Soil conditioning. What can I use?

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My soil is dark clay, sandy and loomy that breaks apart easily. People tell me I should add soil conditioning. What would you add to give the soil room to breath?
 
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Hi Carrie,
I think you might need to add loads and loads of compost and manure and maybe some sand and or grit to open up the soil. It must be hard gardening on clay but if you persevere it will come good. Hard work in the beginning but well worth it in the end. Good luck Carrie.
 
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Definitely can't go wrong with digging in a bunch of compost. Even fall leaves, any organic material really.

What are you planting? I heavily mulch my vegetables with straw; it breaks down and I believe greatly improved the soil.
 
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I garden on clay and a few years of digging in free horse manure from the local stables has done wonders, I also add used multi-purpose compost for structure & even sharp sand or horticultural grit to the individual planting holes. Clay is the highest nutrition of all soils, do you have sandy and loam in different parts of the garden? They are all separate soil types you see
 
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Carrie, agree with the advice given......as much organic compost, manure etc as possible :)
Every time I plant something I incorporate dried manure, pelleted chicken manure, compost etc. I mulch generously too :)
 
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My soil is dark clay, sandy and loomy that breaks apart easily. People tell me I should add soil conditioning. What would you add to give the soil room to breath?
I can't picture what type of soil this is; it seems to be a contradiction. I have worked with clay before and I know very well what clay soil entails. What I'm confused about is that sandy/loomy and clay...seems to be a contradiction. I have very sandy soil, but after years of heavy mulching, much of my garden has a sandy loam texture.

BTW, one thing I know about clay, is that you can add sand to break it up, but you must be exact, because you can actually make it worse, if you add too little -- meaning you could actually make it brick-hard. Personally, I would never add sand to clay, rather try other methods, such as organic matter...
 
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