Organic Convert

[Hastings]

I really want to make every effort this year to have everything be organic. Which means of course, that last year I used fungicide sprays and Miracle Grow. With never having fed the soil, where would I need to start, what would I need to do in order to have a healthy crop this year as I try to rebuild my soil? Thank you for any and all information! I already have a compost pile going, I just bought some MycoGrow, I know I need to figure out fertilizers!

[feldon30]

It's hard to build up enough compost with just kitchen scraps to feed a good sized garden. I would be on the lookout for cow, horse, sheep, rabbit, etc. manures, and other good soil ingredients in as large a quantity as you can afford. Be on the lookout on CraigsList for people wanting to get rid of such materials at a low cost.

At the same time, watch out for bagged soils that are "too good to be true". The 99 cent and $1.99 bags of "topsoil" or "compost" at Wal-Mart aren't all they're cracked up to be and often contain mostly sand and the scrapings from vacant lots. A good bag of composted manure should set you back $4-7 but a little of this black gold goes a long way. If you have to go with bagged compost, then a 3 x 12 garden bed would get a nice kickstart from 3 bags spread out to about 1 inch thickness and gently folded into the top layer.

I am a believer in peat moss, even though there is some debate over whether it is truly a renewable resource. It's cheap, and once wetted (you may need to add 1 tsp of Dawn or other dish soap per gallon of water as a wetting agent), really helps to loosen up soil and improve drainage.

I would extensively read the Gardening in the Green forum as well as this forum (Soilbuilding) and settle down on a list of ingredients you can get your hands on. Adding lots of organic matter is not the answer to every problem, but it's a good start.

A thick layer of mulch will help with preventing fungus spreading. In my last couple of years of gardening before I moved, I was applying fungicide really only at the beginning of the season as a preventative and had stopped over a month before harvest. Leaving enough space between plants and having a good layer of mulch (and watering in the morning with soaker hoses) really helps. The organic alternatives to fungicides have come a long way in the last 5 years.

I'm sure others who are in your region will have more advice about problems specific to your area, as I've only gardened in Houston which might be a tad different.

[Hastings]

I have been able to get my hands on alpaca manure and cow manure. How much composted manure could/should you apply in one season? My gardening friend is taking up the same organic practices as I am this year, but he thinks that his soil will be inadequate in one season, regardless of what he does. My concern is that he will kill the beneficial funi and bacteria that we are going to be adding to his soil by trying to use both practices.

[tjg911]

too much manure can really mess you up so don't go wild adding tons of it to the soil.

if you can get lots of manure and mix it with shredded leaves and turn it every 4 or 5 days you'll have fresh compost to add to the soil and that is a good thing, i doubt you can over do compost. being winter this may be impossible to do now but come spring if you have a machine to mix the pile (front end loader or tractor with a bucket) and the room i'd get a few tons of manure and and equal amount of leaves and start making compost. stock piling leaves in the fall would be required, i ask lawn care guys to dump their shredded dump truck filled with shredded leaves. it's hit or miss for me and i've had to actually pay someone to do it but at least i get a load which is plenty for the entire season.

tom

[dice]

I would layer the cow manure with leaves for a few months at least
(leaving it for a whole year covered with a tarp would be cool if you can
afford to keep it that long without using it).

The alpaca manure you can pile a foot deep on there and just turn it
into the garden a couple of weeks before transplant. It won't burn plants.

[janezee]

Originally Posted by Hastings

My concern is that he will kill the beneficial funi and bacteria that we are going to be adding to his soil by trying to use both practices.

They thrive on it! Go for it!

Dice beat me to it about the alpaca. Use all you can get your hands on this year, and add the cow next year. No such thing as too much compost, IMHO.

j

[Keiththibodeaux]

Get some organic material into the soil, but not much. It is easy to overdue that. But put all you can get on top of the soil and let nature take it down at it's own rate. In the interim you can jump start the process by using this product. http://www.hortsorb.com/DIEHARD_BioRush.asp. A little goes a very long way. And I have no connection to this company, other than being a very satisfied customer.

[Hastings]

Thank you for the input and feedback. I always appreciate new resources as well. I feel like I've fallen down the rabbit's hole and I just keep finding out more and more. Just when I think I got it figured out, I learn something new and realize that I have so much farther to go yet!

[Keiththibodeaux]

Originally Posted by Hastings

Thank you for the input and feedback. I always appreciate new resources as well. I feel like I've fallen down the rabbit's hole and I just keep finding out more and more. Just when I think I got it figured out, I learn something new and realize that I have so much farther to go yet!

