Soil is well .... ugh!

[RedThorn]

Back home, I was blessed with lovely soil, but down here where I am now, the soil is really terrible. All sand and no substance to it at all. No organic material in it and it's almost like beach sand. Working on getting the organic materials into it at the moment, but the soil is also horribly mineral deficient (zinc etc) so was wondering what the oracles recommend? What can I add to improve the mineral content?

[Two_Sheds]

Sandy here too, but probably not as bad as you

This might help: Gardening Australia - Fact Sheet: Improving Sandy Soils

Growing Veg in Oz

"sandy soils can be improved annually by incorporating organic matter, animal manures, or [garden] compost at 2.25 kg/m2 in the top 15 -20 cm of soil (so that's as mulch, not dug in).
Although expensive, proprietary water absorbent gels can also be used to help to retain water ....It may be necessary to apply a proprietary wetting agent to sandy soils every year"

[Newton]

How does everyone else get around the problem Redthorn? Is I heard the home grown veggie mite be an endangered species in Oz? Ouch!

[donnakebab]

Raised beds might be the answer to start with to add your organic matter. My OH has 5 brothers and sisiters in Perth and he was telling me that they import worms from here because the Ozy ones are too lazy. Don't know how true that is given how strict they are on migrants!

[Thelma Sanders]

Google Rock Dust that might work for your lack of minerals, or Calcified seaweed.

[Aberdeenplotter]

Loads of farmyard manure for the mineral deficiency and to try help get even more humous into the ground, get out with your rake and some poly bags and gather as many fallen leaves as you can get your hands on and dig that in as well. Your local authority may even deliver a lorry load of leaves if you feel you can cope with that.

[Thelma Sanders]

Loads of farmyard manure for the mineral deficiency and to try help get even more humous into the ground, get out with your rake and some poly bags and gather as many fallen leaves as you can get your hands on and dig that in as well. Your local authority may even deliver a lorry load of leaves if you feel you can cope with that.

It's late spring in Australia, I think, so they'll have to wait a while for the leaves

[Aberdeenplotter]

whoops, shoulda noticed shouldn't I . Still same principles apply, get humous into the ground however you can and if you can't get fym, I'm told there are plenty camels in Oz

[snohare]

if you can't get fym, I'm told there are plenty camels in Oz

Nah, you'll never manage to dig a camel in, too tall and stroppy.

My thought first of all is: oh, good for carrots !
My second thought is, make raised beds with a base layer of leaves, grass cuttings, manure, any kind of organic materiel, and then put the usual topsoil on top in a gradually decreasing ratio. (i.e. most of the topsoil just at the top.) To supplement the minerals feed using seaweed feed, which I'd guess you can get given the local abundance of sealife. Add more organic materiels whenever possible, digging it in to bring well rotted materiels to the surface and increase the ratio there over time.

[RedThorn]

Thanks all, am feeding with a seaweed extract at the moment, and leaf quality is improving from and insipid yellow to a healthier green, so it is helping. The natives are complaining it's cold still (was mid to high 20's all of last week basically o.O so the organic matter into and on top of the soil is a definite requirement me thinks to keep some moisture in the soil the growing is really different and on bright side, I get to make a whole new set of mistakes As to the camel, I don't wanna get in trouble with the animal rights people here, (you get into more trouble hurting an animal than a person) and They might not take kindly to me burying the camel in the ground up to it's neck.....

[Florence Fennel]

You could keep the camel as a pet RT, I'm sure it wouldn't be as troublesome as some of the livestock you've had Good luck with the soil, you'll grow lovely carrots.

[snohare]

They might not take kindly to me burying the camel in the ground up to it's neck.....

Ah, the secret there is to bury it upside down. You can leave the feet out for hanging nets off ( does Australia have pigeons ?) and pretend they are unusual mushrooms.
Then again, that might count as "a whole new set of mistakes", leading to deportation for growing non-native mushrooms without an import permit.

P.S. Very Important Upside down by Australian standards.

[Aberdeenplotter]

I suspect the camel may take the hump at that.

[snohare]

Just deserts, I suppose.