Soil, water, and tea questions

[moose eater]

Years ago I used to get 1 cu. ft./ bags of what were supposedly freeze-dried ewc from British Columbia, brought up to the Matanuska Valley by a fellow I knew there who ran a hydro store. Colorful character and old-timer who'd had numerous dances with the authorities over forbidden gardening or related issues..

Considering what I think I know now, thinking about the freeze-dried ewc's, I now ask "Why?"

They were clean, lighter weight for the dryer product, etc. But didn't most of the microbes die in the freeze-drying process? Do they come back to life or re-generate?

 

[h.h.]

https://opsdiagnostics.com/notes/ranpri/rpbacteriafdprotocol.htm

That's a new one on me. Sort of like ultra pasteurized organic milk. It will store for a long time and they can ship it. Tastes like crap...

I saw Grace Slick and Richard Nixon, but not at the same time. Grace was with Jerry Garcia and Tricky Dick was with Spiro and Ronald Reagan. Different crowd, different vibes. different drugs.

 

[moose eater]

Yeah, the castings were mottled off-grey in color, notably lighter than typical castings, and fairly (unevenly) granular in consistency.

The link gives promise to keeping microbes alive, but seems like a lot of effort for such a company to have gone through. May never know the reality at this point. I believe the gent sold his shop to another a number of years back. A lot of his inventory back then was Canadian-sourced.

The line-up reminds me of the (Firesign Theater's?) All Star Dead Band...

Had Kissinger been present, there likely would've been a resulting series of lightning strikes in the area of Nixon, Reagan, and Agnew. I figure the Cosmos can only tolerate so much concentration of evil in any given geographic area, before it strikes back.

Gracie was hot. Contemplating spiking the coffee pot in the White House with Lucy was playfully Kesey-ish. I can't remember if she accepted Nixon's invite, though I recall her talking about not understanding WHY he desired her presence. Not exactly birds of a feather.

 

[h.h.]

I was drinking some Kool aid one day and my buddy wanted some. I told him it was electric. Thought he understood. Never do that again.
I think I may have mailed Nixon a doobie once. Some pretty crappy stuff. No wonder he had an attitude.

I saw the Starship at Golden Gate Park. I wanna say Hippie Hill. Not sure. A couple local bands, Sons of Chaplain, and Jerry was playing with a rhythm band. Not a typical Dead set. I remember Grace's psychedelic Rolls and the biggest bowl I've ever seen being passed around and filled by the crowd. "He was playing real good for free." Saw Led Zeppelin with Lee Micheals in San Fransisco for free as well. "Do you know what I mean?"
It's been 14 days since I don't know when, i just saw her with my best friend...Great keyboardist.


Finally slept in to 4;30. This time change always screws me up. Picking up spent grain today, if it isn't frozen. I'll stop by and check out the castings sold downtown.

It's down to the boring part. I have to fix a light setup, mix a bit of soil, but I'm mostly watching plants grow and worms eat. They don't really need my help. I have to slap myself away.
This is the point where brewing ACT does me the most good. It keeps me busy and away from the plants.
If you have faith, they will grow. If you don't, you'll kill them...enough preaching already. It's just you can't be agnostic and grow. You have to believe in a higher power, even if it's just the plant.
Mother Nature's son.
Got no horse, got no sheep, finally got a good night's sleep.

Do you like your 10 gallon pots with the lights? I have these 20's. Not sure if they hog space when using lights.

 

[moose eater]

My largest pots in quantity are the Classic 2000s; I think they're about 4.5 to 5 gallon, if I had to guess. They run a different cycle than the 600s I had run for the last number of years, so weight-wise, frequency of watering, depth of sensation of dryness to watering time, etc., all varies a lot.

I have a handful of much larger (than the 2000s) pots that rarely get used. Maybe when I back myself into a corner with some mothers that get too big, and I need to flower them out. My wife absconded with one of the giant pots for a rhubarb or two outside.

The 600s give better production for more plants present in any given space, but don't hold the organic nutrients necessary for even coming close to carrying them through to the finish line. Give and take. All give and take. Yin & Yang.

