G'day Ivan,
I didn't catch the earlier post on this thread, so I
hope I'm not repeating other advice.
One really good way to put organic matter into a very sandy soil is to grow
a quick 'green manure' crop. Use a cheap cerial crop like wheat or rice, sow
it heavily and let it go for its life, then either mow it down as a mulch or
hoe through. This is also useful when resting beds. If you have a small area
just buy a kilo of brown unpolished rice ($1.50?) at the supermarket or a
kilo of wheat from your local produce store (.50c ?). If you have a large
area buy a 50k bag. Just broadcast it around by hand, and if you dont get a
good strike first up, then resow over the seedlings. They also drown out
most weeds. The majority of the organic matter is formed by the root systems
just where you want it, under the ground, and the more vigorus the better
and deeper they go. Obviosly water helps, but if your short of it, then sow
during or after a good rain. You will lose some to the birds etc, so just
repeat sowing as required, as the young shoots will provide increasing
protection to further sowings. If you use the organic matter mentioned
earlier, you can still sow over the top to aid breakdown, although the chook
poo will probably be very 'hot' and reduce seed strike, but so what?, just
keep sowing. One advantage is that you can have more control over the
timeing of your intended crop as you decide when to mulch or hoe, without
worrying if the manures are sufficiently broken down, just slash it down and
give it a few days to dry off. It also allows you to do different sections
at a time if you want to stager your plantings. The sands will improve the
more you use them, and try to leave as much root material in the ground as
you can when you harvest or slash, ie, when harvesting non-root crops, just
cut at ground level, dont pull them up.


China
Wingham
NSW

p.s. Yes the computer thing is a pain, I love humanity, it's just the people
I can't stand!


Spam robots this way please -