After years of gardening in the same raised beds my soil samples come back with low potasium readings. I have added a lot of greensand, murate of potash, and potassium sulfate to my soil over the years but heavy rains and heavy plant growth must leach it out faster than I add it back in. I did try ashes from my charcoal grill last year on everything from my cabbage, broccoli, beans, cucumbers, squash, tomatoes and peppers and the results were outstanding. My PH at the start of the season was around 6 to 6.7 and I haven't taken soil samples yet this year so I don't know how it affected the ph. The plants it did the most good for were cucumbers, cabbage, tomatoes and bell peppers. I didn't add the ashes until the plants were starting to make fruit or in the case of cabbage when they just started to head and I would sprinkle a small handful around each plant and water it in with my liquid fertilizer application. As for worms I was out today removing some mulch to plant some more broccoli plants and the soil was teeming with earth worms so I must not have added enough to bother them much.
If you need to lower the ph in your soil two of the fastest organic things you can do is add cottonseed meal and lots of peat moss. Pine bark fines will help with loosening up your soil but it can take a lot of them and they also are usually acidic enough to help lower the ph some. My soil used to have a very high ph anywhere from 7.2 up to 8.3 in one bed. I added a lot of the three items above and brought my ph down significantly over about 3 years. Bringing the ph down really helped my tomatoes absorb more iron, phosphorous and probably other elements.
I found something that I am trying this year as a soil conditioner but it would only be available where there are working cotton gins. I went to one looking for some old composted gin waste but all they had was new stuff but they did have a huge pile of old cottonseed that had been piled up and were rotting so I got a truckload of them. I talked to the a soil specialist at the state ag dept and he thought they would be a terrific addition to my garden soil but that they might lower my ph quite a bit. I added them to three beds and even added some lime for the first time in years. The plants growing in those three beds seem to be doing really well so far but only time will tell. I will be planting some tomatoes in a couple of those beds later and see how they are affected either positively or negatively. One thing I can say for sure they do make the soil lighter and more friable.
Bill
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