The reciprocal nature of life is what I believe in when it comes to what I know, versus what I'd like to think. The glowing light, and getting in return for giving, whether plants, dogs, or what ever, literally saved me when things were the darkest.

There was a lengthy period of time after a lot of losses and deaths that I would sit in front of my boxes, and stare at the light and plants. Not providing too much care, as has intermittently been an issue, but just staring, thinking, considering the reciprocal nature of it all. The lights and plants speaking for life, the alternative being something else.

No doubt in my mind that proper farming is a spiritual endeavor. It's who's keeping score that gets arguments and disagreements going.

I figure Agnosticism is an honest religion. We say we don't know, because we don't. That line of inherent humility got me a higher level of consideration in my graduate oral exams. "I don't know.. But I may be able to find out... Or not."

I used to be able to remember nearly every show we went to. In the mid-west, a repeat performance often included REO Speedwagon, before they went Top 40. BOC, Dave Mason, Crosby and Nash, Rush, Allman Bros Band (minus Duane), Steppenwolf, Head East, Johnny Prine (many times over... I'm a true fan; another life saver), Bruce Cockburn (during the Central American meddling by the 'leadership' referenced earlier), John McLaughlin and Billy Cobham (each with their own bands, but at the same show), Edgar and Johnny Winter, Heart, Nils Lofgren, Jerry Garcia and David Grisman @ The Warfield, Santana (who enjoyed playing at LEAST as much as others enjoyed him playing; one of the most soulful folks I know of), BB King, Ozark Mountain Daredevils, Pure Prairie League.. Genesis, Peter Frampton, Mountain, Jim Dandy and Black Oak Arkansas, the old Marshall Tucker band, and probably a bunch I can't recall any more.

Many of those hinging on experiences in life, that, outside of nostalgia and specific important times, meant nearly nothing to many other folks, but for touching on those moments in time.

Chose a Johnny Prine concert over suicide one week end during grad school, bought a guitar, and drove to Northern Idaho, to a small theater on main street in Sand Point. Hadn't smoked weed in maybe close to a year and a half. A drunk logger walked up, slurring his words a bit, wearing a tuque and a military field jacket. Plopped down on the street-side hardwood bus bench next to me, right there on main street, people walking by all around us, and said, "I get up, I go to work, I come home, I get drunk, I go to bed,.. I get up, I go to work, I come home, I get drunk, I go to bed...." repeating this recital of misery a number of times, then looked over at me, reached up into the fold of his tuque, and pulled out a doobie, and said, "Smoke a joint?"

I figured, what the hell, right? And he and I sat there on main street in Sand Point, 1987 or 88 smoking a joint, with people walking all around us. Johnny was graced by the presence of several persons that night, to include a guitar player from Cowboy Junkies for part of that show. They did one of my favorite spiritual songs of life's reality, 'Angel From Montgomery.' I was on my feet, in a cathartic moment, tears slowly running.

"I am an old woman, named after my mother, my old man is another, child who's grown old. If dreams were lightning, thunder were desire, this old house would've burned down, a long time ago. There's flies in the kitchen, I can hear 'em there buzzin', and I ain't done nothin', since I woke up today. How the hell can a person, go to work in the morning, come home in the evening, and have nothing to say?"

Life.. for way too many... A salute to those who keep going, just to keep going.. Wanting more.

-----

I finally hit that magic point of familiar over-load and stress last night, backing myself into a proverbial corner wherein I had to accomplish some things. Started into it last night after midnight. Worked until almost 3:00 A.M. Back to it shortly.

This last run, with a questionable mix, I gave nearly no real feedings; a bit here and there.

When/if I feel (f)risky, I may post an e-pic or two I saved, minus identifiers (assuming I can figure out uploading here), of the box with the GTH#1 and close-ups of SLH and GTH#1, showing their trich concentration. They turned out surprisingly well. Very nice, in fact, for a single 315 in 16 sq. ft. per box, scant real feedings, etc.

'Too much love,' entanglement, or enmeshment has been a curse for over 50 years, much of it connected to deaths, losses, and violence, fairly early on. It can express itself in any number of manners. Sometimes it takes the majority of a lifetime to get that even started toward being in greater balance. The plants, dogs and family appreciate the continued efforts. Still stroking. ;^>)

 

[h.h.]

