Question on ammending the soil for my poppy garden

[cuberuler]

Hello,

First of all let me say it's great to be on these forums. Everyone here seems really helpful and friendly, and I look forward to becoming an active member of this community.

I am preparing a space out behind my house for my poppy garden which I am going to sow early this coming Spring. I live in southwest Colorado, so it snows and freezes here. The dirt in the rocky mountains is dry and red and full of iron, I assume. However, I am completely new to gardening and although from what I have read poppies can thrive in either acidic or basic soil environments, it would be great to have some expert advice on how I should exactly amend this soil. Righ now I may truck in many bags on Miracle Grow garden soil (I assume they will do great in that), but beyond adding maybe cow manure and perlite to the soil you see in the pictures, don't know how else I should amend it.

Thanks a lot for taking the time to help me out, and hopefully in Spring, I have the ground all ready and can sow the ground for some large beautiful poppies!

Thank you, have a great day gardening you guys. I certainly will once I know how I should treat this rocky dry soil! See pictures.
Cheers,
cube

 

[roadrunner]

Your soil looks like it's a heavy clay, so I would recommend you start off by amending in much the same way as the OP does in this thread. https://www.gardening-forums.com/threads/no-need-to-see-clay-as-a-problem.12675/#post-118869

 

[cuberuler]

Ok, awesome! Thanks a million. So basically add generous amount of grass clippings and semi fine wood chips to improve it, and some well rotted manure.

Thanks!