In contrast to many fruit-tree crops, olive can establish well in calcareous soils (Melgar et al., 2006, 2009; Tattini and Traversi, 2009) but can also thrive on moderately acidic soils. In practice, productive orchards are found on soils with pH in the range 5.5-8.5 Soil texture and depth are likely to affect tree growth due their effect on soil water holding capacity and yet olive trees can grow in both sand and clay soils of varying depth, with irrigation as required. Unlike soil texture and water holding capacity, inherent infertility can be corrected with fertilizer (Section 5.2) and in fact low, managed fertility is advantageous for control of vegetative growth that in turn increases porosity, reduces the need for pruning, and provides less competition with fruit and oil production.
In many regions, excess water (i.e., waterlogging) is the most important soil limitation to successful production. Olive roots are sensitive to oxygen supply such that young trees can survive waterlogged conditions for only 3-4 days, with susceptibility increasing during active growth periods (Navarro and Parra, 2008). Since even short periods of waterlogging can have disastrous results on orchard productivity and survival, susceptible locations usually found on poorly drained, light textured soils should be avoided as should also salinity and frost prone areas. In less severely affected locations, consideration can be given to installing drainage systems or planting trees on raised beds.