Hi Everyone
Can anyone possibly help with a cost effective method of doing basic soil analysis, mainly to get the PH correct.
Thanks in advance for some good advice.
Regards
Yvonne & Ted
-
smokensqueal
- Green Thumb
- Posts: 392
- Joined: Thu Jun 26, 2008 1:36 pm
- Location: St. Louis, MO Metro area
If all you are looking for is pH then there is a few different things you can use to test that. I just bought a probe that gives me a reading after 1 minute. There are others that will give you a few more readings that you can by at a hardware store. If you need more then that I think you can bring it to some government place and they will do the testing either free or fairly cheep I though. I never had that done and can't remember at this time what it's called. Maybe look up your county's water and soil conservation office and they could tell you.
Hi Ted,
I did some soil testing last weekend using a Mosser Lee Soil Test Kit bought at Lowes, did not cost much.. I was able to test the soil pH, as well as test for the N P K Nutrients so important to plants ( nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium. It was quite a cool operation, using the tablets and test tubes which come in the package along with my various soil samples, distilled water and measuring cup. I only needed a lab coat to feel like I was conducting a major scientific research.
.
I was glad I did the tests as I was about ready to give up growing certain veggies. They were very useful and proved my soil was very low in nitrogen and potassium; pH was a a bit over the ideal so we will be trying to improved the soil to tolerate the needs of the various veggies for next spring when we take up some more of the lawn... Tomatoes did well this year in bit of lawn space we gave up. We are now ready to give up much more
( less grass to cut and more stuff to eat and share).
Hope your test results are better than mine was .
Ria
I did some soil testing last weekend using a Mosser Lee Soil Test Kit bought at Lowes, did not cost much.. I was able to test the soil pH, as well as test for the N P K Nutrients so important to plants ( nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium. It was quite a cool operation, using the tablets and test tubes which come in the package along with my various soil samples, distilled water and measuring cup. I only needed a lab coat to feel like I was conducting a major scientific research.
.I was glad I did the tests as I was about ready to give up growing certain veggies. They were very useful and proved my soil was very low in nitrogen and potassium; pH was a a bit over the ideal so we will be trying to improved the soil to tolerate the needs of the various veggies for next spring when we take up some more of the lawn... Tomatoes did well this year in bit of lawn space we gave up. We are now ready to give up much more
( less grass to cut and more stuff to eat and share).Hope your test results are better than mine was .
Ria