To test the makeup of your soil do a Jar Test.

A Jar Test is a simple way to test to see if your soil has a high clay content. To test you need the following:

1. A quart glass jar. A common Mason Jar will do.
2. A sample of soil taken from where you are putting in a plant bed. It should contain soil no surface debris. If you are testing for drainage then take your sample from the the soil beneath your plant bed. You need enough soil to fill half the jar.
3. Enough clean water to fill 3/4 of the jar.
4. Marker to mark lines on jar.
5. Ruler to measure with Metric will make calculations easier.

To test:

1. Fill the jar half full with soil sample.
2. Add clean water till jar has about one inch of space left at the top.
3. Put on lid and shake till all soil is mixed with water.
4. Let jar stand 5 minutes and mark soil that has settled. This is Sand layer. Do not disturb the jar.
5. Let it stand 24 hours.

After 24 hours you will see the following.

The soil will settle in the following order. At the bottom will be the sand layer. Above the sand will be a layer of silt. Above the silt will be a layer of clay. Above the clay will be a water layer. Floating on the water will be the organic material.

You should already have a mark for the sand. Now make a mark for the silt, clay and organic layers. Next measure each layer and write it down. Below is an example.

This example shows the following percentages by volume.

25% Sand content
30% Silt content
25% Clay content
20% Organic content

The native soils at WWW.HOSTAENVIRONMENT.COM have Clay contents above 80 percent. So they drain very poorly.

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