Soil pH in Boyd, NE: Lime or Sulfur?

Typical topsoil pH in Boyd, NE

Typical topsoil in Boyd, NE is pH 7.1, just outside the 6-7 range for vegetable garden. Test first; it may need nothing.

What Boyd needs, by plant

• Just outside, test first: lawn (cool-season grass) (off by 0.1), vegetable garden (off by 0.1), roses (off by 0.1).
• Beds or pots instead: tomatoes, potatoes, strawberries, blueberries, azaleas and rhododendrons, blue hydrangeas, pink hydrangeas.

What to do next

If your test lands near 7.1, you can skip lime and sulfur for lawn (cool-season grass), vegetable garden, roses.

How mixed the soil is

Of the 337,392 surveyed acres in Boyd, NE, 54% are near neutral (6.5-7.3), 38% are alkaline (above 7.3), 8% are moderately acidic (5.5-6.5). Mapped soils run from pH 5.6 to 8.2, a spread of 2.6 units across 275 soil components. No single class covers 60% of the county, so two gardens a few miles apart here can need opposite treatments. Test your own bed.

Clay, organic matter and rates

Topsoil here averages 28.3% clay and 2.46% organic matter, which this site treats as clay. Moving it one pH unit takes about 11.5 lb of lime or 3.4 lb of sulfur per 100 sq ft. 46% of mapped components carry free carbonate (lime already in the ground), enough that sulfur gets neutralised before it does much.

Boyd against the rest of Nebraska

pH 7.1 is 0.35 above the Nebraska median of 6.75. 80 of 93 Nebraska counties have more acidic topsoil. Nationally it is more alkaline than the US county median of 6.05.

Closest in pH within the state: Dixon (7), Red Willow (7.02), Cedar (7.03), Chase (7.08), Deuel (7.12), Cheyenne (7.15), Box Butte (7.17), Morrill (7.17).

The range in Nebraska runs from Fillmore at 5.88 to Scotts Bluff at 7.58; Boyd sits 72% of the way up.