Adding life to the soil | Volunteer Gardener

Large established trees in a city green space were showing signs of deterioration. It was determined the soil was the problem. It was compacted and lifeless. The remedy? Applications of a lab-tested compost tea brought life back to the soil and thereby the collection of urban trees.
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[@richarddetriquet9642]

The average homeowner with this problem should enlarge the dripline, apply good compost and perhaps some azomite for trace minerals. Willow oaks send out alot of fibrous roots so trying to improve soil composition a foot or two below the surface may help. Foliar sprays are really only a temporary treatment of limited benefit. As the video states, large trees with this issue requires a long term effort. Finally, I would avoid using chemical weed/feed lawn fertilizers anywhere around trees. Those chemicals are typically used in many urban municipalities and cause many issues for trees and shrubs.

[@nixnox4852]

This is classic nutrient deficiency. You can take leaf samples and send them to a lab for analysis, along with a comparative sample from healthy trees to gain insight into what it's deficient in. You can then do a foliar nutrient spray application as a faster acting temporary fix to rescue the tree and preventing it from declining further while the soil issue is being addressed. Some seaweed extract (like what's in foligro hightide) are able to help the tree endure stress and excessive free radical generation (one source of which are air ozone concentration), though I can't speak for all such products on the market. Nitrogen can *very* slowly be added to the soil with nitrogen fixing organisms, but if there's not enough mineral nutrients like phosphorus, potassium, zinc, iron, calcium, magnesium, etc, then there is no way for those things just to appear there because these aren't gaseous. They have to be physically added, or released from weathered substrate. Another possibility is the pH is so low or high, that critical nutrients stop becoming soluble, or in some cases excessively soluble. Aluminum (the most abundant metal in the earths crust) can start to become soluble when the pH is below 5, resulting in aluminum toxicity. A "tea" of compost isn't just going to be microorganisms, it's going to consist of many nutrients which is likely what is doing the bulk of the work here. In this case the nutrients are being leached out of plant tissue from healthy plants, and likely concentrated. Do be careful what plants are used for such a tea, many plants create a variety of chemicals that they use to suppress competing plants or insects, so you can accidentally create a "natural" herbicide or insecticide.

[@shaneshonda]

Try using pervious concrete that where concrete is in the drip line.theres alotbof poor soils around downtown Nashville because alot of areas where filled in with debris from building the larger buildings to lift the grade above the flood plain of the cumberland river.if you did around downtown you'll dig up tons of brick and old bottles