What Is Clay Soil: Understanding Properties, Improvement Techniques, Pros & Cons, Uses

What Is Clay Soil?

The soil which comprised of very fine mineral particles and not much organic material is reoffered as clayey soil and this clay soil is benefits from high nutrients.

The clayey soil consists of very fine particles of clay and that way clay soil holds a high capacity of water. Wet clay types soils are sticky and contain very little air in clay the size of soil particles is less than 0.2 mm.

These clay soils are composed of millions of clay particles that are 0.002 millimeters in diameter. The particles of soils are tightly spaced so that have poor water movement as well as air movement throughout in and the clay soils are notorious.

This soil consists an above than 25% of clay-made soil clayey and soil holds a high amount of water because of the more spaces found between clay particles.

This clay soil is excellent work for paddy-type plants, but not good for many others and also to make pots, toys, and other purposes this clay is used.

If whenever you noticed the water tends to puddle on the ground rather than soak in it is likely your soils are clay type.

Soil that consists of over 50 percent clay particles is called heavy clay soil and for determining whether your soil is clay soil or not, you can do a simple soil test.

But high probably know if you have clay soil. If the soil sticks to garden tools form big clods, glue, and also stick to a shoe which soil is not easily stuck off, and crusts over and produces a crack in dry weather Condition.

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How To Improve Clay Soil

The improvement of clay soil will take time and effort work but the good thing is that the clay soil work you do instantly improve the structure of your existing soil and make them easier to work with it.

Improving an entire planting area at once rather than to attempt improving the soil’s individual planting holes as you need them if you dig a planting hole in clay soil.

For the improvement of existing soil, you need to add 6 to 8 inches of organic matter to the entire bed. Also, you can add according to your need in it organic matter.

Grass clipping, shredded leaves, compost, rotted manure, rotted manure, and compost are all perfect choices.

Then spread organic matter on the top of the soil, here where the manual labor comes in the organic matter needs to be mixed into the top 6 to 12 inches of soil.

For this digging and mixing process, you can use a shovel because it is a very handy tool for it, and also helps to move a lot of earth or soil without pulverizing the particles of soil.

When you are finished, your garden bed work will be several inches higher than it was originally but this is not a big problem because your bed garden will be settling all over the season and break down the organic material.

The structure of clay soil will continue to improve as microorganisms in the soil work to break down all of the organic matter that you have added.

The bed can be planted immediately plan for adding more organic matter in the form of compost once or twice a year, this process will continue for improving the soil structure and offset any setting that happens.

When you bought your property land and then it did not come with perfect soil at that time need to clay soil improvement.

Clay soils have an average of 2% organic matter, 16% air space, and 82% minerals. Those gardeners generally strive for 50% of air space, 45% mineral content, and 5% organic material that all things are called ultisol by soil scientists.

Two Simple Ways For Testing Clay

You need to be sure you have it before you start learning how to fix clay-type soil. If you are not sure you can find out if you have clay soil by doing a texture Jar test and ribbon test or strip test.

Ribbon Test

To perform a ribbon test, first, you take a handful of soil from 3 inches under the ground surface and then spread the soil on a plate, pan any vessel and pick out any debris or rock then put your soul in a pile and add a small amount of water.

So that it is formed like putty means moist in conditions but not too much in wet conditions. And the next step is rolling the soil into a ball shape and if it does not form like a ball shape then you have called sandy soil.

If it forms a ball shape, the next step is to form it into a ribbon or strip shape with the help of the thumb and forefinger.

While making a strip or ribbon shape, if the soil crumbles then you have loamy type sand, and if the soil stays and makes a ribbon 2 to 3 inches long then you have clay soil, also this test is referred to as a Strip test.

The Jar Test

Performing this test required a glass jar, you can use any jar such as a spaghetti sauce jar, species jar, and many more.

Before performing a test, you should collect one cup of soil from about three inches deep surface. Remove any rocks or pebbles from the sample, and add the soil into the jar, then add water up to one inch from the top level.

Then you can add a teaspoon of borax powder for setting the particulates, and if you don’t have borax powder then you use any detergent and leave this step out.

Then place the lid on the top of the jar and shake it aggressively for several minutes, if you want it to mix well so you can set a container on a level surface and leave it alone for 24 hours.

After, you can see the soil will separate out into different layers as sand are heavy in nature so it places at the bottom of the jar and the middle layer is full of loam, the clay is placed at the top and you should end up with clear water at the top.

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Advantages of clay soil

Drought tolerance

The clay soil can be retaining so much moisture that it is excellent drought tolerant. In that case, when an ample amount of clay is present in your soil at that time your plants have enough water to draw on during the dry season or drought conditions.

Good nutrient density

Always clay soil particles are attracted and bind to nutrients such as magnesium, potassium, and calcium which feed plants and help to grow them.

Suitability to certain plants

The wet clay soils are not suitable for lots of plants but only suitable for certain types of plants because it is high in moisture and rich nutrients are present.

Disadvantages of clay soil

Reduced aeration

The dense clay soil binds particles tightly together so that the roots of your plants do not have enough amount of air.

Increased compaction

Dry clay prevents infiltration of plants throughout the ground and makes sticky and thick surfaces, so an increased rate of compaction of this sort makes them difficult for growing the tree.

Poor drainage

The clay soil always has water content which retains moisture in clay that does not drain water very well which lead to rotten root and other severe issues.

Uses of Clay Soil

Clay soil used for construction purposes

Since ancient times clay soil has been used for construction purposes due to its extraordinary properties, the clay soil can be made into brick by either fire burning process or a sun-drying process

Other building material cobs are also made up of clay by mixing with some other building materials like sand and straw and these cobs and adobe are very cheap, Sustainable,  extremely durable, and capable of lasting for hundreds of years.

Clay soil used for making Ceramic

Clay is flexible in nature it can be easily molded into different structures and shapes when water is mixed in it, after adding water to clay soil malleable material is formed.

That reason the clay soil is used for ceramics by ceramicists, also the clay can be used to manufacture ceramic tiles, as well as that, can be used for floors, walls, and counters.

Clay soil used for Pottery

Clay soil is used for making pottery since ancient times, it is dark-colored clay that is mixed with water and then makes a thick mass kind of material, and that mass material is molded into different shapes and pots.

These clay molded structures are inserted inside an oven where it is fired for sucking out all the moisture from the structure so that it turns a hard texture.

Clay soil is used for Medicinal purposes

The clay soil is used for making folk medicine, it has been discovered that the mineral contents of clay soil relieve wound infections and upset stomachs.

The research has even shown that the clay soil has mineral particles with antimicrobial properties which are effective in killing pathogenic bacteria that are well resistant to antibiotics.

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