Soil pH in Lincoln, MT: Lime or Sulfur?

Typical topsoil pH in Lincoln, MT

Typical topsoil in Lincoln, MT is pH 6.09, already right for vegetable garden (6-7). Test before adding anything.

What Lincoln needs, by plant

• Already in range: lawn (cool-season grass), vegetable garden, strawberries, roses, pink hydrangeas.
• Just outside, test first: tomatoes (off by 0.1), potatoes (off by 0.1), azaleas and rhododendrons (off by 0.1).
• Sulfur: blueberries 2.5 lb/100 sq ft over 2 applications; blue hydrangeas 1.8 lb/100 sq ft.

What to do next

If your test lands near 6.09, you can skip lime and sulfur for lawn (cool-season grass), vegetable garden, tomatoes, potatoes, strawberries, roses, azaleas and rhododendrons, pink hydrangeas.

How mixed the soil is

Of the 295,083 surveyed acres in Lincoln, MT, 55% are moderately acidic (5.5-6.5), 37% are near neutral (6.5-7.3), 8% are strongly acidic (below 5.5). Mapped soils run from pH 5 to 7.2, a spread of 2.2 units across 488 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 10.9% clay and 2.74% 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. 0% of mapped components carry free carbonate (lime already in the ground).

Lincoln against the rest of Montana

pH 6.09 is 1.21 below the Montana median of 7.3. 2 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: Flathead (6.02), Ravalli (6.02), Mineral (6.1), Missoula (6.29), Silver Bow (6.3), Park (6.31).

The range in Montana runs from Flathead at 6.02 to Wheatland at 7.77; Lincoln sits 4% of the way up.