The re-use of our soil

[vonforne]

Yes we have a member that uses comfrey on a regular basis, along with stinging nettle which is also high in N. I didn't know about the clover....Thanks for that one. Have you been through the OFC yet?

V

 

[Guest]

Yeah clover is a fantastic plant, the best thing for green manure, an essential plant for organics inside or out, super provider of nitrogen, it fixes its own nitrogen from the soil with nodes on its root system, when Ploughed back into the ground these nodes break down gradually & can provide season long nitrogen for the following crop. The leaves are alsofull of N, (high protein)so can be used as feed to pep up forage diets for cattle & calves, The flowers make the best honey, bees love this stuff. Also ckeck out alafalfa, lucerne, & vetches. They all do similar things fix their own N. Beans also huge provider of N. If you have any broad beans in your garden, pull a plant up with the roots attached, you will see the nitrogen nodules on the roots like little white ant eggs. Grow clover u can use it green, cut and dried for winter, compost, soil additive foliar feed, its brill.
cheers.

 

[vonforne]

I use alfalfa on a regular basis. And I do cultivate legumes for green cover crops now.

I will check out the others when I return.

Thanks for the tips once again.

V

 

[vonforne]

What are the Benefits of Cover Crops or Green Manures?
Cover crops and green manures are basically the same term. When these plants are alive they are cover crops. When the plants are decaying they are green manures. Green manuring has all the soil benefits of classic composting, plus other benefits:

1. Green manures can fertilize large acres of land cheaper and easier than hauling in tons of finished compost.

2. You can eat the produce of certain cover crops like beans, peas, or radishes. It is harmful to humans to eat compost!

3. The roots of certain legume green manures can supply tons of free atmospheric nitrogen per acre to the topsoil after the cover crop plants are tilled, mowed down, or smothered. Rhizobacteria live inside the legume roots creating a unique relationship that actually converts atmospheric nitrogen into organic nitrogen for the legume to use. This extra nitrogen fixation built up by the rhizobacteria can not be beneficial to other plants near by, or future crops in the soil next season, until that legume is dead and recycled into the soil by the green manuring process. Compost can't fix nitrogen in the soil.

4. All green manures supply extra organic matter to feed and breed beneficial soil organisms for soil fertility and soil health.

5. The roots of certain cover crops can go down several feet below the topsoil and into the subsoil to break up hardpan and pull essential nutrients up to the topsoil level at green manuring time. After 24 months of continuous growth, alfalfa roots can extent over 20 feet down, that can turn it extra OM down into the subsoil! No regular tractor or mechanical tiller can plow that deep! Without tilling it in, compost can't do that.

6. Some cover crops can weed out other plants. Buckwheat, oats, and sunflowers are good types of these allelopathic plants.

7. Some cover crops can attract beneficial insects and repel bad insects like marigolds and crimson clover. Compost can't do that either.

8. Some special cover crops can help control diseases in the soil or on the foliage of nearby plants. Examples are garlic, onions, hot peppers, basil, marigolds, thyme, and other herbs. These plants can protect plants like tomatos from diseases. They can also control bad nematodes or other soil problems. Some of these cover crops can do these functions as living plants or as decaying green manures.

9. Some legume cover crops, like white clover, can be planted next to your crops during the warm season to be used as a living mulch.

10. Green manures work best when mixed with legumes and non-legumes. That way you get the nitrogen fixing benefit from the legumes, but also you maximize the fast growth of the expansive root development and tall foliage height that is characteristic of grasses and grains.

11. Did you know that about 95% of all the bulk and biomass of all non-legume cover crops is a direct production from only water and photosynthesis! The other 5% is straight from the soil. Legume cover crops go farther and pull free nitrogen from the air also. That means that all cover crops will add more humus to the soil than what was there before just from energy from the sun and the atmosphere. Since humus is mostly carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen from the air, that means that cover crops greatly benefit the biosphere and the soil microherd, just from above! Plain compost can't do that!
******************************************************************************** Green Manures have other nicknames also beside Cover Crops. Sometimes they are referred to as Smother Crops, Catch Crops, Nurse Crops, Living Mulches, or Compost Crops. Green manures also help conserve nutrients from the topsoil and even the subsoil, in bad weather, varying temperatures or seasons or climates. Green manures help solve crop rotation issues for small or large garden spaces. Green manures can even help heal soil diseases. Green manures can help buffer soil pH with its organic matter in the soil just like compost for the next planting season. Green manures are also great at controlling erosion and soil water moisture content. A nurse crop is a fast growing cover crop like rye that is grown close to a slower legume cover crop like hairy vetch in order to help support the plant's foliage as it grows. You can grow a cover crop in order to supply green nitrogen rich organic matter for your compost bins. Next to classic composting, green manuring is the greatest single thing you can ever do improve your soil and your gardening environment.
********************************************************************************
Mostly all cover crops can be grown easier by sprinkling or lightly covering seeds on top of 1-2" finished compost or rich garden soil.
This a partial list of some of our favorite cool season and warm season cover crops and their basic purposes:

