material deeper than 10-12" in the soil. Air has trouble penetrating past 8-12" so you might be creating a future muck pit where anaerobic bacteria thrive. I've never used the lasagna method but I've only ever seen it on raise beds/hugelkultur where aeration isn't a problem.

If you want to add water retention to soil then biochar might be the best long term solution. If you want to add aeration to soil then raising the planting location and adding pumice or rice hulls would work.

The digging you did seems like a great start to loosening up the soil. These ideas are not my own, more information can be found here regarding soil > http://www.lagunahillsnursery.com/SOIL-INFO.html
« Last Edit: November 20, 2018, 06:21:18 PM by DurbanDude »

BonsaiBeast

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Re: How would you prepare a hole for planting years later?
« Reply #9 on: November 20, 2018, 05:44:01 PM »
I would advise against putting organic material deeper than 10-12" in the soil. Air has trouble penetrating past 8-12" so you might be creating a future muck pit where anaerobic bacteria thrive. I've never used the lasagna method but I've only ever seen it on raise beds/hugelkultur where aeration isn't a problem.

If you want to add water retention to soil then biochar might be the best long term solution. If you want to add aeration to soil then raising the planting location and adding pumice or rice hulls would work.

The digging you did seems like a great start to loosing up the soil. These ideas are not my own, more information can be found here regarding soil > http://www.lagunahillsnursery.com/SOIL-INFO.html

Too late now haha. The hole has been refilled.

Do you think the threat of anaerobic bacteria is still there if the hole drains well? Also, its hard to explain, but this hole is just next to a slope, so even when 5 feet down, the organic matter is not 5 feet from the air, as there is air available in the lateral direction.

DurbanDude

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Re: How would you prepare a hole for planting years later?
« Reply #10 on: November 20, 2018, 06:29:29 PM »


Too late now haha. The hole has been refilled.

Do you think the threat of anaerobic bacteria is still there if the hole drains well? Also, its hard to explain, but this hole is just next to a slope, so even when 5 feet down, the organic matter is not 5 feet from the air, as there is air available in the lateral direction.

I am not an expert on this with decades of experience so this is just a guess. Considering the slope and the sandy soil I would say its most likely nothing to worry about. It might work like a hugelkultur setup.

BonsaiBeast

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Re: How would you prepare a hole for planting years later?
« Reply #11 on: November 20, 2018, 07:31:08 PM »


Too late now haha. The hole has been refilled.

Do you think the threat of anaerobic bacteria is still there if the hole drains well? Also, its hard to explain, but this hole is just next to a slope, so even when 5 feet down, the organic matter is not 5 feet from the air, as there is air available in the lateral direction.

I am not an expert on this with decades of experience so this is just a guess. Considering the slope and the sandy soil I would say its most likely nothing to worry about. It might work like a hugelkultur setup.

That's the idea. It seems like I might be able to get away with it in this dry climate, but I dont really know haha

Guanabanus

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Re: How would you prepare a hole for planting years later?
« Reply #12 on: November 20, 2018, 08:09:29 PM »
Half a year or so from now, dig a hole into and check for too much muckiness or water-rot stench.  If there is a problem, you might be able to auger in from the slope to insert perforated drain pipes.

When you do plant, dig all the way to the bottom of that trench to fill with non-organic matter, so that the plant's root ball protrudes an inch or more above the surounding soil, so that the root-crown of the plant will not end up in a deep basin, or buried--- sandy loam, perlite, charcoal (former organic matter, won't decompose for millenia), rock dusts.
Har

Frog Valley Farm

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Re: How would you prepare a hole for planting years later?
« Reply #13 on: November 21, 2018, 10:45:28 AM »
The best thing to do is get a diverse group of plants, legumes, daikon radish, winter rye and others grrowing.  Then feed the soil biology with organic matter periodically with compost, compost tea, earth worm castings, alfalfa pellets, raw animal manure, etc. in small amounts.  Using plant soluble fertilizers should be avoided for healthy plants and natural nutrient cycling.  Probably the worse thing to do is leave the dirt bare and pile it in mounds and walk all over it as this causes compaction and kills any life you had left in it.  Hugelkultur mostly works due to living plants growing on top of the mounds.  Having  a compost pile on top of the dirt might cause compaction and create anerobic conditions below ground.

Triloba Tracker

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Re: How would you prepare a hole for planting years later?
« Reply #14 on: November 21, 2018, 10:59:53 AM »
Build compost piles on each site & the soil underneath will benefit. Organic matter will bring ph closer to neutral. The disturbance of turning the piles will eliminate weeds. In two years you should have several batches to work with.
18 day compost:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uyqtnk60U_8
You might try using rings of fence wire to hold each pile together like this:

http://whatcom.wsu.edu/ag/compost/Wire%20ring%20bins.htm

This is exactly what I was going to suggest. I did this for tree sites.
Just be sure you do not till-in the organic matter itself into the backfill when you plant the trees. Pull the compost away to the bare soil, plant the tree, and you could then return a top-dressing layer of an inch or 2 of the compost.

I do not believe in amending native soil.
 The only similar thing i have done is to dig-in elemental sulfur to the future planting site to lower pH. Some would probably not even suggest this.

Triloba Tracker

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Re: How would you prepare a hole for planting years later?
« Reply #15 on: November 21, 2018, 11:49:42 AM »
Having  a compost pile on top of the dirt might cause compaction and create anerobic conditions below ground.

Basically i agree - I would not do a "pile" much deeper than a foot.....nothing like a full-on compost pile like you would do if you were just trying to make compost.

Frog Valley Farm

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Re: How would you prepare a hole for planting years later?
« Reply #16 on: November 21, 2018, 04:49:52 PM »
If you are trying to provide a healthy environment for trees to flourish you need a fungal dominate soil.  Michorizae fungi cannot survive for more than a few weeks without roots in the soil.  If you plan on starting a market garden then you would just use your dirt and compost which would be a bacteria dominant soil.

Mikey

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Re: How would you prepare a hole for planting years later?
« Reply #17 on: November 23, 2018, 09:55:49 PM »
I would recommend putting down an irrigation pipe going vertical so that u can feed deep roots when the tree get bigger.  And you can save on water by directly watering the deep roots.