Tried growing my own vegetables in contaminated soil and got sick for 2 weeks

I live near an old industrial site in Cleveland, thought I'd start a small garden to feel better about all the truck emissions and plastic waste. Dug up a patch in my backyard, threw in some tomato seeds and lettuce starters from the nursery. After 3 weeks I ate a salad from it, woke up the next morning with terrible cramps and nausea. Ended up in urgent care, they ran tests and said it was probably heavy metal exposure from the soil. I should have tested it first, but the whole point was to feel closer to the earth you know? Now I'm stuck wondering if any of us can really grow clean food anymore with all the legacy pollution everywhere. Has anyone else run into this problem trying to start a garden in an older city?

3 comments

3 Comments

ray3561mo ago

Man, that's rough but honestly you might be dodging a bullet anyway. Old industrial sites in Cleveland often have way worse stuff than heavy metals, like old solvents and weird chemical residues that don't show up on standard soil tests. You probably would have been better off building raised beds with clean soil from a landscape supply place, it's more work upfront but at least you know what's in it.

murray.jana1mo agoMost Upvoted

Actually, Cuyahoga County's soil testing program is pretty thorough and tests for a lot more than heavy metals. They check for things like PCBs and other old industrial gunk because Cleveland's soils are known to be complicated. I had my yard tested through them two years ago and they detected everything down to leftover pesticide compounds from the 1940s. The problem with raised beds is you're basically importing unknown dirt from who knows where unless you pay for a full lab panel on that too. I've seen landscape supply places sell "garden soil" that's just screened debris from construction sites mixed with sand. At least with native soil you know the history and can address real problems instead of guessing what's in some mystery mix.

sage3081mo ago

Murray's right about the testing program here, but ray's advice about raised beds needs a little fixing. The landscape supply places actually do have to meet certain standards for their garden soil blends, at least the reputable ones do. They're not all just dumping construction debris in bags, that stuff gets screened and tested before they can call it garden soil. I had a friend who used to work at one of those places and they'd reject whole truckloads if the ph was off or there was too much clay. The real problem is that building raised beds with imported soil doesn't solve the issue of what's underneath, because if you dig deep enough for carrots or potatoes, those roots can still hit the contaminated native soil. You'd need to line the bottom of your beds with landscape fabric and a thick layer of clean gravel to really isolate your plants. And even then, you're right that Cleveland's soil is complicated, but the county program gives you specific recommendations for each contaminant they find, not just a list of problems.