Good News: soil test results are in

Got good news via e-mail this morning. I received the results of the soil test that I sent to UMass and we're still good to go. There are no dangerous levels of lead, cadmium, or other heavy metals, which was the big concern. I'm very relieved. This was an important hurdle for this project--if it had come back dirty, then the project would have to be off (we could just plant flowers, I guess).

The report is quite detailed, giving the percentage of organic material (we could use more) and other essential nutrients (we need more magnesium), and they even tell you what soil amendments you should use to bring the soil to its most productive level. In general, though, the soil is better than I'd expected.

I realize that we need to do a soil test of our own community garden plot, ASAP, to know what we should do to improve the soil.

So, now the big thing keeping this project from leaping ahead full throttle is the fence replacement. I've got a call into the property manager to try to get a status update. I hope this return of the rain won't delay things, because I've got 40 cucumber seedlings on my back porch eager to get in the ground.