Soil pH in Dawes, NE: Lime or Sulfur?

Typical topsoil pH in Dawes, NE

Typical topsoil in Dawes, NE is pH 7.4 and calcareous, so sulfur won't lower it for long. For vegetable garden, choose alkaline-tolerant varieties and add compost rather than fighting the soil.

What Dawes needs, by plant

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

What to do next

If your test confirms pH near 7.4, consider raised beds for anything acid-loving; with 43% of soils here carrying free lime, sulfur will not hold.

How mixed the soil is

Of the 879,263 surveyed acres in Dawes, NE, 50% are near neutral (6.5-7.3), 50% are alkaline (above 7.3). Mapped soils run from pH 6 to 8.5, a spread of 2.5 units across 484 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 26.1% clay and 2.02% organic matter, which this site treats as loam. Moving it one pH unit takes about 7 lb of lime or 2.3 lb of sulfur per 100 sq ft. 43% of mapped components carry free carbonate (lime already in the ground), enough that sulfur gets neutralised before it does much.

Dawes against the rest of Nebraska

pH 7.4 is 0.65 above the Nebraska median of 6.75. 91 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: Sioux (7.27), Hitchcock (7.3), Kimball (7.35), Banner (7.38), Scotts Bluff (7.58).

The range in Nebraska runs from Fillmore at 5.88 to Scotts Bluff at 7.58; Dawes sits 89% of the way up.