Pellet Lime Question

UGAMike

New Member
So for most of us we have to use pellet lime since it flows through our spreaders much better than trying to fight ag lime or pulverized lime.

The local farmer near our club says he has an Agronomy Degree from the Univ. of GA and states that pellet lime is sugar coated and takes 3 years to fully incorporate into the soil and that we are basically wasting money using pellet lime.

I wanted to hear everyone's opinion on this based on food plot results and soil tests a year after pellet lime application. I know when I get pellet lime on my driveway and don't sweep it off, its dissolved by the morning dew after just one day. Could it be that is how companies used to manufacture pellet lime and the manufacturing process has change?

I kind of feel if what he was saying was accurate then I would have found more information on forums to confirm his statements.
 
So for most of us we have to use pellet lime since it flows through our spreaders much better than trying to fight ag lime or pulverized lime.

The local farmer near our club says he has an Agronomy Degree from the Univ. of GA and states that pellet lime is sugar coated and takes 3 years to fully incorporate into the soil and that we are basically wasting money using pellet lime.

I wanted to hear everyone's opinion on this based on food plot results and soil tests a year after pellet lime application. I know when I get pellet lime on my driveway and don't sweep it off, its dissolved by the morning dew after just one day. Could it be that is how companies used to manufacture pellet lime and the manufacturing process has change?

I kind of feel if what he was saying was accurate then I would have found more information on forums to confirm his statements.
I've never heard that one before. Pelletized lime has worked well for me with the same results as powdered, but in my area it's way to expensive, 290 a ton vs 96 a ton for bagged. It has the same value pound for pound. I'd dump bags by hand before paying that much.
 
Oh, lets see if I can put this delicately. Umm, maybe you heard the local farmer incorrectly. I don't have an agronomy degree, but I did work in the crop input business for a number of years. Properly constructed pelletized lime consists of small lime particles of varying sizes. If you look at the tag on the bag it should tell what percent passes thru different screen sizes. When we manufactured pelletized lime we used the same ag lime one would spread for production ag purposes. The lime was mixed with a water soluble binder, pressed into pellets, dried and bagged.

Some people confuse the size of the pellet with a chunk of raw limestone which, in the short and intermediate term, has no neutralizing capability at all. So, I can understand how there might me confusion, but I would expect more from UGA educated agronomist.

Now, some will argue pelleted lime neutralizes more quickly than regular ag lime, but it just depends on the composition of the pellet -- that is, how much of the lime used to make the product is sufficiently small to, chemically, change the acidity of the soil. Small is fast. Big is slow. Smaller is not necessarily better and bigger is not necessarily worse.
 
thanks for the input...I try read as much as I can find from University research papers and everything I found was not lining up with his comments. I did have to ask him twice to confirm his comments of 3 years to breakdown pellet lime in soil.
 
So many myths exist in farming it's not even funny, like the one that "anhydrous ammonia kills the soil and makes it hard because that's what they used to build airfields in WW2"

But at the same time I take everything the universities put out with a grain of salt. You have to remember that they don't farm for a living, I know I've met quite a few of the university "experts" that would've gone broke farming in the real world decades ago lol

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thanks for the input...I try read as much as I can find from University research papers and everything I found was not lining up with his comments. I did have to ask him twice to confirm his comments of 3 years to breakdown pellet lime in soil.

Heck, even the coarsest ag lime is likely to be fully incorporated into your soil in 3 years! The only way his statement is correct is IF the pelletized lime you happened to buy was, in fact, made from very coarse lime. The opposite is usually true; most pelletized lime is made from relatively fine-ground materials, which is why it frequently will increase your pH more rapidly, but not last as long.

Perhaps there was some manufacturer of pelletized lime, at one time, who chose to coat their pelletized lime with sugar because it was formed from very coarse lime. Perhaps that lime didn't broadcast very well, so he coated it sugar? Yeah...I don't think so, either. :)
 
So for most of us we have to use pellet lime since it flows through our spreaders much better than trying to fight ag lime or pulverized lime.

