Iron pan in grassland.

Limestone Cowboy

Doing a bit of mole ploughing on a bit of land today that used to be very productive about 15 years ago but has been almost useless in recent times lads. Im no expert on soil types but I had reckoned there was a serious compaction issue and that a pan may have formed from poaching. It's the type of ground that would get sticky very quickly but also dry very quickly. I'm guessing a high clay content in the soil. Could see where bits of scraws had turned over that there is a rust coloured layer in the soil about 4-6 inches down. Is this an iron pan and is it causing the ground to hold water for longer? The subsoil isint mud and a lump will break up into crumbs in my hand at the moment but at the same time I'd imagine it is not the most permiable after a period of wet weather because it wouldn't be much above the water table. Pic attached. Cheers for any info.

pedigree 6

Limestone Cowboy wrote: »

Doing a bit of mole ploughing on a bit of land today that used to be very productive about 15 years ago but has been almost useless in recent times lads. Im no expert on soil types but I had reckoned there was a serious compaction issue and that a pan may have formed from poaching. It's the type of ground that would get sticky very quickly but also dry very quickly. I'm guessing a high clay content in the soil. Could see where bits of scraws had turned over that there is a rust coloured layer in the soil about 4-6 inches down. Is this an iron pan and is it causing the ground to hold water for longer? The subsoil isint mud and a lump will break up into crumbs in my hand at the moment but at the same time I'd imagine it is not the most permiable after a period of wet weather because it wouldn't be much above the water table. Pic attached. Cheers for any info.

Was this land ever ploughed before?

What is the subsoil?
Is the subsoil a grey gley type beneath this layer?

And finally it does look like an iron pan and it was formed because of the high water table as you say and poor drainage of the soil underneath.

Limestone Cowboy

pedigree 6 wrote: »

Was this land ever ploughed before?

What is the subsoil?
Is the subsoil a grey gley type beneath this layer?

And finally it does look like an iron pan and it was formed because of the high water table as you say and poor drainage of the soil underneath.

I wouldn't think it was ever ploughed no, it's a valley in the burren so you'd be near enough to the rock so not really the place for a plough even though I didn't meet as many as I though I would with the mole plough. Subsoil is dark grey, not the type of muddy daub you would see in really boggy places and will crumble in your hand rather than form a ball at the moment, it not the type that would hold the mole drain. I would say the the subsoil should be able to soak a good bit but don't think the water could get down to it through the pan. Its sitting right in the bottom of a valley with a fairly large mountain to one side about a mile away which is all bog. Might explain where all the iron came from. Gave it a fair going over with a twin leg mole plough about 4ft apart. Do you reckon this will make much of a difference in the short term?

pedigree 6

Oh the mole ploughing will help with drainage no doubt.

The iron pan though afaik forms in situ and the iron doesn't come from anywhere else. It's just a chemical reaction between the grey subsoil (full of calcium that gives it that colour) and the mineral topsoil (low pH high acid soil) above and the iron pan forms between the two.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hardpan

This is the last job we did on drainage. The grey gley was the topsoil and a mineral soil as a subsoil all above a shale and slate( if you go far enough down) bedrock. But you can just see the iron pan difference in colour between the two layers.



Edit: There's even bits of turf was starting to form in that bog. Turf in wexford. :eek: :

Good loser

Would not consider it is a true 'iron pan'. Too thin.

Muckit

Did you pipe those drains anywhere pedigree? Interested to hear what he did and how it worked!

I have land with that grey marl too. But think it's a deeper band than that.... then again never dug down 8' to see!!

pedigree 6

Good loser wrote: »

Would not consider it is a true 'iron pan'. Too thin.

How thin or thick is a sheet of metal?
How much water goes through a sheet of metal?

Even spreading lime on land can make a slight pan on the surface when you think about it before it mixes in.

pedigree 6

Muckit wrote: »

Did you pipe those drains anywhere pedigree? Interested to hear what he did and how it worked!

I have land with that grey marl too. But think it's a deeper band than that.... then again never dug down 8' to see!!

Piped and stoned up to any old drains or springs to let that water into the pipe and all drainage pipes exit in the one outlet pipe at the open drain so that there's always running water in the pipes and should never block unless roots get in the end of course.

Ah i'm always banging on about this here Muckit!
It's turned into a brilliant field.

This was the field this winter and that digger would have been in the middle of this picture. This picture would have been taken from behind the digger.
The drainage was done in Sept 2011 and sown the following May.
It was sown with grass varieties Kintyre and Aberchoice.


Calcium is fantastic stuff for grass. When you think of it it's where the calcium in milk comes from (the soil). There's thinking in the U.S that reckon soil needs 80% soil base saturation of calcium to be optimum for crop growth.

limo_100

pedigree 6 wrote: »

Piped and stoned up to any old drains or springs to let that water into the pipe and all drainage pipes exit in the one outlet pipe at the open drain so that there's always running water in the pipes and should never block unless roots get in the end of course.

