Best way to improve soil quality when you have water restrictions, hard pan clay and alleopathic trees ?
al·le·lop·a·thy | \ ə-ˈlē-lə-ˌpa-thē , -ˈle-lə-; also ˌa-lə-ˈlä-pə-thē
: the suppression of growth of one plant species by another due to the release of toxic substances
Have been considering gypsom and maybe hydrogel ?
I was gonna say: Gypsum and low amounts of organics. Don’t overdue the organics.
Which trees are you referring to?
Walnut, Pine, eucalyptus there are others but I have just those with hard pan soil.
Improving hard pan clay pretty much requires you to remove the clay and replace it with something else. Some trees actually love that stuff, oaks will burrow deep and enjoy the richer nutrients clay has to offer, but a lot of other trees will not like it.
What’s the shape of the land? The biggest problem with trying to improve clay is that you create pockets that accumulate water that can’t run off, fomenting root diseases if not outright drowning the roots.
Step one is sorting out water drainage if needed. There are several options from there. You can work into the soil a fuck ton of organic material (you too will be using foul language shortly after you start). Easier would be to just build your soil up by dumping 2~3 feet of dirt on top and planting in that. Top soil by the truck full is not that expensive. You can do individual mounds, rows, or raise the entire area.
I don’t know if this is the “best” since I have not tried it but will in the spring; we have hard clay and drainage issues (but no allelopathy) and I was going to plant iron and clay cowpeas in May after our last frost date around our small home orchard.
They mature in 3 mo, can grow in shade, have deep roots that can break clay, are legumes so nitrogen fix and are sensitive to frost so will die off and add a lot of biomass/organic matter in the fall (without the added work of tilling them under); you can also eat them (aka black eyed peas) and they dont seem expensive (for seeds) and have many many vendors
They will attract deer, who will forage it, and so it might create a new problem or worsen an existing one. To be determined for us.
Anyway, I have not planted them yet but this profile seems attractive for our heavy clay soil and will help remediate it through its deep root structure, nitrogen fixing and then after the season, the no-till increase in biomass and organic matter
Groundhog radishes will punch holes in hardpan.
This incoherent, unclear topic seems to try to address both plant toxins and soil drainage…but fails utterly to connect them in an informational fashion.