[BigPeat]

I've had a veg patch for the past 2 years.  The soil if VERY heavy clay, it's right next to a field which used to have a brickworks in it! As we speak it is lying with water on the surface, undug and abandoned I've been waiting for it to dry up enough to work but yesterday we had so much rain it's all flooded again.  Can anyone suggest what I might add to it to improve the soil structure and drainage? Was thinking lots of sand and power harrow it in?  Or could I bring topsoil in from somewhere else and just put it on top to bring the levels up above the flood line!

[DavidandCollette]

Ours is quite heavy so we are putting lots of compost and Manure on. Top soil would be a good solution as well.ha e a look at the Charles Dowding books on organic growing and the no dig method

[doganjo]

Raised beds?  Mine are just over two feet high.  Take a lot of filling but you can put rubble/gravel/polystyrene in them and fill with topsoil/compost

[Fleecewife]

Move it to higher ground?

Most unusually for me, I would suggest raised beds too - clay and decrepitude are the only two reasons for raised beds as far as I'm concerned.  However, even with raised beds, the water has to be able to drain away somewhere.

Is there any chance of putting in some sort of drain for the whole area?

If you can rough dig the garden in the autumn this year, it will have the whole winter to break the soil structure apart.  Although if it's under water that will really not help.

Deep rooted plants such as fodder lupins will help break up the soil.  Because your ground is so wet, you won't have many earthworms which would normally help to aerate the soil.

I grew up on heavy clay but I'm not totally sure what my Dad added.  I remember lime, and loads of manure, but there were always corners where nothing would grow, with standing water even in the summer.

I have heard of sand and gravel being dug in to the top, but again, the deeper soils needs to be able to drain.

[Lesley Silvester]

I've built raised beds when I lived in a clay area. You also need lots of manure/compost. Sand would help as well.

clay and decrepitude are the only two reasons for raised beds as far as I'm concerned.

Not sure I like the thought of being decrepit, FW, although I do have raised beds as I can't get down to ground level ones, much less back up again.

[pgkevet]

With enough investment (time +/- money) you could solve the problem for a section ...dig out a couple of feet depth then trench the bottom to a soakaway - fill trench with large stone/broken brick etc. Mix the dug out soil with sharp sand (river washed) and replace and dig compost into the top layer.

A heck of a cost in labour and sand and for anyone but the youngest a job for a digger.

Alternatively raised beds or dig out a 1 foot deep section, drain the bottom and just fill it with bought in earth - essentially the same as raised bed.. just not raised.

[clydesdaleclopper]

An easier and cheaper option is to make raised beds using hugelkultur - where the main part of the raised bed is rotting logs

[BigPeat]

Thanks for all your replies.  Sounds like raised beds are the way to go!  I love my veg patch but with 4 kids, full time job and loads of animals to look after I was hoping to do it the lazy way and have DH plough it with the tractor It is so hard to dig as either like concrete or ..clay!! He did this 2 years ago in the October with the hope that it would breakdown over winter and be workable in the spring.  Unfortunately the tractor sank in and created a pond which lay in water all winter and right through to May, the clay effectively working as a pond liner.  We even had wild ducks coming to use it

[Lesley Silvester]

Having a pond will attract all kinds of insects which will help pollinate your vegetables. I'd keep it.


It doesn't sound like ploughing did much good last time. Whatever you do, you need to get a lot of manure and/or compost into it.

[Penninehillbilly]

I started my veg patch in what was basically a field, clay/shale with just a few inches of 'soil', rough grass and rushes on top. put 9" boards to make long raised beds, dug a spit out, put manure in spit and forked it over into lower level, turned next pit into it etc, yes it was hard work, but satisfying. Later years a friend came and commented on lovely soil I had, she obviously thought it was like that naturally, I was so surprised I never thought to point out the work I'd done.
Water table is still just below path level in spring, because the beds are like a sump, the original paths holding water back, but it will dry out enough for growing things in summer, providing that moisture further down.
Why not get OH to put the bed sides in for you then try the no dig method, putting well rotted manure / compost on top and planting through that.
Last year my potatoes I planted them shallow, put manure on top and covered with black plastic, cutting crosses for the spuds to come through. was a bit late for a decent crop but reusing the plastic this year, planting through the ready cut crosses.

