Posted: 4/20/2026 9:44:47 PM EDT
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I’m putting in a 3k sq ft “berry garden” a bit downslope of my house in Montana. 3 varieties of table grapes are on the agenda but my soil in this area is pretty much all heavy clay. A few “native” plants are going straight into this clay soil and they’ll be fine but raspberries and grapes will greatly benefit from a different approach. The raspberries are going into 25 foot rows with a modified version of hugelkultur (excavated 16” deep, bark, sticks, sawdust base with dirt & manure layered on top). For the grapes I’m thinking about taking my 12” earth auger and drilling as deep as I can get to replace the soil, then also digging out a few foot circle around each plant about a foot deep and replacing that soil as well. My thought on this is a lighter soil would allow the roots to penetrate and may help the plants grow. Any opinions on this? |
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Gun Owner: Cut off your penis to prevent rape.
Liberal: I'm not going to rape anyone!!!
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Originally Posted By Urimaginaryfrnd: Heavy clay has drainage problems. Would using a trencher and dropping pipe with holes in it like a septic field below help you long term? Is anyone else in the area doing similar? Try as I may there are some things that I simply cannot get to grow. Best info I can find says to amend soil with compost, organic matter, etc. I don’t think piping water out will help much, though a trench with amended soil and the grapes planted on the upslope side of each trench may divert water far enough away from roots to provide drainage. |
Liberal: Give up your guns to prevent murder.
Gun Owner: Cut off your penis to prevent rape.
Liberal: I'm not going to rape anyone!!!
Gun Owner: Thanks for proving my point.
Gun Owner: Cut off your penis to prevent rape.
Liberal: I'm not going to rape anyone!!!
Gun Owner: Thanks for proving my point.
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Plant radishes, sunflowers, and cow peas. Give it 2 or 3 years, and then plant the garden. Or, bring in a bunch of organic material. In dry areas, the buried wood rots down far far more slowly than wetter climates. As the material rots, the surface will sink down. Some perennials hate that. For annuals, it's not a problem. Don't know about how that will impact grapes. With heavy clay soils, holes and trenches dug for new plantings can turn into bath tubs that hold water. Drainage is critical. |
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As already said: work on the soil. Have manure hauled in. Cow, horse, or whatever you can get in truckloads. Tilled in and left over winter. What types of native berries grow locally to you? Would look at mulberry trees and serviceberry bushes raised in your area. Blackberries also. We have all three that thrive in our poor soil. |
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Up here in the Arizona White Mountains, our soil is volcanic, and clay. I have a berry patch that I prepped with gypsum and a bunch of soil amendments. That gypsum really does a great job on clay soil. Ran my tractor with the gannon teeth set all the way down. Watered heavily for a couple months, then watered like there were plants in it. That next spring berries were planted and they are thriving. All I do now is in the spring I cover the area with sterilized steer manure, and once the flowers start turning to fruit we feed with berry food from Gardens alive. Pretty much the same thing with grapes, but we did buy a couple varieties last year that we put in raised beds. |
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You will forever be missed my friend
You will forever be missed my friend
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Originally Posted By Ernesto556: Make sure you know what herbicides have been sprayed on the pastures of the people supplying manure. Some herbicides can be in the manure. Duracor, as one example. It can persist in manure and kill or damage a wide range of broad leaf plants. This. 100 percent. If you can't know, get a sample of it --like a tote full--and grow some beans in it at the very least. Usually you will start to see the damage on the beans within about ten days or so. There are "forever chems" in herbicides now that get sprayed on pastures, eaten by the animals, persist through the gut or rumen, persist through the composting process, and persist when you put it on your garden. It's everywhere and the only way I know to avoid it is to make your own compost. |
Nobody ever wakes me at 2 in the morning telling me that my grass is out on the highway.~~Radiopat
Wine is sunlight held together by water~~Galileo Galilei
Well-behaved women rarely make history~~Marilyn Monroe
Wine is sunlight held together by water~~Galileo Galilei
Well-behaved women rarely make history~~Marilyn Monroe
| I bought a place that has 8 rows of neglected grape vines. I have kudzu with fruit. Grapes are on my property , my neighbors and all over from bird eating them and dropping seeds. I am not a fan. |
RIP Jeff Reed. Tennessee Squire, Ga. Carry member, NRA,Non-puking 72 ounce drinker 2 of 6 Norcal call sign, Forgotten.
| I have Muscadines that last produced (in quantity) in the Fall of 2022, when we moved into our current home. I cut the vines back during the Winter of 2023, and although I had good re-growth, didn't get any that year. Rinse and repeat for the next subsequent years. I saw a few Muscadines last year, but probably less than a dozen. So, I cut back again last Winter and have good re-growth again, even adding a trellis. So I'm waiting to see what happens. If I don't get any Muscadines this year, I may dig up the vines completely and try something else. |