Strawbale gardening....Its workin....

[GIZZARDFARM]

www.gizzardfarm.blogspot.com

posted up some new pics. Last Sunday we had a heck of a wind lost very few plants still have 136 left ok plus another 150 to plant. What do yall think of those strawbale plants i think its gonna work...

Gizzard

[dice]

You are going to need some replacement for ammonium
nitrate eventually. It's use in explosives is going to require
more restrictions on the sale of it. Should be easy enough
to calculate, though. You could mix sulfate of ammonia
and calcium nitrate 50-50, use twice as much, and be within
a couple of percentage points of the amount of nitrogen
you supplied with calcium nitrate (36% vs 34%), plus supply
sulfur and calcium that are not in ammonium nitrate (should
help prevent BER).

Using organic fertilizers, you could use blood meal (15% N) at a
little more than twice the rate that you use ammonium nitrate,
and it would probably work. Might need to start earlier,
though, and give it a few more soaks to get the blood meal
to soak down into the bale (fast breakdown, but not instantly
water soluble like chemical fertilizers).

I bet fresh bat guano from your cave is fairly high nitrogen
(I have seen 12% N on commercially available desert bat
guano), and you could mix that up with water first to water
it in. Maybe 3 cups of that for every cup of ammonium nitrate.
(You could try it on one bale some year and compare growth
and production to those that are chemically fertilized.)

Edit:
"...(36% vs 34%)..." should be "...(34% of 1.5 cups vs
around 18% of 3 cups)..."

[GIZZARDFARM]

Thanks, Ammonium Nitrate is still easy for me to get but the guy I got the idea from said he has used blood meal and it works fine. and instead of triple 10 i used 6-12-12 this year.

[Ruth_10]

Do you have your own source of straw bales or do you buy them? Around here they go for $4-$5 apiece.

[Raymondo]

Wow, 4 or five bucks. Here the cheapest you can get them is $8 and they're usually more like $12. I guess it reflects our very long drought and the relatively higher price of fuel.
Great idea though. I used one to grow some lettuces and cucumbers last year and it worked very well. I watered it a couple of times with some seaweed extract and fish emulsion in the beginning just to give it a kick start but didn't do anything more after that.

[kelleyville]

What all have you planted in the haybales? I am thinking of trying this just not sure what all I can plant in them. I read most everything except things like corn and okra which are top heavy, am wondering how watermelons would do!

I also saw a long list of instructions for getting these bales ready, is there a shortcut list?

Kelley

[GIZZARDFARM]

Kelley I have planted squash, tomatos, peppers, cucumbers and melons in bales all seem to be doing great.

Ruth man thats high...I give my neighbor 2.00 a bale i have 30 planted. If I had to pay that much I may not have tried this experiment.

I will post new pics this week so check back toward the end of the week.

[GIZZARDFARM]

Kelley the way I prepare my bales is the following.

soak bales for three days keep them soggy on days 4,5,6 add one half cup ammonium nitrate to each bale and water in good. On days 7,8,9 cut down to 1/4 cup and water in. Day 10 just water. Day 11 plant plants ant top dress with 10-10-10 and keep bales wet. Once a week I use miricle grow. Hope that helps. You are correct corn, okra , and other tall plants dont do so well.. Gizzard

[Ruth_10]

You're using straw bales (from wheat or other grain) and not hay bales (mown grasses), right?

[GIZZARDFARM]

Yes, I use wheatbales Ive been told that haybales wont work although Ive never tried them. The only negative thing Ive found so far and its really not a problem is the sprouting wheat seeds. I have only trimmed them twice though with scissors not really a hard job as i can sit on a five gallon bucket and trim their hair. I just planted another 10 tomatoes today and I have eight more bales to plant. wo of which im going to plant bannana pepper the rest will have tomatos. One idea is to keep an eye out for building sites as they use strawbales for silt screen and after they finish most companies will give them to you. also alot of festivals and such use bales for various reasons. This year i got 10 bales after the national cornbread festival for free...Gizzard

[kelleyville]

I would like to see more pics as your straw bale garden grows! Also what you planted so I can mimic it! I found some awesome pics of strawbale gardening today and figured out just what to do about staking my tomatoes as well! The pics are here
http://www.4042.com/4042forums/showthread.php?t=12405

I got four bales started too!

Was wondering about the amonium nitrate, I cant actually get that real fast, all though i can get it through someone else for next year...I saw the note to use bloodmeal, but would Fish emulsion do? the idea is to heat the inside up with nitrogen right? So I could maybe spray it real heavy as i water with fish emulsion?

Thanks!
kelley

[GIZZARDFARM]

Im not sure about the fish emulsion but you are right the idea is to heat the bale for 9 days and feed th micro organisms tho rapidly start decomposition. Some folks I have spoken to actually use nothing but leave their bales out a few months before planting and just dress with triple 10 when planting. I will posts some more pics monday as i have planted some more and should have my last eight planted by then..Gizzard

[dice]

[fish emulsion]
The only problem that I see with using fish emulsion is
that it takes a lot of it to get that initial nitrogen charge
into the bales.

Figure for each cup of ammonium nitrate that he uses
(34% nitrogen), you would need to use 7 cups of undiluted
fish emulsion (5% nitrogen, if it is the usual 5-1-1 Alaska
Fish Fertilizer). You would of course dilute the fish emulsion
enough to make it pour easily and soak into the bale, but that
is really how much you need. The bacteria trying to breakdown
that high-carbon wheat straw will consume the usual
2 tablespoons of fish emulsion in a gallon of water in a
heartbeat, more-or-less.

A couple of handfuls of sulfate of ammonia might do it,
though (very inexpensive, dissolves easily, etc). It is
an acidifier, but the bacteria and fungi inside the straw
bale are basically making compost at a rapid rate, which
tends to even out low and high pH components of what
they are eating, moving the end result toward neutral
pH. I would not use sulfate of ammonia in my garden beds,
because it kills earthworms, but that should not be a big deal
in a straw bale, which does not have any earthworms to start
with. By the time the worms discover it and the internal
temperature drops enough for them to tolerate, the bacteria
will likely have eaten most if not all of the sulfate of ammonia.

[kelleyville]

Hurray! I found Ammonium Nitrate! Lowes had it of all places....Lowes that does not have TomatoTone, or that soil activator stuff either! Go figure! I am really excited about this for some reason!

Kelley

[GIZZARDFARM]

For some reason i have problems posting pics on this website but Kelley if you like I could Email you some additional photos although the ones you have are similar to what i have and as I said Ill keep my blog updated with fresh pics. Thanks dice good info