11-30-2006, 05:11 AM
G'Day Dave , soil over here in the Sydney basin is a very finely decomposed sandstone with sticky orange / yellow clay subsoil and blue greasy shale below that on a sandstone bedrock. So all top soils sold here are 60% river flat silt which being 40 feet deep is generally sub soil. It is dark brown gutless stuff having little to recommend it as garden soil or lawn top dressing. It is incapable of absorbing water without the addition of expensive soil wetting agents. Rain or hosing causes the water to run straight off the surface. The inclusion of pig or poultry manure combined with spent mushroom compost and well rotted recycled refined ground up lawn clippings and garden waste put through a composting process at least separates the sand particles allowing water to penetrate the surface. The microorganisms in the soil eventually break down the "inclusions" so after a couple of years you are back to square one with sandy soil that wont absorb water and you have to buy more garden mix. I also buy bales of compressed Sugar Cane and refer to it as Queensland Grass Clippings. I spread it around the surface of the gardens as a mulch to shield it from the hot dry wind that occasional blows in from the desert in the outback. The Sugar Cane has a slightly sulphurous smell about it when first spread but the flowers and vegetables do well on it. Due to our "Worst Drought Ever" we are on water restrictions here now and are only permitted to water the lawns and gardens by hand on Sundays and Wednesdays which is rather laborious. I have installed a couple of computers which control an irrigation system with Drip Eze brand Pressure Compensating brown drip hoses and have it running through all of the gardens. All new housing subdivisions here have the thin surface top soil and grasses skimmed off the underlying clay by Bobcats during development. The clay is terraced to make the building blocks flat and easy to build Concrete slab on the ground type housing. The soil that is skimmed off the surface goes off by truck to the "waste complex" where it is put through the process of mixing it with all the "inclusions". The poor suckers eventually move into their new houses to find they are surrounded by a expanse of flat clay that is hard as iron when dry and sticky as glue underfoot when wet. In order to construct gardens and lawns they have to buy soil. So the soil that was skimmed off their land and carted away for free is "re-engineered" and sold back to them at great cost. They do say there is Money in Muck
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