The local farmer near our club says he has an Agronomy Degree from the Univ. of GA and states that pellet lime is sugar coated and takes 3 years to fully incorporate into the soil and that we are basically wasting money using pellet lime.

I wanted to hear everyone's opinion on this based on food plot results and soil tests a year after pellet lime application. I know when I get pellet lime on my driveway and don't sweep it off, its dissolved by the morning dew after just one day. Could it be that is how companies used to manufacture pellet lime and the manufacturing process has change?

I kind of feel if what he was saying was accurate then I would have found more information on forums to confirm his statements.

My understanding is that pellet lime is made from very highly pulverized lime, and so once the pellets get wet and break down it actually raises soil ph faster than most grades of ag lime.

Of course, it is also much more expensive, so there's a trade off involved, as in all things.

I've used both. Similar results.


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What exactly makes the ph go back down? And what stops it from continuing to go down?


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Primarily, soil is weathered rock eroded over a long, long time. Each rock type has it's own composition which determines pH. Here's a map of 'natural' pH across the country. If you do a zoom in with a click you'll see a label with the pH of the soil in the area. Looks closely. http://www.bonap.org/2008_Soil/pH20110321.png
Adding lime is replacing low pH ions (hydrogen) with high pH ions (calcium/magnesium). Eventually, rainfall leaches (or washes) the positive calcium / magnesium ions thru the soil. That brings us back to the 'natural' pH. Additionally, breakdown of organic material adds acidity as does application of fertilizer.
 
Primarily, soil is weathered rock eroded over a long, long time. Each rock type has it's own composition which determines pH. Here's a map of 'natural' pH across the country. If you do a zoom in with a click you'll see a label with the pH of the soil in the area. Looks closely. http://www.bonap.org/2008_Soil/pH20110321.png
Adding lime is replacing low pH ions (hydrogen) with high pH ions (calcium/magnesium). Eventually, rainfall leaches (or washes) the positive calcium / magnesium ions thru the soil. That brings us back to the 'natural' pH. Additionally, breakdown of organic material adds acidity as does application of fertilizer.

Thank you, it makes perfect sense now


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What exactly makes the ph go back down? And what stops it from continuing to go down?


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A lot of factors here. As mentioned natural factors but also planting choices, land manipulation, erosion, soil deposits from water movements, pollutants, and even Fert choices and amounts. And not all soils are meant by nature to be ph of 7 since there are many plants that exist and prefer both extremes. Acid or basic is not necessarily a bad thing in the overall scheme of natures plantings or even animal population. Thus one reason water can act as either an acid or base, forcing a substance to either end of the spectrum.
 
Primarily, soil is weathered rock eroded over a long, long time. Each rock type has it's own composition which determines pH. Here's a map of 'natural' pH across the country. If you do a zoom in with a click you'll see a label with the pH of the soil in the area. Looks closely. http://www.bonap.org/2008_Soil/pH20110321.png
Adding lime is replacing low pH ions (hydrogen) with high pH ions (calcium/magnesium). Eventually, rainfall leaches (or washes) the positive calcium / magnesium ions thru the soil. That brings us back to the 'natural' pH. Additionally, breakdown of organic material adds acidity as does application of fertilizer.
Cool map. Thanks!
 
I got curious about pelleted lime production today (compared to 20 years ago!).

A couple things occur to me.

http://www.pelletizedlimestone.com/

The system advertised at the link above is aimed at limestone mining operators. It's being sold as a way to use the byproducts -- the "fines" that would normally go to waste. And that's OK, but this byproduct will probably pass thru a very, very fine screen. It will raise pH quickly, but, the impact will be short lived.

The product the company I worked for many years ago formulated a pellet purposely composed of limestone particles of different sizes to extend the neutralization over a longer period.

I haven't looked at a tag in a long, long time. Today, is there any opportunity to buy a pellet that is made of variable particle size?
 
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