It didn't cost very much, but it last a long while...

 

[moose eater]

"Your flag decal won't get you into Heaven anymore.." ;^>)

Johnny got drafted and took Uncle Sam's aptitude test, randomly or arbitrarily filling out the colored circles fairly rapidly. Turned it in, and was told he was a 'mechanical genius.'

He has some excellent stories about that sequence of events, including having one-too-many bull-dozers in the pool, and burying one of them to make the count correct.

Life's absurdities have the capacity to simultaneously draw laughter and tears.

"That's the way that the world goes 'round, yer' up one day, and the next yer' down; it's a half an inch of water and you think yer' gonna' drown; that's the way that the world goes 'round." (J. Prine)

 

[ronbo51]

and the air smelled like snakes and we'd shoot with our pistols

but empty pop bottles is all that we'd kill

 

[moose eater]

"Daddy won't you take me back to (??????) County, Down by the Green River.."

Started into work in the shop, and shows that'd escaped my memory a moment ago rushed in;

Arlo Guthrie, Leon Redbone, Jesse Colin Young (right after John Lennon was shot; ate a stout dose of Lucy, and they did an encore of 'Imagine'.. Pretty heavy. Sat by myself.. Good thing, too; and they did the hallmark, "C'mon People, now, smile on yer' brother, everybody get together, try to love one another right now..." An intense evening, for me and Lucy.), Grateful Dead, Nanci Griffith, Starz, and a bunch more; most all of them heart-felt and personable people, in heart-felt times.

In the absence of reliable adults, as a youngster, I'd sit behind a recliner with a portable phonograph player, listening to John Fogerty posing questions about who might stop the rain. Putting a candle in the window, representing hopefulness and the return of those who would've if they could've. Swamp Buddhism. ;^>)

 

[h.h.]

I range between Iron Butterfly and Blondie, Canned Heat, Savoy Brown, Eric Burden. Worked on his house. Santana, CSN, Seger, Pink Floyd, Alice Cooper, Cal Worthington and his dog Spot. Kinks, Tubes, Ramones, Leon Russel, Outlaws, Dead, Fleetwood Mac, Merle, Waylon, Dylan, America,
I worked for the owner of Peabody Mines. Personal security if you can believe that shit.
But I couldn't pass the test.

Stopped by the worm place today. Pretty impressive. Some high dollar droppings.
Well fed worms. Special diet. Everything is tested. Nutrients listed.
Fifty bucks for five gallons. Can't recommend it at that price, especially if you throw in shipping. I'll give a plug for anybody local that may pass by.

I figure folks must be finding value or he wouldn't be selling them.

"

 

[moose eater]

If my very loose math is correct, the 5-gal bucket is in excess of a cu. ft., is it not?

Probably get <half of that into a larger flat-rate USPS Priority box @ $17.00 and change for 2nd day (here usually 3-days) shipping.

Fan of Canned Heat and Country Joe & the Fish.. Bobby Seeger used to play the Grand River Raft Race before infamy, charging something like .75 cents to $1.50/head to play the gig, whereat the hippies out-numbered the cops quite radically, and crowd control was the best they could hope for, even losing that battle on occasion. We built odd-ball rafts and 'raced' them down the (quite polluted) Grand River, through Grand Rapids, Michigan.

Good times. The authorities were largely still dumb-founded during those years, contemplating how to handle, and what to do about this onslaught of counter-culture that, unfortunately for what they -wanted- to do at times, consisted largely of their own children.

'Nut Bush City Limits' 'Beautiful Loser,' 'Turn the Page'... All appropriate highway jams in the day.

Lots of Willy and Waylon on the Farm.

I was at the McComb Field House in Edinboro, Pa., when Zappa recorded Side B of Roxy and Elsewhere.
|
Cal was cool for interrupting bad television, but I wouldn't have bought a car from him... nor his 'dog' Spot. He's got or had a dealership up here in Los Anchorage. I think he's dead now. Interesting WWII history for Cal.

