Compost or Conpost?

[roadrunner]

I found this kind of interesting. Personally, I don't buy compost or any soil amendments for many reason, including plastic waste. I hate buying anything in plastic bags, but also I like making my own soil/compost.

Do cows eat wood

 

[Anniekay]

As far as mushroom compost goes he is TOTALLY ignorant about what mushroom compost comes from. Lemme tell ya, horses at the race track, which is where mushroom growers get their starting soil from, horses are bedded down in wood shavings, sawdust, ( rarely) or straw. The mushroom growers come and get the contents from the manure bins ( large concrete slabs with 4-5' high cement block walls on 3 sides which contain soiled bedding in a MUCH higher proportion than it does manure.

After they get the horse manure from the track they mix other things in. Ground corncobs is something they use, wood chips, and also, potashis added. I know these things because I trained race horses for a living and dated a guy who is a mushroom grower. So, the guy in the video is just ignorant of how mushroom compost is made.

Cows and horses do eat sand, their mouth is right there pulling up grass as well as cutting it off. Horse can get intestinal impaction from sand in their stomach and we have to treat them periodically for sand if we are grazing them on sandy soil.

As far as woodchips in the Black Cow, I say: big deal. If you want 100% pure cow manure, ( which will burn the crap out of your plants roots unless you compost it for a year) go to a dairy and see if they'll let you shovel your own before they scrape it up and deposit it outside, (down here) in the sand.

 

[Tetters]

I have nothing like the vast experience of Annie, but this is really nothing so new when it comes from the stuff you buy in bags. The same sort of scams have been happening for years.
Anything containing any manure, as Annie mentions needs to be at least a year old or even longer, and manure from chickens is the worst.
I bought my very last bag of ''rubbish'' several years ago. Never again. We make our own with natural waste household, and vegetative which is worth having. I also like to add some peat (while my supplies last out) which I bought in bulk when they threatened to remove it from the market place. Leaf mould is a wonderful addition, and for pots I use slow release osmocote.
The continued habit of compost making gets easier and better as the years go by.
By all accounts, here in the UK, the bought stuff contains bits of glass, plastic, string and wire....
They need to put up a sign ''Can we sell you a lovely bag of tatt Sir/Madam'' it will only cost you a SMALL fortune.

 

[Logan]

I buy all purpose compost that is peat free, it's of good quality and no plastic or glass in it. I do make my own but it's not suitable for containers so i use it as a mulch. The bags can be recycled as well.

 

[Zigs]

As Tetters said, we make our own compost now days, but there were all sorts of rubbish appearing in the commercial stuff recently. Best thing I found was a coconut.

We use a few different methods.

Composted wood chip.

Bits of trees that have been shredded, left for a year and then sieved. The fine stuff goes in the compost mixes and the coarse stuff is used as mulch or on paths.

Leaf Mold.

As it sounds, rotted down in bulk for a few years and then sieved. Fine stuff for compost and the coarse stuff to mulch the strawberries in the pudding tunnel.

Garden Waste.

Composted in bulk for a year, sieved fines for compost and coarse stuff to earth up potatoes.

Kitchen Waste.

Currently put into our digester so the rats don't get it (no possums or racoons here ) Liquid strained off and used as feed, left over sludge added to Garden Waste heap

 

[olly-buckle]

This garden had been mainly ignored for years, and as well as reclaiming the parts that had been cultivated I have been creating new beds on virgin clay soil, so requirements continually outstrip supply. I compost everything I can get hold of, but I am always turning, sorting and sieving, partly to get it to work more quickly, partly to extract something I can use early on. This means it is often still full of seeds, no harm on the garden, I knock them over with the hoe as two leaves and the soil is soon good and clean, but it is a pain for planting seeds, so I do buy commercial compost as well. It varies considerably in quality, though I can't say I have found other detritus in it, however it does get heated, I don't know whether naturally or artificially, presumably to kill off things like seeds, and I have taken to handling it only with tools or gloves as it makes my hands black in a way that is difficult to get off. It's a pain, it is so much easier to make a hole and close it up around the plant with my fingers, but I don't want to scrub my hands raw all the time.
The plastic bags get saved and used until they are falling apart, I have a bunch of them full of leaves at the moment, and all sorts of stuff goes into them. Turned inside out they are black and get nice and warm in the sun, which helps decomposition, then stood with a board in front to keep the sun off they are great for growing potatoes, you can roll them down and back up aain as you earth up. At the end of their life they are filled with rubbish for the dump.
Kitchen waste goes into a compost bin stood on a piece of aviary wire, it seems rodents can't get their teeth into the curved plastic, though I have seen the occasional very small mouse that has got through the wire.
Worth saying, what goes through the compost really improves the ground underneath, worth building it where yo want to use a bit of virgin ground. Also that compost heaps are home to slugs in a big way. They help break down the compost as much as worms in many cases, but don't situate your heap within eight feet of anything you are growing, or you will find it gets 'slugged'.

