Oyster shells/Sea shells

[Kathy in GA]

Hi Ann,

About the sea shells mentioned in an earlier post.

Please explain in Laymans terms about the Oyster shells/sea shells in a flower graden.

What flowers will like them?
what flowers won't?
I didn't know that I needed to do research on this. I never knew they could effect the way a garden grows!
Thanks
Kathy in Ga.

[Ann B.]

Kathy,

Crushed or ground oyster shells will increase the ph of your soil, thus reducing acidity. Whole oyster shells will not have make as much change.

I do not know the origin of the shells the builder put in my beds. What I do know is that the sun bleached them to a bright white, and the 10 X 10 foot bed at the entrance glared brightly when the sun was shining, and the weeds were terribly hard to pull, and digging to plant anything was almost impossible.

Some shells will increase the ph of the soil. Our soil is more acidic by nature. Rain is acidic by nature. Many plants are not particular about the acidity of the soil, but some are, and if you are told that a plant requires alkaline soil and you are in a region of the country that has naturally acidic soils, you can either amend the soil or grow the plant in a pot.

If I were you, I would stay away from using shells to amend the soil, and use pulverized or ground limestone instead for the reasons given above.

Clematis and lavender are just two plants that I know of that will not do well in acidic soils. On the other hand, Azaleas and Camellias require acidic soils.

You can amend the soil with pulverized limestone to add calcium to your soil if you are experiencing blossom end rot on your tomatoes. Our well water and vegetable garden soil is lacking in calcium.

According to our Master Gardening training, it is much easier to make your soil less acidic than it is to make it more acidic. As I mentioned rain water is acidic. In regions of the country where the soil is naturally acidic, our water supply will also tend to be acidic. In regions where the soil is high in lime content, the water source will most likely be alkaline.

Also, in our Master Gardening class, the instructor used the example of a lady that had a very sick azalea and couldn't understand why. They tested the ph of the soil where the azalea was planted, and it was extremely high (alkaline). So high, that they said forget amending the soil. As it turned out, she had used wood ashes to mulch the plant. Their advise was to never try to grow azaleas near that spot again.

Does that make sense?

[Kathy in GA]

Ann B.

Yes it doea make sense. Sounds like I will have to take the research even one step farther.

I suppose I will need to find out what type of soil each plant requires to flourish. Gosh... I'll be busy for a long, long while!

Thank You for the info!
Kathy in Ga.