Ah i'm always banging on about this here Muckit!
It's turned into a brilliant field.

This was the field this winter and that digger would have been in the middle of this picture. This picture would have been taken from behind the digger.
The drainage was done in Sept 2011 and sown the following May.
It was sown with grass varieties Kintyre and Aberchoice.


Calcium is fantastic stuff for grass. When you think of it it's where the calcium in milk comes from (the soil). There's thinking in the U.S that reckon soil needs 80% soil base saturation of calcium to be optimum for crop growth.

Im hoping to do 6acres in the next month hoping to drain it and sow it by the end of june. Hw much did you spend pre acre to drain and wha size is that field im you dont want to tell me its sound. Also what stone did you use and how far did you fill it?

_Brian

Clay looks like our own here, would see plenty of iron in the ground mixed with clay.
Mole ploughing definitely helped on last two years.

Limestone Cowboy

Good loser wrote: »

Would not consider it is a true 'iron pan'. Too thin.

That just a piece of a sod I picked up, can see it going all through the sods that were turned up.

Limestone Cowboy

pedigree 6 wrote: »

Oh the mole ploughing will help with drainage no doubt.

The iron pan though afaik forms in situ and the iron doesn't come from anywhere else. It's just a chemical reaction between the grey subsoil (full of calcium that gives it that colour) and the mineral topsoil (low pH high acid soil) above and the iron pan forms between the two.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hardpan

This is the last job we did on drainage. The grey gley was the topsoil and a mineral soil as a subsoil all above a shale and slate( if you go far enough down) bedrock. But you can just see the iron pan difference in colour between the two layers.



Edit: There's even bits of turf was starting to form in that bog. Turf in wexford. :eek: :

Thanks for that response pedigree, subsoil looks similar to your own and like you said it seems to have formed between the two layers. I would imagine that the bedrock is limestone going from the surrounding ground. Ground was soil sampled last year and there was no lime required and it was index 2 and 3 for p and k. Hard to explain but the ground floods there a couple of times a year from swallow holes. The water coming from the mountain meets the craggy limestone and goes underground and springs back up overground through them then in our place, very rarely lasts longer than a day. There is a small stream starting just at the edge of the field flowing through a few neighbors places then. Have 50 acres in that strip and it's not that long ago that it would feed 30 cows and calves for the summer. It'd struggle to feed half that now, hasn't been grazed yet this year and is half eaten with leather jackets to make matters worse. Have all the rushes topped, going to fertilise it during the week and it hasn't seen any in 10 years I'd say and spray the rushes when they grow a bit again in a few weeks time. Hoping the mole ploughing will make a big difference. Is it worth shaking a few bags of grass seed where the leather jackets damaged?

Limestone Cowboy

Few pics.

davidk1394

First thing I'd do is soil sample it for all the trace elements as well as P,K and pH. Then you'll know what your dealing with. More than likely the pH is probably below 5.5 due to the soil and there is a shortage of P due to high levels of iron in the soil which would explain poor plant growth. More than likely lime will have to be applied. This will give an immediate response. Then focus on your drainage.
Be it shallow drainage like what your doing with sub soiling or deeper drains using drain pipes and stone. But first soil sample otherwise you won't know what your dealing with.

blue5000

LC it's probably a turlough. When it floods the water brings up the lime, that's why your pH is ok. With the mole ploughing it might not get flooded anymore, so will need lime in future to keep it right.

Can you dig a hole about 2 ft deep, leave it for a few days for the iron to oxidise, you'll probably see the pan then.

yosemitesam1

Was there much fert applied during 80's and 90's? Was silage ever cut off it?

Would think throwing on a bit of cocksfoots or festulolium seed would be better than ryegrass as both have deeper roots that would help keep the subsoil more open.

Edit. Was it ever reseeded?

Limestone Cowboy

yosemitesam1 wrote: »

Was there much fert applied during 80's and 90's? Was silage ever cut off it?

Would think throwing on a bit of cocksfoots or festulolium seed would be better than ryegrass as both have deeper roots that would help keep the subsoil more open.

Edit. Was it ever reseeded?

Ya it would have got 3 bags 10-10-20 to the acre every year back then. No silage was never cut off nor was any of it reseeded.

Limestone Cowboy

blue5000 wrote: »

LC it's probably a turlough. When it floods the water brings up the lime, that's why your pH is ok. With the mole ploughing it might not get flooded anymore, so will need lime in future to keep it right.

Can you dig a hole about 2 ft deep, leave it for a few days for the iron to oxidise, you'll probably see the pan then.

It'll hardly stop the flooding. Ya can dig a test hole no bother, hadn't thought of that!

pedigree 6

limo_100 wrote: »

Im hoping to do 6acres in the next month hoping to drain it and sow it by the end of june. Hw much did you spend pre acre to drain and wha size is that field im you dont want to tell me its sound. Also what stone did you use and how far did you fill it?