Best album by Iron Butterfly, imo, was lesser known 'Metamorphisis,' with an evening/morning pic of coffin sitting in the surf, up on some rocks, at the sea-side. Good music by Doug Ingles and Crew. Probably still have that one, too, buried in the archives in the basement.

Pete Seger, Odetta, Woody Guthrie, etc., played in our rather liberal Protestant church when I was a youngster, as did Manfred Mann's Earth Band... 'Blinded by the Light'... Our minister didn't sit on the side-lines too much where the issues of civil rights, war, and love were concerned. He was a good guy. I slept a lot during sermons, when I wasn't dying from itching in that wool suit, or making ceramic Buddhas in Sunday School.

Leon Russell was the Okie Messiah..

Lesser known were 'Tucky Buzzard' (hard rock, produced in part by one of the Stones), and melodic, floating key-board heavy psychedelia near the time of the original release of Dark Side of the Moon was a band called Rare Bird. Good stuff.

I should hook up one of several higher-end turn tables I have in the basement to one of several stereos, and break out Lp's I haven't played in over 30 years or more...

Right after I finish these chores!! ;^>)

Then there was Curtis Mayfield, Marvin Gaye, the Righteous Bros, Otis Redding, Janis, Gladys Knight, Diana Ross and the Supremes, Smokey Robinson, Bowie, Clapton, Mayall, and so many more that choreographed the turbulent times and winds of change..

 

[h.h.]

Then there were all the no names, playing "Rocky Racoon" at every campfire across the nation, perhaps the world.

Jesse Colin Young
With a slight edit;
"It's a skunk sanctuary, they think this grass is their home."

Thinking local. Out on the back ten picking pods off of the bear grass(yucca). They open up at the end of the season, pointing upwards, full of seed. Cupped hands waiting for the rain.
Not given up without a fight. Not taken without bloodshed.
Took a good pair of boots and the surfer's stomp.

A Ninja blender and

It should help with aeration and drainage and not not break down to quickly. A good bit of chopped up seed in the mix.

"Ninja" my foot. There's a little nylon coupling that sits on the motor shaft. Probably intended to protect the motor. Probably a 2 dollar part, if I could find it. An internet search only turns up others searching for the same part. Looks like a job for Super Glue.
It was that big stick on top. I expect too much out of the name. A true ninja would have done it.

My turntable's sitting in a shed in California. A Circle Jerks record sitting on the platter covered with some well deserved dust. Memories of my ex. Some things I will never understand. My ex and the Circle Jerks.

Last show I saw was Lucinda Williams. A few years back. I avoid the crowds anymore.

 

[moose eater]

Yep, there are moments that got over-played; like deciding NOT to make a statement at a wake/memorial, 'cause it might cheapen the moment.

There was a show on public radio re. that phenomenon yesterday, as I was preparing to leave the house to drive across the Borough and into town; tunes that carried a time or meaning, that lost their emphasis for some, often due to excesses.

A kismet moment; as I was leaving for town and errands, having been listening to the show on Public Radio, I began singing a portion of Don McClean's 'American Pie,' and almost as soon as I began singing it, they put it on the air. Almost like a two-part round, without sufficient spacing. My wife saw and heard it. I told her I should quickly run to buy a lottery ticket.
----------------------------
Seems much of nature's equipped to get what it needs without too much effort, if we let it, and don't fuck it up.

The yucca looks like a nice amendment now. In that I've been using yucca extract for neutralizing salts, rinsing on a semi-regular basis, etc., I would guess that your chopped yucca possesses at least some of that property, plus proteins from the seeds?

I tried to imagine what I have here, locally, that would suffice for aeration, be relatively neutral in ph, last a while in a mix by virtue of a tougher consistency or texture, and maybe add something in the way of nutrient benefits. So far I come up with.. nothing.

Spruce bark has properties that are unattractive. Maybe chipped balsam poplar/aspen/willow bark?? Who knows?? We spoke of willow a while back. I assume I could invest a LOT of time I don't have left toward finding something suitable.
------------------------------------------------------
Sorry for your experiences in the realm of hopeful long-term relationships; I've some horror tales of self-destructive nature in that regard, though I own some of the outcomes myself.

