I'm building a new raised bed that will be mostly dedicated to echinaceas. It is 16" tall and I want to put in the best soil for my echinaceas. Any ideas on what mix I should use?
If you could mix the perfect soil mix for an echinacea,-??
Love to know the answer since I just FINISHED planting out 18 new echies this morning and used what I had on hand. .
On top of red clay topsoil and on a slope, I leveled the bed with a shovel and garden fork, chopped up the bottom of the bed to at least 6" and allowed slope for drainage. Landscape timbers on the downhill side to hold the soil. I put down newspaper, wet it. And mixed in a wheelbarrow:
- 1 part red clay topsoil removed from the bed,
- 1 part mushroom compost,
- 1 part aged horse stall leavings,
- 1 part peat moss, &
- 1 part vermiculite.
Mixed well and chopped up clumps with the hoe before dumping in the bed to a depth of 12". In each hole I put 1/2 cup worm castings, mixed with the soil. The plants were in 2x2x2 cups -- and some already blooming, so I'm late with this project.
I think clay is the worst "Choice" for coneflowers, but if that is what you have to work with then you have to make do. The perfect mix would be hard to come up with but coneflowers love moist soil that drains well. So I would think a sandy loam with lots of rotted organic matter mixed in would be about as good as you could get.
When searching Google, I found this snippet from a book called An Herbalist's Guide To Growing & Using Echinacea by Kathleen Brown. Thought it was very interesting. I have no idea where you would buy this, farmer's exchange type of place? Never bought kelp or rock phosphate before. How much would be good, too. I'm a literal-minded kind of gal.
I have posted on this subject before so will repeat it here ..there are a lot of native coneflowers blooming here at this very moment i see them on steep rocky slopes and flat ground as well ..Here in SE Oklahoma the ground is very rocky and most certainly not what one would term good by any stretch..i never had much luck with echies untill I started putting them in raised beds up and away from underground pest as well as away from wet feet in the winter..