What is wrong with my garden soil? ?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Erika M
  • Start date Start date
E

Erika M

Guest
I have a perennial garden that I planted last year. Here is the history.

We live in am area filled with clay soils. We built flower beds with approximately 1' of top soil, followed by 1' of topsoil/clay/natural soil mix, and then let the remainder stay as is. I planted perennials last Spring. I mulched the bed, but was careful to leave sufficient room around the perennials so that the roots wouldn't rot. We get a lot of rain in the summer here so there wasn't any need to water.

This fall, I am planting some fall plants and I noticed that a lot of my perennials are not doing so well. My Sedum 'Brilliant' had all its leaves fall off, a very abbreviated bloom, and I can pull the sstemfrom the ground, like there is no root base.

This root base issue I have noticed with many of my plants, like I can easily just pull it from the ground with no rResistance. it is like all the roots have disintegrated.

So as I was walking through the bed I noticed how fluffy it was, I was sinking in the soil. While trying to dig, I noticed how the soil was incredibly light, there were areas where it appeard under the top layer of soil it was completely void of soil, like there were pockets without soil...

I was wondering if anyone had any experience with this?
I'm in Florida... any idea how to treat weevils?
 
well i'm guessing, some of your perennials may have just reached there use buy date but i'm sure there's more to it.
without knowing where you live, my first thought was fungal like phytophra. with the clay, the layering,rain,mulching (you cant be sure there was nothing in the soil/mulch u bought in) the gaps in the ground could be from the fruit after it breaks down. there could be several different fungi.
treatments are widely available for this, any where you get gardening supplies
 
Dig down and sieve the the soil to a depth of about 18". If you find little white grubs measuring about 1/2" long that look like shrimps you have a vine weevil problem. These grubs eat all the roots and kill the plant.
 
Back
Top