I've been lucky in the choices I made in that regard almost 30 years ago with my wife of now.

And I've left things behind that were scattered to the wind or pilfered in my absence; heirlooms sometimes. After a time, I've let them go, only thinking about them on rare occasion, with lesser sense of loss over them.

Had an epiphany on the side of the road near Sharon, Pa, in the mid-70s, hitching in an untimely, unseasonable, and totally unexpected snow storm on the expressway there, wearing a cotton shirt. A religious experience resulting from desperate prayer. "Look to receive from those who have little."

Won't say where or from what it came. It was what it was. I'll stop there, as the follow-up to that moment would take way more space than I'm already known for typing. Suffice it to say it was a unique and fruitful day that followed that moment.
--------------------------------------
Pete Seger's on the radio right now, an older recording, singing in unison with a large crowd, 'Michael Rowed the Boat Ashore.' Somber moments of memory, adorned with some sense of inherent and stout hopefulness that won't be defeated.

Don't think I know of Lucinda Williams.

I rarely go to shows or bars; used to tell my family and associates that bars are filled with hustlers, UC cops, and shallow or wounded people trying to find love in all the wrong places. None of those groups will typically benefit the effort of mingling or lead to sunshine and rainbows.. Even if I didn't suffer social anxieties.

A couple months ago, however, I went to see a Hawaiian Reggae Band from Anchorage (H3) at a local bar; the first night taking my wife, the next going alone with the intentions of meeting up with my older son, which I did, though he had to leave early.

Through a variety of encounters, and my son leaving early, myself with a smaller reserved table, a 'young woman' (probably in her early 40s, & from your neck of the woods) asked if she could sit with me.

In the course of (not very long) we talked above the music with each other; me with woeful tales of political efforts and years of ganja endeavors, blacklisting, etc., and her testimony of being mistreated locally at a private party earlier that evening, for having not known who Mike Pence was, how the people there had mocked her, and assumed her to be intellectually depraved or deprived..

She was a commercial-rated pilot, and a long-time women's rights activist, no longer really active at all, other than travel and flying. Quite genuinely personable.

I wondered for a brief moment if being targeted like this wasn't a set-up of some sort.. I'm no longer young and dashing, so assumed it was a combination of my aura, (like the guy that doesn't like cats, being the one that gets the cat in his lap), and/or my having an extra chair at a private table, in a crowded place.

I cautiously went with that appraisal of the situation.

We came from very different places where my definitions of civil duty or social obligation are concerned, but we bonded quite nicely. She talked about her psyche, and the benefits of not cluttering her mind with the negative. I talked about my abandoning activism, as a result of bitterness toward humanity's short-sightedness and lack of commitment or altruism. Irony? Plenty.

At one point she insisted that she find a piece of paper to write her phone # on, giving it to me, with an explanation of where she was headed, etc..

We spoke above the music and in between jams for well over an hour or so, maybe two, pretty intensely. A passing finding of a soul-mate of sorts. Though polarized in some ways. 2 sides of a coin.

When I got up to go, conscious of my wife waiting at home (who I told immediately of the night's most flattering aspects), and midnight chores waiting, she chased me down, grabbed my hand, spun me around, and gave me what seemed a very sincere, fully embracing hug.

She wasn't drunk, nor was I, so I took it at face value. My ego soared for a bit. I needed and thrived on that moment.

So violating my typical avoidance of bars paid in spades that evening. Yin & Yang. Good music, heart-felt connection to humanity, etc.

But yeah, typically, for me, to over-ride my strong sense of crowd avoidance and such, the draw has to be fairly strong. There's some names I would go see any time, hiding in my parka like a ninja turtle beneath a mask.

But otherwise, I stay where my location under my avatar says I live. It's a bit more predictable and maybe safer and more tolerable here....... And there's no cover charge.

 

[h.h.]

5 gallons =0.668 cubic feet

 

[h.h.]

