Learning all about soil compaction

I drilled some holes for my new rose bushes awhile back, dug them really deep using an auger bit on my skid steer. When I planted the roses they all sat in the holes well and fit perfectly. But eventually it rained, and when that happened I found the plants sunk in the holes quite a bit... Some over a foot deep into these holes! So I had to do something. Thinking the rose bushes would not like being that sunken into the holes.

They are all like this, each looks like they are down in a hole now. lol Probably not a good idea to leave them like this, during heavy rains they will fill with water and probably too much water for the roses.

I will need to take a shovel, and scoop out the rose plants.. and then backfill with more dirt. Maybe I should have waited for a good rain before trying to plant these. But honestly I had no idea this would happen.

Luckily I just a big bag of peat moss, I can probably use that fill the holes and replant.. hopefully they do not settle again bad.

Glad they have been okay for a few days, I think this happened when we got a really good rain.

Lol you can see the potting soil around the hole too. I will try to keep as much as I can of that in the holes.

I guess I need to think about compaction more when drilling these holes. I do not remember my cannabis plants having this problem. As I drilled holes for them too.

So now I will need to take some time and pull out the plants, fill in and replant. All of that dirt around the holes is dirt that would have probably gone back into those holes. And when I filled them with less dense garden soil all the plants sank in after a good rain.

I also planted some asparagus in these holes.. for them, I will not be pulling them up, but instead leaving them be.. And when winter comes, fill in the holes.. Hopefully the asparagus will grow all the way up the next year.

Hope they do not mind it for the summer and fall.

I really need to add some mulch around these holes when I am done. Probably weed wack too. In a future project.

Hah we can see the asparagus flowering, guess they do not mind the sunken holes all that much. They seem like some really hardy plants.. dealing with just about anything thrown at them.

One day the rose bushes and asparagus will hopefully fill in the area. But this is the first year so they need time to adjust, and maybe a few years I should have some nice plants growing there.

Roses should become quite hardy after a few years, and its cool they are already producing flowers.