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How do I test my garden soil?

Learn why you should test your garden soil and the different kinds of tests to ask for. Resources include instructions for how to collect a soil sample for testing and a short video demonstration.

Brooke Edmunds | Apr 2021 | Article Peer reviewed (Gray level)

Methods for mitigating soil erosion after a wildfire

Soil erosion following a wildfire often needs to be addressed in areas of high-intensity fires. Which method is used to minimize erosion depends on soil type, slope steepness and subsequent rainfall.

Alicia Christiansen, Wildfire Recovery group | Nov 2020 | Article

Soil pH and pasture productivity on the Oregon Coast

Producers have questioned the conventional advice to apply lime to change the pH of coastal soils. We look at one set of data on ryegrass pastures that shows the return on investment may indeed be modest.

Troy Downing | May 2009 | Article

Guide to Oregon County Soil Survey Reports

An inventory of all the different kinds of soils in many Oregon counties is available. These inventories were made starting in the 1970’s by soil scientists of the U.S. Department of Agriculture Soil Conservation Service in ...

Brad Withrow-Robinson, Debra Zaveson | Dec 2007 | Article

Soil temperature conditions for vegetable seed germination

Results of an experiment to see correlations between various vegetable seeds number of days to sprout appearance and the temperature at which they are kept.

J. F. Harrington | Apr 2013 | Article

Benefits of soil testing to guide pasture fertilization

We evaluated the production practices of clientele who use our OSU Extension program information to properly test soil and follow OSU guidelines for fertilizing pastures, and compared that to the standard practices they used prior...

Shelby Filley, Gene Pirelli, Amy Peters | Aug 2010 | Article Peer reviewed (Gray level)