The purple and gray-headed ones are native to my area and they grow in fairly poor rocky clay soil on hot sunny slopes. If you give them anything nicer than that they go absolutely nuts. I've planted them in clay with some compost added and they get very large and healthy and drop seeds all over the place. I pull them like weeds in most of the yard now.

So based on my experience you don't have to try too hard.

Yes, any well-draining, reasonably fertile soil will work fine.

The Purple Coneflower version is a native to TX, so it will grow well in some fairly crappy soils so long as they are well drained. Here's a link to the USDA Plant Database sheet from their East Texas Plant Materials Center. That sheet describes them as having a low tolerance for drought, which is at odds with TAMU, which describes them as "drought tolerant". I know they are a favorite among landscapers in the Austin area, where the native soil is really pretty pitiful.

Here is a link that might be useful: EASTERN PURPLE CONEFLOWER

Here in NC they can go right in the ground pretty much anywhere.

About the only thing that will ruin them around here is planting them during the winter when the soil is extremely wet.

I know they CAN go right in the ground, but that is not what I want. Our drainage is not good at all and echs don't do as well as they could here, thus the reason for a raised bed. Not working with the oldies, but with the hybrids that everyone knows can be much more picky than the "pinks". Echs are my favorite flower, which is why I am going to all the trouble of making them as happy as possible in my garden. I don't want to just plunk them in the ground and write them off when they drown, I want to know that they have very good drainage and since I have to put soil in this raised bed anyway, then I want it to be the type of conditions that echs would flourish in, not just what they will survive in.

I think everyone agrees - good drainage is needed. Beyond that, it's nothing special, but don't overdo the fertility.

What kind of soil do you have now? If it's not heavy clay, I would think you could use it for the raised bed too. If you have to import soil for the raised bed, just make sure it's not too clayey so it will drain.

It's heavy clay :) It is heavily amended in my other garden beds, but this is a new area so it hasn't been amended at all. Even so, I don't have anywhere that I can take soil from, so it will need be brought in.

Best echinacea I've ever planted happened when I was completely redoing a garden. I needed to scrape off the existing sod throughout, thus comes the problem of what to do with it. I stacked and stacked sod artistically ;) on the back and sides of my planned flower beds. I dislike flat gardens, they need 'flow'.

Once the area was ready for the next layer, I had the big truck drop yards of half yard debris compost and half mushroom compost. Ordering this in very early spring, before most gardeners are out and about here, gives the best compost since it's been composting over the fall and winter. Ordering later it's a gamble how mature the stuff will be, as is the nature of what they are selling. If it's still too new, it's just not enough for plants to grow in.

We hauled and hauled all that compost to cover the existing beds, then piled and piled it on my new sod piles. BTW the soil was all clay, which can be a good thing here since it retains all the minerals and 'secret ingredients'. Turned out the new 'raised beds came out with between maybe 8 and 15 inches of compost. I built them higher than the final goal since as that sod broke down it was going to sink.

Echinacea was one of my first picks for this garden since I now had well draining soil that would stay well draining, plus it was full sun. Then OMG... echinacea on steroids ! I know echinaceas.. they are a staple here so one sees them in a variety of gardens and situations. I've seen some beauties but never like the ones I put in this garden. I did not buy any special types, just the same types I've used before. Yes, come fall there was plenty of thinning and shuffling . But the comments from other gardeners in the neighborhood than had watched them through the season made up for the extra work I created for myself. Dang that was a lot of work and those darn plants had dug deep and were hanging on. Learned my lesson.

I'm sure even with the big difference between our climates, this probably has some worth as a success story. The trick would be to find the best source of compost mix. You might ask at a smaller specialty perennial nursery in your area. They should know the suppliers and be able to recommend, since they want success for you as a customer. Then there's always chatting with gardeners nearby. They probably have already eliminated to lesser quality suppliers from experience.

Any soil will work as long as you add enough organic matter to the mineral portion to equal 6 to 8 percent. Clay, with inadequate amounts of organic matter, will not drain well, but if sufficient amounts of organic matter are added that same clay will drain quite well and will also release the nutrients that clay soils tend to tie up.

I would do 3 parts compost to 1 part sand

Funnthsun,

There is a very nice article about echinaceas in the new issue of Garden Gate magazine that arrived a couple days ago. August 2013 issue 112. Four pages, about half is photos, a no ads magazine BTW.

This post was edited by plaidbird on Sun, Jun 16, 13 at 14:25

"I would do 3 parts compost to 1 part sand"

For a perennial planting bed in the SE U.S., it will be extremely difficult to maintain more than ~ 5-6% by weight OM in the soil by annually top dressing with organic mulches or compost . Higher initial levels will be lost to ongoing decomposition. For a bed with 3 parts by volume compost, which would be ~ 35-40% OM by weight, you should expect to lose about 1/3rd of the bed depth to decomposition over a few years. That loss will appear as settling - a 16" deep bed will soon become a 10" deep bed, possibly even shallower depending upon the form of OM in the soil, and the only way to get it back in a perennial placement will be to dig up the plants and add more soil.

If you want a physically stable bed limit the initial OM content to 5-6% by weight (10-12% by volume) and regularly mulch or top dress with compost.

This post was edited by TXEB on Mon, Jun 24, 13 at 0:26

This is very helpful, thanks for the feedback, guys!