Soil pH in Montgomery, KY: Lime or Sulfur?

Typical topsoil pH in Montgomery, KY

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

What Montgomery needs, by plant

• Already in range: lawn (cool-season grass), vegetable garden, potatoes, strawberries, roses, azaleas and rhododendrons, pink hydrangeas.
• Just outside, test first: tomatoes (off by 0.2).
• Sulfur: blueberries 2.3 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, 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 112,976 surveyed acres in Montgomery, KY, 38% are moderately acidic (5.5-6.5), 35% are near neutral (6.5-7.3), 24% are strongly acidic (below 5.5), 3% are alkaline (above 7.3). Mapped soils run from pH 4.5 to 7.9, a spread of 3.4 units across 110 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 20.7% clay and 2.37% 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. 6% of mapped components carry free carbonate (lime already in the ground).

Montgomery against the rest of Kentucky

pH 6 is 0.21 above the Kentucky median of 5.79. 83 of 120 Kentucky counties have more acidic topsoil. Nationally it is more acidic than the US county median of 6.05.

Closest in pH within the state: Fleming (5.97), McLean (5.98), Hardin (5.99), McCracken (5.99), Ballard (6.03), Larue (6.03), Boone (6.04), Gallatin (6.04).

The range in Kentucky runs from Greenup at 5.09 to Carroll at 6.63; Montgomery sits 59% of the way up.