Soil pH in Wasatch, UT: Lime or Sulfur?

Typical topsoil pH in Wasatch, UT

Typical topsoil in Wasatch, UT is pH 6.77, already right for vegetable garden (6-7). Test before adding anything.

What Wasatch needs, by plant

• Already in range: lawn (cool-season grass), vegetable garden, tomatoes, roses.
• Sulfur: potatoes 3 lb/100 sq ft over 2 applications; strawberries 1.8 lb/100 sq ft; blueberries 4.1 lb/100 sq ft over 3 applications; azaleas and rhododendrons 3.5 lb/100 sq ft over 2 applications; blue hydrangeas 3.5 lb/100 sq ft over 2 applications; pink hydrangeas 1.2 lb/100 sq ft.

What to do next

If your test lands near 6.77, you can skip lime and sulfur for lawn (cool-season grass), vegetable garden, tomatoes, roses.

How mixed the soil is

Of the 238,743 surveyed acres in Wasatch, UT, 62% are near neutral (6.5-7.3), 30% are moderately acidic (5.5-6.5), 8% are alkaline (above 7.3). Mapped soils run from pH 5.8 to 8.3, a spread of 2.5 units across 290 soil components. 62% of the land falls in one class, so the county figure is a fair first guess for most yards here.

Clay, organic matter and rates

Topsoil here averages 18.8% clay and 4.56% 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. 10% of mapped components carry free carbonate (lime already in the ground).

Wasatch against the rest of Utah

pH 6.77 is 1.18 below the Utah median of 7.95. 1 of 29 Utah counties have more acidic topsoil. Nationally it is more alkaline than the US county median of 6.05.

Closest in pH within the state: Morgan (6.66), Summit (6.95), Weber (7.09), Cache (7.13), Salt Lake (7.57).

The range in Utah runs from Morgan at 6.66 to Millard at 8.44; Wasatch sits 6% of the way up.