Soil pH in Deer Lodge, MT: Lime or Sulfur?

Typical topsoil pH in Deer Lodge, MT

Typical topsoil in Deer Lodge, MT is pH 6.33, already right for vegetable garden (6-7). Test before adding anything.

What Deer Lodge needs, by plant

• Already in range: lawn (cool-season grass), vegetable garden, tomatoes, strawberries, roses, pink hydrangeas.
• Sulfur: potatoes 1.8 lb/100 sq ft; blueberries 3 lb/100 sq ft over 2 applications; azaleas and rhododendrons 2.5 lb/100 sq ft over 2 applications; blue hydrangeas 2.5 lb/100 sq ft over 2 applications.

What to do next

If your test lands near 6.33, you can skip lime and sulfur for lawn (cool-season grass), vegetable garden, tomatoes, strawberries, roses, pink hydrangeas.

How mixed the soil is

Of the 409,232 surveyed acres in Deer Lodge, MT, 50% are moderately acidic (5.5-6.5), 38% are near neutral (6.5-7.3), 6% are strongly acidic (below 5.5), 5% are alkaline (above 7.3). Mapped soils run from pH 4.2 to 9.4, a spread of 5.2 units across 3,109 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 17.2% clay and 2.94% 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. 8% of mapped components carry free carbonate (lime already in the ground).

Deer Lodge against the rest of Montana

pH 6.33 is 0.97 below the Montana median of 7.3. 7 of 56 Montana counties have more acidic topsoil. Nationally it is more alkaline than the US county median of 6.05.

Closest in pH within the state: Mineral (6.1), Missoula (6.29), Silver Bow (6.3), Park (6.31), Granite (6.37), Sanders (6.37), Madison (6.46), Powell (6.46).

The range in Montana runs from Flathead at 6.02 to Wheatland at 7.77; Deer Lodge sits 18% of the way up.