I would find soil that is very fast drying, sand and gravel mix. Mix in some of your own soil and some potting soil. Some times I have had the best results from directly planting in my native soil, but it is drier here. So some experimenting my be needed. 😉

Hi Macario,

Merry Christmas!

In my raised cactus beds I used a mix of plenty of horticultural sand and cactus soil as well as regular good triple mix all blended together...On top of thus i used pea gravel like a good2 inch layer...I would do my best not to use clay at all...

Palmettoman z6-Ajax, On

Before using a soil mix try this. Shape your clay so that moisture will drain off of it without leaving any puddles. Then add several inches of road crush(navy Jack)(3/4 " crushed gravel). This will provide good drainage for the bed. You can either lay the landscape fabric now or on top of the soil. landscape fabric may not seem essential but wind blown weed seeds from prior years could create a problem if you don't use it.

I have been using a heavy loam. You may want to get standard garden soil and add either perlite or vermiculite to improve drainage. The soil should be slightly alkaline or neutral so don't use peat moss.

There is a website on Cacti which provides good advice on creating a growing environment. I am at my daughters until the 27th. When I get home I will post the web site from my bookmarks.

Allen

Ok ill be looking for it

Here is the address of the web site;

'www.cactiguide.com'

The growing environment is 'www.cactiguide.com/growcacti/'

A lot of the information makes sense to me, but don't believe everything that you read. Happy reading.

Allen

Allen has a good point about keeping the soil at a slope, it does more in keeping plants dry then most other things do. But if you can't try on of the other methods.