[cloddopper]

We had the same problem  on one of our small holdings . It was 18 acres of 12 yr old reclaimed land laid over a marsh .
 It was full of inert material that had been tracked in with a 30 ton bulldozer and other heavy tracked plant and god only knows how many 30 tonne tipping lorries .
 ie grey , blue & yellow clay ,demolition site clearances of brick ,concrete and stinking black river bed slub.
When it dried you needed a medium road breaker to work it , when it was wet you had to wear knee length laced up boots as it would take wellies of your legs at every step 

 I sat and gave it lots of thought as to how I could get it productive . This is what we did .
Have fun ,.

I hired a two tonne tracked digger for a week and whilst I was  at work Alison used it to make a four foot deep drainage moat around the 1/2 acre our garden area .
 
 In your garden using a straw bale wide bucket or the the narrowest 12 inch wide  narrowest bucket dig a three foot deep herring bone drainage system in your garden so it runs out into the moat in several branches .  3/4 fill Fill the trenches with whole bales or lots of compacted straw and lots of brushwood on top.
Then back fill to the last foot , now with the widest bucket / scrape and turn your garden over with the digger , having laid a four to 8 inch bed of straw on the surface plus about the same depth of mixed  cow , sheep,  pig & chicken  muck .. ( cow muck does not contain the weed seeds that horse muck does .
 Broadcast  about 2 kg of builders plaster per four sq mtrs all over the turned over soil ..this plaster will work it's way in as the weather acts on the soil and help crumb the clay , leave it save for a small salad area for the weather to break it down .

Come Feb next year , put 1/4 cubic metre of spent mushroom compost or  the manures mentioned above every 4 square metres , fork them out and  then hire a decent sized pedestrian controlled rotovator and  work it in , taking out the bigger than an egg sized lumps of brick etc as you go .

Rotovate it completely in shallow runs of 3, 6 ,9 & 12 inches  first .  The final run of 15" or so inches deep should see the whole worked area become a rich friable soil .

You can grow everything in it save for the root crops , as the fresh manures will cause them to grow many roots which makes the veg tiresome to prepare for food .
 
   Set up a three , four or five bed rotation system and towards the end of the year  re manure only one of the beds for the greedy feeders you want to grow in the next year . You may be able to grow the root crops  in this second year but they will be even better the year after .

[Penninehillbilly]

Why not get OH to put the bed sides in for you then try the no dig method, putting well rotted manure / compost on top and planting through that.

BTW I wasn't saying you couldn't put the bed sides in, just if you were so busy and he was being saved the job of ploughing it he could do that instead  .
OH rotavated some of the beds for me last week, I did stop him because I could see he was doing more harm than good, but too late, there are huge ponds where there should be soil. Can't be cross, he was trying to help, but he totally destroyed the soil structure by heavy machine and size 11's on beds I have never stood on  .

[sabrina]

My soil was heavy clay but having loads of horse muck it has improved a lot over the years.  Much easier to work. Takes time though so raised beds might be your best bet.

[devonlady]

If you're starting a garden off from scratch it will take a few years of mucking and digging before you get it right. It needs patience and a bit of graft

[BigPeat]

Thank you all for your suggestions, sounds like you are a very determined bunch!!  I noticed a site getting cleared for a new house a few miles from here and scrounged some top soil from them (probably about 60 tonnes of it!!).  It is nice and loamy and I have spread it over my clay about a foot deep. Hopefully this will allow me to dig it by hand in the future.  I am hoping to get everything planted this week but have had frost, rain and artic winds for much of the last week Tatties are probably happier and safer where they are in the house!!