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Post by floweringcherry on Jun 29, 2008 16:32:23 GMT 1
Need to improve the soil here, it's very sandy and lacks texture. But should I use - 1. Loads of pelleted chicken manure 2. Buy bags and bags of garden manure from the GC or 3. Wait til autumn and dig in some well rotted manure?  The pelleted chicken manure won't do much to improve the texture although it will add nutirents. I believe sandy soils are best bulked up in the spring, although adding in the autumn will help. Some councils sell off their recycled compst as soil improvers, it may be worth considering. |
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Post by owdboggy on Jun 29, 2008 16:32:54 GMT 1
Chicken manure only feeds the plants, use as a short term boost.
2 and 3 are better options, though 2 is more expensive.
Sandy soil is always hungry, so the more humus you can add the better as it will hold nutrients in it.
Having said that we added tons of manure to our previous pure sand garden and you just could not tell that we had done it!
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Post by 4pygmies on Jun 30, 2008 7:17:01 GMT 1
I don't think there's anything better than good old farm muck, The witch. You could topdress your borders this Autumn and let the worms do the work and then dig in another load in the Spring. Be careful where you get the muck from though - the current problem about that chemical which has destroyed people's crops on allotments, as it has stayed active despite working its way through cows and being stacked, is very scary..........an organic source is safest ( although still not 100% guaranteed). Do any of your neighbours keep rabbits or giuneapigs? Maybe you could beg some of the old straw and topdress with that the Autumn? Just a thought anyway  I think chicken pellets are best dig in when you plant, as a short term feed. Have you considered a worm bin? |
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Post by 4pygmies on Jun 30, 2008 8:11:37 GMT 1
I'm slightly dubious about spent mushroom compost, as they do use dodgy stuff when growing. I wouldn't use it myself. To be honest, The witch, as OB says, there's very little you can do to make sandy soil really different. I've been putting goat muck and straw on my soil for years now and it's still really sandyand free draining! I think quantities of muck are the best way to hearten your soil - you could try the runner bean trench method for plants that need better moisture retention (line with newspaper and fill with household compost etc) but it's only a short term solution at best. Whatever method you choose you will have to do it every Spring I think. Best to go with the flow and choose plants which appreciate your soil type - there are LOADS!
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Post by madonplants on Jun 30, 2008 10:19:05 GMT 1
I take it, you didn't double dig before you started planting, The witch?  When you planted your plants, what did you do? |
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Post by debbiem on Jun 30, 2008 10:19:17 GMT 1
I would throw whatever you can at it, well rotted compost, as much household compost as possible - ours is now much better than it was by just adding household compost, whatever potting compost was left out of any pot at any time, manure when we had it, anything! I have two compost bins full of good compost rotting down and a couple of bags of chicken manure and leaves which I'm going to use for our new flower beds where the path is going to be as the soil is terrible there, almost pure builders rubble and as dry as a bone. But plants are happy in the soil now, whereas when we first moved her anything planted in the flower bed would protest until we dug it back out again.
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Post by madonplants on Jun 30, 2008 21:50:55 GMT 1
I take it, you didn't double dig before you started planting, The witch? When you planted your plants, what did you do? Why would I need to double dig 23 tons of topsoil Keith?  Depends on the quality of the top soil, I suppose, but I would have still done something with it for my own piece of mind. |
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Post by seanmckinney on Jul 20, 2008 20:59:24 GMT 1
The witch, when my folks bought this place my old man dug in 1000+ VERY large barrow loads of sand to lighten the soil. Every vegetable trench was filled with rotted manure (horse muck and grass). The soil is still great and the vegetables were really nice. I used to pull a carrot, wash it off in a mosquito infested water barrel and munch away, generally I couldnt finish one carrot and we are talking an active teenage boy here. The spuds you could eat on their own, I very rarely eat modern potatoes because they taste crap, of course my dad's garden was before the EU banned all the nice spuds but I think the manure contributed to their flavour.
He also once tried sewage farm 'waste' but that appeared so sanitised that it was all but useless as a fertiliser, I dont know if sewage farms are still allowed to dispose of their watse that way.
Ditto spent mushroom compost.
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Post by Sweetleaf on Jul 20, 2008 22:03:16 GMT 1
Hello Sean! How lovely to see you  |
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Post by seanmckinney on Jul 21, 2008 13:49:50 GMT 1
Hello and thanks sweetleaf I havent been around much as you have noticed ;D |
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