Anyone? My soil is contaminated and someone gave me a smooshed 5,000 gal water tank that I’m building 4 pots that hold aprox 800 gallons each. Which works out to almost 4 cubic yards of soil- each. Am thinking of growing 12 - 15 foot cherrys in them. Maybe an orange or myers lemon. Maybe service berries if I get another tank. Anyone done something like this?
Yes, I know they’d do better in the ground. But… my soil is contaminated and there aren’t too many spots that are safe to plant. The previous owners had broken cars, trash and car parts all over the place.
These 250 gallon containers seem like they’d be the way to go. They’re very common and available, and should last decently well with the metal frame. I bet figs or any fully dwarf root stock tree would do fine in them.
That looks really nice, but people who use those for fertilizer tend to get new ones every few years. The plastic doesn’t last many years in the sun.
That fig does look happy in 250 gallons. I wonder how old it is.
The plastic doesn’t seem to last many years in direct sun with those white ones. The green water tanks made out of heavy duty plastic last decades. Just hard to find one that’s been damaged and being thrown away. But- I have one I cut up. It will probably last 30 years or more.
No, but it has motor oil, transmission fluid and antifreeze in it I’m sure, plus household chemicals. I picked out 2 full barrels of broken glass by hand so far, I’m not going to trust most of it for anything edible.
It’ s OK. My neighbor’s boss owns pot farms and had to get rid of some soil. He dropped off 2 huge dump truck loads of nice potting soil in my driveway for free and another load is coming at some point. I probably have 25 cubic yards.
I would consider having some soil testing done by an environmental lab. As terrible and sad as it is that someone allowed their trash to contaminate the soil, it’s possible that it would take more than the fluids contained in a couple of cars to raise concentrations to a level that is a health concern. Might be worth it to find out, anyway.
Oh, It was more than a couple. There were 15 cars in various stages of decay plus he fixed many other people’s cars on the lot and threw the parts down the hill and in the stream. Aside from the cars there were more than 48 yards of trash hauled out of the yard. It was a literal dump. I still have a pile of toxic liquid stuff I haven’t brought to the dump yet.
But, the property was hella cheap… And I have free good soil. And it doesn’t look like they cooked meth here. Just too much alcohol… It will be worth it.
I think the soil is good enough that it’s not a hazard to me as it is, walking on it etc, but I won’t grow food in the flat spots.
i would still get the soil tested. mother nature can take a beating and still thrive. about 15 yrs ago we had a tanker truck overturn and dump his whole load of gasoline in the ground in this one spot about 20 mi. from here. the insurance paid to drill 15 test wells where it was dumped about a month later. amazingly they found nothing and the houses nearby had their wells tested for 10yrs after that. nothing. im not sure how many gallons those tankers carry but its alot. i bet your soil is in better shape than you think.
The best we can do for soil testing (realistically) is to test for heavy metals. While they are a good general indicator for soil contamination, they certainly don’t cover the literally thousands of chemicals one would have to test for to determine whether there are other soil contaminants.
That all said, I’ve seen good research on plant uptake of toxins, and it seems likely that providing ample organic matter and nutrients can persuade the plant to leave most heavy metals—and perhaps other contaminants—in the ground.
If I had soil that I knew for a fact was contaminated, I’d be tempted to go the giant container route too. Then again, I suffered a toxic exposure injury while at work, so I’m likely more sensitive to this kind of thing (and now make choices accordingly).
I have a friend who is a retired EPA agent specialized in soil contamination, and in his opinion, the general public (including gardeners) consistently underestimate how much harm soil toxins can cause.
Curious what non-heavy metal contaminants specifically you are talking about? PCBs, dioxins, pfafs?
In water these are serious contaminants but all of these bind very tightly to soils (especially clays, they use clays to remediate them and lock them away) and aren’t meaningfully taken up by fruit trees, and especially not brought into the fruits themselves, maybe don’t grow root vegetables if you are really scared of them
Many other organic compounds are quickly broken down in soil
Heavy metals would be my biggest concern
This is all coming from a geologist who’s father did environmental remediation his whole life
There is no specific chemical with which I’m concerned. I just understand that testing for heavy metals is only one tiny tip of the iceberg, in terms of contaminants.
I am admittedly not a toxic soil expert, but my friend who is claims the risk is not simply from plant uptake. In his (expert) estimation, off-gassing (yeah even outdoors) and directly handling the soil are just as big—or perhaps bigger—risks.
But I’m not an expert, I’m simply passing along what I’ve been taught.
Thank you Danzeb. Yeah I’m thinking I could definitely do up to 12 maybe 15 ft high. I guess they wouldn’t get pot bound, IDK. Have you done that or know of any?
I understand what you’re saying, I really do. I’m a scientist myself, and I don’t enjoy sensationalism or even just overly simplistic logic. I know there are many who will balk at any chemical, no matter what. Which is silly, in my view.
As someone who has become gravely ill as a result of a known toxic exposure, I think I’m less likely to shrug it off as an acceptable risk. I used to be MUCH less risk-averse than I am now. FWIW, the chemicals that harmed me (PCE / TCE) had been in the soil for over three decades before it made us sick (there were several of us). While it’s true it was an indoor environment, it was also a very large and well ventilated warehouse. And when the experts became involved, they could get elevated readings of those chemicals with their devices over a block away, outdoors. My EPA friend told me that he didn’t feel very comfortable stepping foot in the building for even a minute.
That’s just the chemical with which I’m familiar. I know with my body (literally) that it’s dangerous stuff, even decades later, even after significant ground water, even in well ventilated areas. I am sharing just to offer some perspective on where a non-chemist like me might be coming from when it comes to making blanket statements about the overall safety of chemicals in soil. It certainly changed how I see the world, and I am definitely more cautious now than I used to be. Perhaps to a fault, but that’s ok with me.
I appreciate your knowledge too, and am glad there are people in the world who know all the ins and outs of the thousands of chemicals out there. I am sure many (or as you imply, most) are perfectly safe. But I do know that’s not true across the board, based on my lived experience alone.
