Used to live in Mississauga, Ontario, Canada where the clay is rock hard when dry or will sink a truck when wet and liquified. Mississauga used to be the home for several brick manufacturing plants, one still exists just a few miles north, and claims to be the largest brick making plant in North America.
When I first moved there, I tried growing potatoes. During the summer the soil cracks like a dried up swamp. When I dug the potatoes up, the few that managed to grow had followed the cracks and were long and flat. Onions grew above the soil, just their roots in the ground.
I can recall many years ago, a small hill was excavated for its clay, this was used to build berms around the fuel storage tanks at a local oil refinery. It was to contain any spill, leakage or tank rupture.