A. Crimson clover - cool season annual legume. More cold hardy than most other clovers. Grows great on all soil types in 1-2 months. Supplies lots of foliage and roots OM.
Crimson clover and winter peas can be found in deer plot mixes. Attracts lots of beneficial insects. Easy to green manure. The favorite legume green manure of the south.

B. Hairy vetch - cool season annual legume. It is the most cold hardy of the popular legumes. Can grow in temps below -5 degrees F. Can be found in some deer plot mixes. Great legume weed suppressor. Grows great with a non-legume like rye as a nurse crop. The favorite legume green manure of the north.

C. Rye, winter wheat, and oats - cool season fast growing grass/grain non-legumes. Rye is the most cold hardy of all green manures, and it can grow almost anywhere. Rye can grow in temps below -20 degrees F. Rye and oats are a great non-legume weed suppressors. These crops can grow fast in a few weeks. Supplies lots of OM. Rye must be killed at least 4-6 weeks before planting spring crops to not hinder seed
germination. You can find these cover crops in deer plot mix or horse or cattle feeds.

D. All beans and peas (legumes) - All beans are warm season except fava beans. Most peas are cool season. The most cold hardy peas are winter peas. Most dry beans and peas sold in bags in grocery stores will sprout and grow fine.

E. Radishes, mustard greens, rape, kale - Great cheap fast growing cool season annual non-legumes for lots of foliage OM. A thick crop of mustard, rape, or kale is a great non-legume weed suppressor. a thick crop of radishes are great for repelling many bug pests all year round.

F. Buckwheat and sunflowers - Great fast growing warm season annual non-legumes that can break up hardpan, kill weeds, and pull up insoluble subsoil phosphorus from minerals up to the topsoil to make available for next crops. Buckwheat can grow fast on any soil type (4-6 weeks to maturity).

G. Marigolds and other herbs - warm season annual non-legumes. Marigolds when planted thick, it's great for nematode control and other pest controls. Garlic, onions, and hot peppers control many soil pests.

H. All weeds - This unknown class of green manures recycle much needed foliage and root OM and nutrients back to the topsoil.
All cover crops should be either tilled in, mowed down almost to the ground, or smothered by organic mulches before they go to seed, to prevent sprouting later in the year and becoming a weed themselves. The no-tilling option is the best way to get optimal soil health, texture, and soil microbial activity. Recent research has proven that excessive tilling, or tilling too deep, can kill off beneficial fungi in the soil and create soil texture problems and some soil fertility issues. If you decide to go with a no-till garden, you can poke holes in the soil around crop roots with your spade fork, to get more oxygen in the soil to further increase organic matter decomposition and increase microbial activity in the soil. Year round green manuring practices can not only improve your soil health and texture, but also decrease extra periodic plant fertilizers and soil amendments.


My left over bird seeds, grown in one area of my yard providae some great compost mulch. Just mow it over with the mower and empty the bag onto the compost heap and mix. I have also germinated them for my birds and what they don't eat goes to the compost bin.

V

 

[pumpkin2006]

Hey ya

Ya we use cover crops in our crop production (legal veggies) and it really helps. First you mow, then you till.

Anyways, I was thinking, I have composted the normal way and am well versed in how to build a good pile out of nitroceous and carbonaceous materials, but I've never really dealt with composting potting soil. BTW, which is far from actual soil.

So if you didn't actually have to break any materials down, I.E. stems, leaves and various other O.M. Couldn't you just heat your soil in the oven or something like that to pseudo-sterilize.

It would just seem pointless to have to build such a large pile and move it back and forth to just heat up your soil to pasteurize it. I understand that we don't want to kill all the beneficials but its necessary to rid yourself of pathogens; although, there should almost be no pathogens because there isn't really any decomposition. If you adding granular ferts; I.E. blood meal, bone meal, kelp meal, ect. your allowing your endo and ectos to do that work for you. You could probably heat your soil rapidly so long as you could recolonize your soil and let it sit for a while and keep feeding it.

So did I answer my own question? I don't know, what do you guys think?

 

[vonforne]

Yes, you did answer your own question. And quite a good answer too.

