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Mon, Jan 31, 11 at 11:11
| My fall soil test called for 10 lbs/1000ft of calcitic lime, so I'm putting down 20 lbs/1000ft of wood ashes. It's tempting to put them down now with snow on the ground helping get an even distribution, but I wonder if I'm better off waiting until the snow is gone.
I suppose ash on the snow will help it melt a bit faster, but meltwater might dissolve the ash, too. |
Follow-Up Postings:
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| There is mixed opinion on the value/wisdom of adding wood ash to soil, one school thinks its awful and should never be done, the other school says fling it often. I fall in the later category, and winter is prime time for flinging. Go for it. |
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| One should apply wood ashes to one's soil as often and as much as one applying something very caustic and could change soil properties drastically, ie. lime. Since you've tested your soil and they needed higher ph, go with david's advice then. |
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| Wood ashes contain about 25 percent Calcium Carbonate, some more and some less, that is very soluble and some other nutrients in much smaller quantites. Depending on your soils pH wood ash can be substituted for part of the Calcium Carbonate (lime) needed to raise a soils pH, although it will do that quicker and for a shorter time. Most of what I see indicates that the best time to apply wood ash to soil is in the fall but few people have much then so early spring is the next best time, when the soil is workable so the ash can be mixed into the soil several weeks before planting. |
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| I blast it out there from late fall onwards. I am on the vineyard with similar sandy soils as you - I've been putting on wood ash liberally for years and still my ph is not at all high and K is low. I do have very ample levels of Ca, however, probably because of the wood ash. I guess Ca leaches slowly, while K is sucked up right away by the crops. I always sow ash into the furrows when planting peas, and with beans if I have any left. |
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