The “cultured nightcrawlers” are african nightcrawlers that grow best at 70 to 90 degrees f. They are available as eggs or adults throughout the southern US. The growing medium is naturally harvested partially rotted granulated peatmoss that looks like the castings. The feed is primarily cornmeal, oats and barley grains. The worms are grown in areated (holes drilled in sides at the top) 5 gallon buckets stacked in 4′ squares and covered with plywood, with more layers to the ceiling, requiring little space for lots of buckets. The finished product is not pure castings; it may contain 80% peatmoss granules. For separating, the castings and peatmoss pass through a 1/8 inch screen, the eggs through a 1/4 inch screen.

That's what my worm guy had. I just thought it was a stack of orange buckets. I thought it strange that he used a black bucket to put my castings in when he had all those orange buckets. Then I couldn't see where he was keeping his worms.
Duh. They were in the buckets.
All that stuff can be calculated out. If you use a consistent recipe along with the same poundage of worms, fairly consistent temperatures, you could pretty much judge finishing time.

 

[MedResearcher]

Interesting thread, I only read the first page so far. Wanted to chime in because my well water is very similar. Calcium carbonate pulling the PH up constantly, and we get orange/red slime on the filters.

I am always jealous of neighbors who pull water out of the streams/creeks. Always seems like they have it so much easier.

We also use organics, pretty similar. Always loved Bat Guano, agree that it has gone downhill. I don't really use the ABG phosphorus stuff anymore. It seems like it is more rocks and sand than guano, takes forever to break down. Lately been using a solution grade high Phos seabird guano, works a bit faster imo.

The commercial chicken manure has gone downhill as well. A little bit use to be enough to burn a plant, was great bang for your buck. Now days you can dump bag after bag, and still need more.

No great advice, or answers sadly. Lately I have been trying to use Hydroslate Fish on somewhat of a regular routine. They add phosphoric acid to the fish to keep it stable, so the PH is rock bottom. I am hoping the regular periodic use of it, is helping to fight the alkaline PH pull. We did use some AG sulfur this winter as well.

Obviously you could buy powder phos acid, or even citric acid, to get the same effect. Although the fish is simple, provides some nutrition, promotes fungal growth, and I don't have to see the phos acid added to the solution.

Planning on getting a nice barrel or tote of hydroslate fish or crab and liquid kelp for this next season.

Gonna read the rest of the thread as I get time.

Mr^^

 

[moose eater]

5 gallons =0.668 cubic feet

I wonder if there's weights and measurement enforcers, like there are for gas pumps and weigh scales?

Seems by your posting quoted above, very few of those products I buy as '1 cu. ft.' are actually 1 cu. ft.

What to do. The Whopper (not that I eat them any more, or for many years for that matter) stopped looking like the burger in the poster after about the first 6 months. Bait and switch, hook the buyer, then let 'em run.

Turning cups into gallons, and then cu ft. is a bit closer for me now. Thanks.

 

[moose eater]

Thanks MR.

My ca carbonate at 95 ppm isn't so much a hassle for short-term organics in pots, as it is for the raised beds and potato field. The pots are cycled through quickly enough that the 95 ppm doesn't have time to disrupt the dolomite or other buffers sufficently to cause an issue.

When you refer to high P bat guano, were you referencing the 0-5-0/0-7-0 stuff that's strictly high P, or were you referencing the .5-11/13-.3 (Indonesian) or DTE's 3-10-1, or all of the above?

Did you also note the reduction of activity in the High N guano teas, where microbial activity changed markedly about 13-15 years ago??

Had you changed your water sourcing as well at that time?

All of this matters to me in re. to tracking variables at a time that I changed too many at once.

I used to use a 2-stroke pump and suction hose fitting with a knee-high nylon stocking attached to strain water pumped into 55 gallon drums from a local creek, back wjen I was gardening outdoors without a well; refusing to pay by the gallon for outdoor veggie watering, only buying potable H2O for the house's holding tank..

Not across the board, but in many cases, naturally filtered stream water, with minerals intact, but buffered and filtered by traveling over rocks, sand, etc., is often preferred, as long as there's no excess heavy metals, contaminants, etc.

The iron bacteria was a concern when I began posting this rambling minimally attended thread, but I gather from h.h.'s opinion that the bacteria breaking down the iron may be a good thing, with processed iron more available.