But use this as an example.....you have say 300 + gallons of soil.....you have the container plants to match that amount of soil. Like in a nursery, you have another 300 + gallons of soil "cooking" getting ready to be used----Now between taking care for the plants in their different stages of growth, mixing the soil, CARRYING 300 + gallons of soil to the oven and heating it....are you seeing this?

So, we are just letting the micro-organisms do their job, not that they are doing it for us, but doing what nature intended for them to do.

V

 

[pumpkin2006]

This is true, is it more work to cook with your own device then to just haul it and let it sit? Yes.

Well... I'm pretty handicapible, I could cook something up. And yes the pun was intended

I'll have to think on that one....

 

[vonforne]

HaHa, I use "cooking" are a term to describe the decomposition of the organic material by the micro-organism with in the soil structure.

V

 

[Guest]

Magic & Muck.
A lot of farmers still bury a cows horn in the bottom of a muck heap, sposed to improve fertility.

 

[pumpkin2006]

Magic & Muck.
A lot of farmers still bury a cows horn in the bottom of a muck heap, sposed to improve fertility.

Yes this comes from Rudolf Steiners theories on Biodynamics. The only thing from biodynamics that is applicable to growing marijuana is the composting techniques, which are heavily based on manures and cycling with the moons ebb and flow; it has hints of astrology in it, which I don't like/believe in, but thats just a personal thing. The reason the rest isn't relevant is because there's is biodiversity in their crops; we grow monocrops.

The reason that they bury a cows horn with manure and leave it for (hmm can I remember?), I think 6 months, is that all the microbes in the soil web around there will move towards that rich source of yumminess . Anyways, once its colonized, you extract it and leave it in something like a cigar box surrounded by peat, inside of a small mason jar. Often the way farmers use it, is they get a stripped stick and dilute some of this mix with water and then dip the stick in the mixture and walk around their farm waving the stick. Each drop of water contains thousands upon thousands of microbes that will inoculate the soil.

I suggest researching Rudolf Steiners Biodynamics if your interested in the composting techniques. However, fair warning, if you don't have access to a lot of manure, nettles & yarrow, along with the space to compost, don't bother.

Have a good one guys and keep it green!

 

[vonforne]

pumpkin, I'm glad you showed up. You are a needed asset here.

V

 

[Guest]

Maybe rudolph invented bullshit?..............
cheers

 

[vonforne]

Biodynamics is kind of weird.

v

 

[Guest]

Weird is a nice way of putting it, made me smile to think of some hard nosed old farmer type, hopping round his farm flicking drops of water off a stick, while reading his horoscope. He wouldnt need to tell you to get off his land as you'd be long gone.

 

[vonforne]

How about the ole boys with the witching stick?

V

 

[pumpkin2006]

Weird is a nice way of putting it, made me smile to think of some hard nosed old farmer type, hopping round his farm flicking drops of water off a stick, while reading his horoscope. He wouldnt need to tell you to get off his land as you'd be long gone.

Wo wo, hey there guys. Maybe I gave you all a wrong impression about this art/science. It has real world principles in it that produce some of the most productive gardens/farms in the world. Its almost better to be certified biodynamic then to be certified organic.

These composting techniques are and "old school" way of doing what we do with are granular mycorrhizae and compost teas. From a food production aspect, this is one of thee best systems out there; it just may not be the best for growing our favorite plant

Thanks for the compliment V.

 

[vonforne]

I said kind of. did not mean to offend. it wasn't meant to be offensive. Go back through my posts and you will find that my Grandmother was a biodynamic farm girl.

 

[vonforne]

And I did learn a lot of my composting things from her.

And besides that my wife is German and it is practiced by most of the Bavarian farmers where she is from.

 

[Guest]

Sorry, didnt mean to be offensive, just having a chuckle. Seriously, the notion of putting a cows horn in a muck heap predates Steiner by a long long way, Ive seen old farmers do it who probably never heard of biodynamics, Dunno bout Astrology, but astronomy works. Planting & harvesting by the moonphase is something I know for sure works, I put a thread up on moonphases, but no replies, I'm surprised more people dont. I think Steiner took a lot of very old principles & tried to make them his own, or tried to give them a modernist slant. I kind of like wacky ideas. A Bhuddist once told me cows get power from their horns, from the moon & stars, bit like antenna. Maybe some of that gets released during decomposition. I'm always open to new ideas. Anyways I feel I'm getting off thread, apologies.
Still it would be intersting if anyone wants to try some cowhorn compost, in some kind of controlled experiment. See if it makes a difference. Next time I see one I,ll chop it into cubes & send it to anyone who wants to try.
Cheers.

 

[pumpkin2006]

Ya no problems, I misunderstood.

I think the thing that would best suit the cow horn experiment is to get it tested by a lab for its biological count of microbes. That costs $$ though.