Shannon, there is a ton of info, but just keep it simple. Mother Nature is not complicated at all. It works on very simple principles. Let's face it, things grow just fine without any interference from man. Usually the only actions required are to correct what we screwed up in the first place. The closer you can bring it back to nature, the easier it gets.

[janezee]

I built my raised beds according (loosely) to the square foot gardening method, and I'll never go back. No tilling, no weeds, so much less to water and take care of. More production than I could imagine. It's a bit of a pita to get started, but it's all gravy after that. It's a really good way to get started on organic, too.

"The All New Square Foot Gardening" book. Mel Bartholemew

http://squarefoot.creatingforum.com/

and the site:
http://www.squarefootgardening.org/#!__whatissfg

Just another great way to do things.

I am not affiliated with them at all.

jane

[tjg911]

Originally Posted by janezee

Dice beat me to it about the alpaca. Use all you can get your hands on this year, and add the cow next year. No such thing as too much compost, IMHO.

j

while it is true that alpaca manure will not burn you plants and can be used immediately it is not compost - it is manure. and you can over do a good thing, too much manure will put too much 'stuff' into the soil. stuff is the chemicals in the manure especially "salts". too much manure can cause problems with nutrient absorption. too much of any element can cause imbalances and even too much organic matter can be detrimental to your plants. i too used to think it was not possible to over do organic amendments and a soil test said differently!

if you make compost then it is ok to load it into the garden because it is balanced having been 'composted'. just adding huge amounts of leaves, manure, grass clipping et al can cause problems. nature adds these things to the soil slowly not putting lots of any or all in 1 fell swoop.

tom

[feldon30]

It may be helpful to give some quantities or measurements.

Shannon is starting with garden beds that sound like they may not have much organic matter. I'm thinking 1 inch of leaf mold compost, 1 inch of peat moss, and 1 - 1 1/2 inches of composted manure (or sheep/alpaca which doesn't need to be composted) gently turned into the top layer of soil would provide a good kickstart.

Is that too much? Not enough? I wonder if an earthworm test would provide some guidance?

I usually try to add about 1 inch of compost and 1 inch of composted cow manure per year to each of my beds. Also, I try to add 1-2 inches of shredded leaves into the top layer of soil. I know you don't want too many leaves or they will mat down and start to smell.

It's worth pointing out I have found tomatoes and peppers were perfectly happy with 30% compost and 70% other materials, while melons really preferred 50% compost.

Thoughts?

[dice]

I think you want to build up humus and humic compounds in the soil.
Adding organic matter is the way to do that.

Manures have their own nitrogen, so they do not cause nitrogen
draw-down in the soil when you mix them in. The only problems
to watch out for when using manure are too much ammonia in fresh
manure (not a problem in rabbit, alpaca, and llama manures), salt
buildup over successive years of adding manure, and, only recently,
contamination with aminopyralid or clopyralid broadleaf herbicides
spread on pastures (these herbicides pass through livestock undigested).

I have dug a foot of aged horse manure into a garden bed
and planted in it. No problem, the plants grew and produced great.
(I think this was before aminopyralid herbicides were for sale in the
US. Now, I would probably test the manure in a container first with some
peas or buckwheat. If those survive without looking like someone got too
close with the Roundup, it's good to go.)

Some thoughts from an expert on adding organic matter to soils:
http://humusandcarbon.blogspot.com/

[Hastings]

I wonder if an earthworm test would provide some guidance?

I didn't even know that there was an earthworm test! Would this be done by the same places that do soil testing? Which I've never had done either. People talk about soil tests as if they are generic, buy I imagine that there are soil tests that can measure a few nutrients to tests that will measure everything, including microbes in your soil.

[dice]

I looked around for soil tests by Univ. of Nebraska, but I only found
a page for calculating fertilizer recommendations from tests that
you had done by private labs, etc. (Probably big agriculture synthetic
fertilizer recommendations at that.)

Others have recommended Logan Labs in Ohio for this, but their
web site seems to have issues at the moment.
( http://www.loganlabs.com/ )

You can overdo anything, manure, leaves, straw, other kinds of organic
matter, but I would not expect a foot of alpaca manure to be overdoing
it in a Nebraska native soil. I would not hesitate to use that in my garden.

(Although these days I would mix a shovelful or two of it into container
mix and plant some fast-growing test plant like buckwheat in it first. You
can do that test indoors in winter. Even if the alpaca owner does not use
any herbicides in their pastures, it might be in hay bales that they buy to
feed the alpacas in winter.)