I won't tell you then. Ha!:P

The whole job was linked in with putting in a roadway and digging shale out of the field and using that for the roadway and then we put the topsoil from the roadway for filling in any hollows in the field. So it is hard to split up how much it cost just for the drainage. But the digger cost 45/hr and 150/day for the tractor and stoner. I forget how much stone was used but it wasn't just a basic foot or so you hear about. The stone was brought up in height in the drains to meet any springs or old drains that they met to allow the water from these to get into the pipe. Also they used a laser level to keep a continuous fall all the way to the outlet. I think the stone was just called standard drainage stone from kilcarrig quarries in Carlow. You might be able to see the kind of stone it is from the pictures.







It was sprayed off after this in the autumn but I ran out of time then between picking stones and cutting up trees for firewood on the field and then ploughing the field. So never got to sow the grass seeds till the next year. But it was better it worked out this way as more rushes came back and I sprayed them again and got a complete kill plus the drains settled over the winter and the soil sank. So then when it came to tilling and levelling I was able to level the field perfectly but I had to get someone else in with a track digger again to pull back the bank from the open drain into the field to get a proper fall to the drain.
Then there was a soft hole still in the field so I got that digger to dig a hole and put the stones that I picked off the field into the hole and I filled up the hole that way and used more of the bank to level up this hole. Then I just tilled and levelled till I got the falls on the field right and I was happy with it before finally sowing the grass seed.

Whatever about the cost though a professional drainage contractor is worth it.
There's plenty of cowboys out there who haven't a clue what they're doing.
It's a lot easier do a good job on a barren piece of ground than try and rescue a field that someone else messed up before.

Waffletraktor

pedigree 6 wrote: »

I won't tell you then. Ha!:P

The whole job was linked in with putting in a roadway and digging shale out of the field and using that for the roadway and then we put the topsoil from the roadway for filling in any hollows in the field. So it is hard to split up how much it cost just for the drainage. But the digger cost 45/hr and 150/day for the tractor and stoner. I forget how much stone was used but it wasn't just a basic foot or so you hear about. The stone was brought up in height in the drains to meet any springs or old drains that they met to allow the water from these to get into the pipe. Also they used a laser level to keep a continuous fall all the way to the outlet. I think the stone was just called standard drainage stone from kilcarrig quarries in Carlow. You might be able to see the kind of stone it is from the pictures.


.

That would be getting on for what's known here as a french drain, regardless of depth the pipe is in gravel/stone and filled until 18" off the surface. About 15" wide.
Done for main drains(which has smaller branches coming off it) and in particularly bad areas on clay ground here.

Waffletraktor

Is there a stream or drain to carry away water or is it pourus limestone underneath?
A common thing here if no fall is to dig a sump/pond with an outlet pipe and oneway valve or even a small wind powered turbine- pump to drive out the water if it can get away. Just needs some checking every few months

Good loser

Limestone Cowboy wrote: »

That just a piece of a sod I picked up, can see it going all through the sods that were turned up.

There can be a thing called a plough layer in the soil.

Iron pans from my recollection are on very acid mountain soils - podzols?
And are deeper than a plough layer, which comes/came from ploughing to the same depth for many years.

Limestone Cowboy

Good loser wrote: »

There can be a thing called a plough layer in the soil.

Iron pans from my recollection are on very acid mountain soils - podzols?
And are deeper than a plough layer, which comes/came from ploughing to the same depth for many years.

Like I said in the first post I wouldn't be too well up on the different soil types and their characteristics. Iron pan may not even be the right term for it. Here's another pic that might show it better.

Limestone Cowboy

Pic too large and won't attach for me

Limestone Cowboy

Waffletraktor wrote: »

Is there a stream or drain to carry away water or is it pourus limestone underneath?
A common thing here if no fall is to dig a sump/pond with an outlet pipe and oneway valve or even a small wind powered turbine- pump to drive out the water if it can get away. Just needs some checking every few months

There is a small stream at the far corner of that field alright. From the furthest point that would require some drainage to the beginning of the stream is 800 meters and I'm not sure if you could get enough of a fall in a pipe/drain to get it there. To my eye there is no fall in the land naturally either way and the level of the stream isn't much below the level of the land. The stream only flows in our place during a flood but never drys just outside our boundrary in our neighbors place. There is 2 springs there wetting a nice area. I had actually thought to dig out the source of the springs fill with stone and put in a sump and pipe it to the nearest swallow hole rather than trying to drain the whole lot of it because I'm not sure if it would be needed. I haven't seen a similar type of a job done anywhere else though but it my own head I can't see why it wouldn't work. Ground underneath would be porus limestone alright.

blue5000

Limestone Cowboy wrote: »

Pic too large and won't attach for me

Crop off the top until you get below 4 mb

patsy_mccabe

blue5000 wrote: »

Crop off the top until you get below 4 mb

You also open the photo with MS Paint and resave as a JPEG . That will reduce size most times.