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Sand For Clay Soils

Categories: Soils, Fertilizers and Irrigation

Will beach sand do adobe or clay soil any good? It gets hard at times

and I thought that if I was to put beach sand in the ground the salt in

the sand would do the ground harm.



It is certainly desirable to mix sand with heavy soil for the purpose of

making it lighter - that is, better drained and more friable and

therefore improving it for the growth of plants. Sometimes beach sand

contains a good deal of
salt, which, however, is readily removed by

fresh water, and sand hauled and exposed to the rains rapidly loses any

excess of salt it may contain. Probably with such an amount of sand as

you are likely to use to mix with your adobe, there is no danger at all

from salt. Even if such sand should contain considerable salt, if

applied at the beginning of the rainy season it would be so quickly

distributed as to not constitute a menace to the growth of plants. The

worst adobe can be transformed into a most beautiful garden soil by the

application of sand and stable manure.



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