 

[Zigs]

Kitchen waste goes into a compost bin stood on a piece of aviary wire, it seems rodents can't get their teeth into the curved plastic,

That's useful to know Olly

 

[Tetters]

This garden had been mainly ignored for years, and as well as reclaiming the parts that had been cultivated I have been creating new beds on virgin clay soil, so requirements continually outstrip supply. I compost everything I can get hold of, but I am always turning, sorting and sieving, partly to get it to work more quickly, partly to extract something I can use early on. This means it is often still full of seeds, no harm on the garden, I knock them over with the hoe as two leaves and the soil is soon good and clean, but it is a pain for planting seeds, so I do buy commercial compost as well. It varies considerably in quality, though I can't say I have found other detritus in it, however it does get heated, I don't know whether naturally or artificially, presumably to kill off things like seeds, and I have taken to handling it only with tools or gloves as it makes my hands black in a way that is difficult to get off. It's a pain, it is so much easier to make a hole and close it up around the plant with my fingers, but I don't want to scrub my hands raw all the time.
The plastic bags get saved and used until they are falling apart, I have a bunch of them full of leaves at the moment, and all sorts of stuff goes into them. Turned inside out they are black and get nice and warm in the sun, which helps decomposition, then stood with a board in front to keep the sun off they are great for growing potatoes, you can roll them down and back up aain as you earth up. At the end of their life they are filled with rubbish for the dump.
Kitchen waste goes into a compost bin stood on a piece of aviary wire, it seems rodents can't get their teeth into the curved plastic, though I have seen the occasional very small mouse that has got through the wire.
Worth saying, what goes through the compost really improves the ground underneath, worth building it where yo want to use a bit of virgin ground. Also that compost heaps are home to slugs in a big way. They help break down the compost as much as worms in many cases, but don't situate your heap within eight feet of anything you are growing, or you will find it gets 'slugged'.

When it comes to the black hands Olly, it might help to consider the blue nitril thin gloves for the job. They keep your fingers clean, and it doesn't feel as though you have them on. They are what I discovered when I had a form of dermatitis on my fingers, probably due to too much bleach ! I always use them now when kneading bread.

 

[Anniekay]

When it comes to the black hands Olly, it might help to consider the blue nitril thin gloves for the job. They keep your fingers clean, and it doesn't feel as though you have them on. They are what I discovered when I had a form of dermatitis on my fingers, probably due to too much bleach ! I always use them now when kneading bread.

I'm going to get some of those if I can get them in a small size. Dirt goes right through my gardening gloves and gets under my nails every time.

 

[Tetters]

I'm going to get some of those if I can get them in a small size. Dirt goes right through my gardening gloves and gets under my nails every time.

Just like the nurses in the hospital, they have small medium and large, in every ward and every clinic. A new pair for each patient, so as not to spread infection. Each glove will fit on either hand. They are brilliant and strong. Mine are small, and I find them on Amazon usually.

 

[olly-buckle]

I have thought of those gloves, but it is another expense and a bit more plastic, I am gradually getting quite competent with a wooden offcut.

 

[Anniekay]

Just like the nurses in the hospital, they have small medium and large, in every ward and every clinic. A new pair for each patient, so as not to spread infection. Each glove will fit on either hand. They are brilliant and strong. Mine are small, and I find them on Amazon usually.

I remember those from being in the hospital. I used a brand new box of them to kill a bug in my room. I'd just had my back operated on and when I saw the bug on the floor I dropped the box on it !!

I told the nurse so next day the exterminator came. I had to wait in the hall as he sprayed when my Doctor came by. I told him what was happening and he asked: "How big was this bug?"
It was a palmetto bug.

I told him : "Big enough to saddle !!"