How much muck?

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3 total messages Started by harryweb@musicia Fri, 14 Jan 2005 12:04

#99988

Author: harryweb@musicia
Date: Fri, 14 Jan 2005 12:04

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I'm in the fortunate position of having a lot of cow muck near my
allotment, but am a bit apprehensive about possibly overdoing its
application.

It's a plot that was overgrown for a number of years before I took it
on. I spent a lot of (bizzarely enjoyable) time last year getting the
twitch, broken glass etc out of, and know it is a limestone soil in an
area where the season is late and short.  A few trial plantings in
different areas  revealed that the soil structure and depth needs to
be improved, hence this year's main efforts being to address this.

I reckon I've barrowed enough around to thinly cover about a third of
the area if I squash it all out under-welly.  If I dig this in to that
part this year (getting ready for the old crop rotation thing), will I
make it too acid?   It's quite well rotted already, fairly dark and
firmish, only a little smelly.

On a similar vein, I've got a fair quantity of leaf mulch from the
autumn.  Given my availability of muck (especially in the winter
momths) will I be better digging this in rather than waiting ages for
it to compost down in bins?

Thanks.

Re: How much muck?

#99991

Author: Janet Baraclough
Date: Fri, 14 Jan 2005 20:47

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The message <f203dd93.0501141204.177610f7@posting.google.com>
from harryweb@musician.org (Harry Web) contains these words:


   Harry Webb/Cliff Richard, or another one?

> I'm in the fortunate position of having a lot of cow muck near my
> allotment, but am a bit apprehensive about possibly overdoing its
> application.(snip)
> I reckon I've barrowed enough around to thinly cover about a third of
> the area if I squash it all out under-welly.  If I dig this in to that
> part this year (getting ready for the old crop rotation thing), will I
> make it too acid?   It's quite well rotted already, fairly dark and
> firmish, only a little smelly.

  It's very hard to overdo manure. A thin covering of rotted manure
certainly isn't going to, though it's better not to grow root-crops in
ground that's been dressed with it.. it makes them fork.

  You don't need to  trample it or dig it in btw.. just spread  it
roughly  on the surface and incrediblly quickly, the worms will take it
down into the soil.

> On a similar vein, I've got a fair quantity of leaf mulch from the
> autumn.  Given my availability of muck (especially in the winter
> momths) will I be better digging this in rather than waiting ages for
> it to compost down in bins?

   Rotted leaf mulch looks like coarse peat, and is quite acid so makes
a great soil-surface mulch around acid loving plants, like strawberries,
 raspberries, azaleas and rhododendrons.(No need to dig it in, again).
If it's still visibly "leaves", it's liable to blow away in high winds,
so would be better added to a compost bin.


   Janet

Re: How much muck?

#99993

Author: Kate Morgan
Date: Fri, 14 Jan 2005 21:49

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> I'm in the fortunate position of having a lot of cow muck near my
> allotment, but am a bit apprehensive about possibly overdoing its
> application.
snip

I have a fair amount of horse manure that I just spread around my
borders I dont dig it in. Where there are troublesome weeds I spread it
a bit thicker and the weeds get smothered.

kate

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