TOPIC: Thoughts from anyone on soil

hillhopper

I'm curious about your technique for collecting the soil sample.
How did you do it?

Guy

Guy,

I know you asked hilltopper about his, but I'll tell you how I did mine. The local farm store I deal with does soil samples, so I picked up a bag they provided and headed to the woods. I went to the area I was thinking about planting in and picked six different spots in the area to dig some soil. I had a little container that I put the different scoops of dirt in, I picked most of the roots and leaves out of the sample, then I mixed up the dirt with the hopes of getting a good idea of what the whole area is like. I don't know if all samples are like this, but my sample bag had a fill to line on it, or it said fill it with a pound of dirt.

guy wrote:

hillhopper

I'm curious about your technique for collecting the soil sample.
How did you do it?

Guy

Guy, In my line of work we have to take soil samples almost every week for some reason or another and this is the way I shown a long time ago to get an accurate test. Get samples from five or six various spots in the area as Jacquo mentioned above, about 1/4 an acre is the largest area to test so if you were looking at 1 acre then 4 tests would be needed. They will always be micro environments in certain areas but ya can't test every square inch. When you take your samples from the ground make sure to dig down five or six inches and not gather anything from the top for your leaves and debri there will naturally be more acidic and alter the ph reading. From your five or six areas you have taken soil from I would say 1 lb would be plenty but I have always gathered enough soil to equal one good handful and it has been sufficient every time.

Hillhopper

Hillhopper

Your soil test is for farm soils, when you test for wild ginseng you need to do it a bit different.

Ginseng tends to grow sideways in the leaf duff or mulch sending only some of it's root fibres down to the mineral soil for moisture. It is rare to see it grow staight down in to the mineral soil. The leaf mulch contains high calcium level from maple tree leaves. They are a bio sink for calcium and contain almost 2%. This is how you get high calcium and a low pH.

The recomended way is to remove the leaves and debris, then dig down only three or four inches thru the mulch layer. You must include the mulch layer. You need to get the soil from around the root not the mineral soil.
This is a recommendation from Bob Beyfuss.

A must read manual, American Ginseng Production in the 21st century. There they can explain this reasoning better than I can.


guy

Guy lol, I don't believe I have ever dug any Ginseng out of leaf duff. Does it grows sideways into a hillside,yes. Anytime I have ever dug mature Seng it has left a gaping hole in the ground that you would twist an ankle off in. I haven't tested for farm soils before but do know that when preparing a sample it should be gathered from the anticipated root zone.. If it's turf then the top two inches should be tested but if your planting trees or shubbery then you would want to test lower, depending upon your plant. In this area if dug deep enough you would hit clay but you would have to go maybe 9 or 10 inches to hit the subsoil which I guess is what you are calling mineral soil.
The high calcium content comes from limestone outcroppings and boulders that are littered everywhere. They are very few if any maples in the tested area. Poplar, Hickory and Chestnut are primarily living in this plot.
Thanks for the insights though

Hillhopper

Hillpopper

Yes, clearing duff, digging six inches is from a standard farm soil test intructions.

After you read the study by Bob Beyfuss; Soil Nutrient Characteristics of Wild Ginseng Populations in New York, New Jersey, Maine and Tennesse. You will see thousands of diggers say they gather ginseng in leaf mulch and duff. And that the roots grow sideways in this layer to gather the calcium from the leaves. Tulip Poplar, Hickory, Black Walnut and Chestnut are also a high calcium sink leaf.

Scott Persons books under planting instructions for his transplants suggest planting them sideways , the way they grow.

Insight is there for your reading. eh!!

guy

Maybe in a your cooler climate it can grow there but around here it better have it's little ass deep enough in the ground so it won't dry out. If any by chance were growing in this layer then after the summer we had this season I can promise ya it's not anymore. We may have each other confused here. Topsoil and duff is two different things. To clarify.... no i have not dug ginseng out of subsoil,yes ginseng grows in the topsoil and sends root hairs lower down for moisture, no ginseng will grow in leaves that I have ever seen and finally yes Canadians must think they know it all. A little southern humor for ya there EH

Hillpopper

Just try reading the American Ginseng Production in the 21st Century, call the Cornell Cooperative of Greene County, Cairo, New York for your copy.
You'll see some familiar names.



Guy

I saw this home remedy PH testing method posted in the internet. It said the following:

Vinegar and Baking Soda Test for PH level.
Another way to roughly estimate the pH level of your soil is to use baking soda and vinegar and add it to a very small soil sample. If you mix a soil sample with distilled water and add some baking soda to the mix, soil that is acidic will fizz. With the vinegar test, if the mixture of soil and vinegar fizzes then your soil is fairly alkaline.

I am going to give it a try today to see if I get any results.
Thanks,
Latt

Latt

Being a taxidermist for the past 25 years, I have tanned thousands of skins, which involves a acid pickel that has a ph of 1.5 which close to what vinegar is. And then neutralizing the acid with baking soda so you end up with a skin that has a ph of about 6.5-7.0

All that test is going to show is if its acidic the ph is any where from 0.0- 7.0 . If the soil is alkaline the ph will be 7.0 or higher. But it will not tell you what the actual PH is, which has a broad range. But it would make a great science experiment.

I have a electronic Ph tester that will accurately test tanning solutions or soil. But it cost me about $120.

I think your best bet for an accurate ph is to send a soil sample for testing.

classicfur