soil sample help

[scf84]

can anyone help me understand this sample. thanks

 

[poorfarmer]

I am sure some of the guys on here will help, I have done soil samples in the past, but each time the Co-op set me up with an attack plan. I didn't have to decipher the print out. Looks like the bottom two lines are showing you the amount of each you need to add per acre to get your 3 ton per acre goal.

 

[Jogeephus]

Looks like you have acid soil and need to add lime. I'd do this first because this will make other nutrients available that are locked up at the moment. In other words, fix your pH then address fertility.

 

[scf84]

yes, i added lime last year, about to start lime now.
just need help understanding what mix to get.

 

[Rajela]

If you take that to your local coop or fertilizer dealer he will help you understand it or you can take to your local soil conservation office and they will help.
I can see that you need lime and some P&K which is best applied in the fall.

 

[Ebenezer]

I can see that you need lime and some P&K

Just don't spread both at relatively the same time. Skip about 4 or 5 months between one or the other. I would go with lime first.

 

[Jogeephus]

yes, i added lime last year, about to start lime now.
just need help understanding what mix to get.

If you spread lime last year and your pH is still this low you'd be better off growing blueberries than grass. I'd put more lime before I started fertilizing. A low pH will make many of your nutrients in the fertilizer unavailable so you are just wasting money until you get your pH right. JMO

 

[ChipC]

You don't need to worry much about the busy looking stuff on the top of the report, the important part is on the bottom. It tells you what you need to apply for the specified crop. It's recommending 1.3 tons of lime to get you to a 6.5 ph. With the extremely hard rains we've had this year it can cause your nutrients to leach through the soil quicker than normal and that may have affected your pH. Take this report to your local fertilizer dealer and they'll mix up what you need. Adding legumes to your pastures will help save some nitrogen. Legumes fix the nitrogen and make it more plant useable. It may be beneficial to split up your fertilizer application. This will help reduce losing as much through leaching. Good luck!

 

[Jogeephus]

Here is a chart that might help you understand what I'm talking about. Here, a pH of 5.2 would be considered unsuitable for grass production because you cannot fertilize it in any cost effective manner. If you look at the nutrients in this chart you'll notice the thickness of the bar. The maximum thickness is the maximum the fertilizer can be taken up by the grass. At a 5.2 pH for N this is only about half the amount it should be so in other words when you purchase N you will have to use twice as much N to get the same effect as someone whose pH is well balanced. This goes for the other elements as well but the good thing on the other elements is they are more stable and will more than likely become available as the pH is corrected. IMO, fertilizer is too expensive to be spending money on it when its only going to half way work that's why I would put my money on the lime and get this right first before I started spending a lot of money on fertilizer.

 

[Limepro]

Where did you get your lime from? No reason if you put it out last year for your ph to be that low. I see where your at in Tennessee just wondering if you got dolomite lime out of the zinc mine in East Tennessee ? It's worthless in my opinion.

 

[kenny thomas]

Where did you get your lime from? No reason if you put it out last year for your ph to be that low. I see where your at in Tennessee just wondering if you got dolomite lime out of the zinc mine in East Tennessee ? It's worthless in my opinion.

Teach me why the lime from there is no good. The sheets they have to file with the state shows it to be good lime.

 

[littletom]

What was your ph before you put it on last year? If that was here I would be putting more than 1.3 tons. But lime is cheap here. I agree with the others that ph is the first thing to get fixed. I wonder if that cec is comparable to your area.

 

[JMJ Farms]

What was your ph before you put it on last year? If that was here I would be putting more than 1.3 tons. But lime is cheap here. I agree with the others that ph is the first thing to get fixed. I wonder if that cec is comparable to your area.

My CECs in Ga range from 4.5-7. Average around 5.8-6. Usually around 6-6.2 on the fields I've been tending the longest. I didn't even know what it was till last year. One farm I rented this year has had a lot of chicken litter applied in the past and the CEC is 7.1. How important is the CEC?

 

[Limepro]

Easy answer. They make lime with a cyclone not a crusher. They spin their waste water threw a cyclone. The size openings they use in their cyclone allows everything between a 40 mesh to 80 mesh to spin out to their lime pile. All the ultra fines you typically find in a crusher made aglime blow by their cyclone and go out to their waste ponds. They are basically throwing away the best part which is what passes the 100 mesh screen. Tennessee gives a 100% credit for anything passing a 50 mesh screen, that's as far as they go. That law was written years ago back when a traditional crusher was the only was to make aglime.Show me a lime that takes a 2 inch rain and spreads the next day and I'll show you a lime that doesn't work.

 

[kenny thomas]

Ok, limepro I do understand what you are saying. But the lime from the quarry in Lee Co. VA are even worse as far as size. What ever the score is called the ones from the rock quarry score 85 and the Zinc plant is like 120. So you are saying the 85 is better?

 

[Limepro]

What I'm talking about comes from a zinc plant and scores no where near any of those numbers. Maybe a different zinc plant but kinda doubt it. Their chemistry (CCE) is in the mid 80's and their RNV is in the low 60's. I had a customer try some that showed me an analysis from an independent lab, only reason I know anything about it.

 

[kenny thomas]

What I'm talking about comes from a zinc plant and scores no where near any of those numbers. Maybe a different zinc plant but kinda doubt it. Their chemistry (CCE) is in the mid 80's and their RNV is in the low 60's. I had a customer try some that showed me an analysis from an independent lab, only reason I know anything about it.

Im sure it is the same Zinc mine, Treadway, TN. I have a sheet that shows all the places to get lime in the area but for some reason I cant lay my hands on it at the moment. I only need about 40 ton this year and our truck is not licensed to haul in TN so guess I will just get it here.

 

[Jogeephus]

What was your ph before you put it on last year? If that was here I would be putting more than 1.3 tons. But lime is cheap here. I agree with the others that ph is the first thing to get fixed. I wonder if that cec is comparable to your area.

My CECs in Ga range from 4.5-7. Average around 5.8-6. Usually around 6-6.2 on the fields I've been tending the longest. I didn't even know what it was till last year. One farm I rented this year has had a lot of chicken litter applied in the past and the CEC is 7.1. How important is the CEC?

Your CEC is very important because it determines how much lime will be required to change your pH. For instance where it might take a ton of lime on low CEC soils with the same pH it might take two to three times this amount of lime to make the same adjustment on soils with a high CEC. This isn't all bad though because soils having high CEC typically have more stored nutrients in them its just that the grower needs know how to release them because simply throwing fertilizer on the ground is not always the answer.

 

[scf84]

looking back at my papers, it was fall of 14 when we limed. not last year. also was only able to spread half of what it needed then. was gona spread the rest the next spring but we had some logging done, just now have every thing cleaned up again.