Others spoke of neutralizing the bacteria in the water jugs I use, by taking ph up (chlorine bleach), then back down (citric acid). At the height of H2O consumption, mid-bloom, that would be a true PITA. I avoid phosphoric acid and sulfuric acid, due to their potentially providing nutes in excess of healthfulness.

Anyway, feel free to chime in with anything you like that might be helpful or topical. And the 'topical' has come to include philosophy, metaphysics, karma, and much more.

Thanks again.

Interesting thread, I only read the first page so far. Wanted to chime in because my well water is very similar. Calcium carbonate pulling the PH up constantly, and we get orange/red slime on the filters.

I am always jealous of neighbors who pull water out of the streams/creeks. Always seems like they have it so much easier.

We also use organics, pretty similar. Always loved Bat Guano, agree that it has gone downhill. I don't really use the ABG phosphorus stuff anymore. It seems like it is more rocks and sand than guano, takes forever to break down. Lately been using a solution grade high Phos seabird guano, works a bit faster imo.

The commercial chicken manure has gone downhill as well. A little bit use to be enough to burn a plant, was great bang for your buck. Now days you can dump bag after bag, and still need more.

No great advice, or answers sadly. Lately I have been trying to use Hydroslate Fish on somewhat of a regular routine. They add phosphoric acid to the fish to keep it stable, so the PH is rock bottom. I am hoping the regular periodic use of it, is helping to fight the alkaline PH pull. We did use some AG sulfur this winter as well.

Obviously you could buy powder phos acid, or even citric acid, to get the same effect. Although the fish is simple, provides some nutrition, promotes fungal growth, and I don't have to see the phos acid added to the solution.

Planning on getting a nice barrel or tote of hydroslate fish or crab and liquid kelp for this next season.

Gonna read the rest of the thread as I get time.

Mr^^

 

[h.h.]

'. It sorta starts off real slow and then fizzles out altogether."

Yuccas are legumes. Part of the lily family, they're nitrogen fixers. An extremely important plant in the desert landscape.

The yucca extract sold commercially is from the Yucca schidigera. A fairly large plant growing up to 5 or 6' tall. When you cut into the stalk, they're very wet and full of suds. Full of steroids, they were food for the giant sloth as well as the Colorado River Indians, who were said to be good size people. The surrounding soil is usually pretty dark and stuff grows well in it.
I helped a friend plant his orchard. In one area we filled in over a bunch of schidigera. The contrast in growth was obvious.

What I have is beargrass. I think it's Yucca smalliana. They have no stalk to speak of. Taller ones might be 2' high. It's said that the roots were used for soap. Desperate people in desperate times maybe. I don't see it.
"Love the one you're with." Using the hope and shit method. Hope in one hand, shit in the other and see which one fills up first...This is what I got.
I don't see a difference between the type of hull I use. Rice, buckwheat, yucca. For the most part the hulls all serve the same purpose. If I receive extra benefits, I can just sit back and enjoy. After washing my hands anyway. That hope and shit method gets a bit messy.


https://www.maximumyield.com/yucca-extracts-a-gardening-secret-from-the-desert/2/1236

 

[moose eater]

You said the yucca are nitrogen fixers, and (don't laugh.. I guess you can if you want; neither one of us can hear the other....) I thought of our snow peas and various bush beans in the veggie garden.

There's a fair amount of waste from them, they're nitrogen fixers, though they lack the 'solidness'/density of the succulents(??) you're referring to. But considering the waste, there's probably some good grub in there.

I wouldn't want to feed that to the plants directly, as with sq. ft. gardening (or more densely planted than that, even) beans often develop some degree of fungal presence. Especially on a more damp year. Less so with the snow peas/edible pea pods. But I suspect feeding the greens from these things to the worms, even storing the waste dry, in preparation to be fed to worms later, might make for good to excellent ewc/fertilizer?

It also occurred to me that I have false aspen (balsam poplar) down and rotting for years now, half-way around the property. My guess is the contents of the bark, etc., have been diluted by decay, and that with pulverizing & some amount of heat-treating to neutralize any unwelcome growth, that could be used directly as an amendment for soil texturing.

If I win the lottery, I think I want to impress the neighborhood with a new, larger-size chipper. Another goal..