The Lemon Fool

bungeejumper wrote:

Bouleversee wrote:Can one put kitchen paper with which one has mopped up the oil in sardine tins in an ordinary compost bin? I wouldn't dream of pouring it down the drain so just put the oily paper in the household waste bin but would prefer to compost it unless it attracted vermin.

Yum, essence of sardine. My favourite. Or shall I just line my nest with it? Squeak!

BJ

Well, I wouldn't put it in the large home-made and unsealed containers at the bottom of the garden but I put my kitchen waste in a Dalek type near the house which has a trapdoor and solid sides and cover so the squeakers would find it difficult to get in so long as I replaced the trapdoor after extracting compost. I actually find the Dalek produces well rotted compost rather quicker than the bigger bins but not all that much of it at one time, of course. I suppose my query was really whether kitchen paper soaked in olive oil would add anything useful to the compost as well as being more environmentally friendly.

I finally found a peat-free all purpose compost, as recommended by the RHS - suitable for seeds and seedlings. It contains a lot of finely chopped wood - and as well as my seedlings it produces an excellent crop of miniature fungi! This seems to be a common complaint in on-line discussions elsewhere. Its a product of the wood decomposition. I pick them off with tweezers.
So I still haven't found any peat free seed compost to rival the with-peat seed compost - but I'll keep trying.

scotia wrote:I finally found a peat-free all purpose compost, as recommended by the RHS - suitable for seeds and seedlings. It contains a lot of finely chopped wood - and as well as my seedlings it produces an excellent crop of miniature fungi! This seems to be a common complaint in on-line discussions elsewhere. Its a product of the wood decomposition. I pick them off with tweezers.
So I still haven't found any peat free seed compost to rival the with-peat seed compost - but I'll keep trying.

We are not I suppose allowed to mention names here but my local garden centre has a certain well known brand whose name begins with the letter M which proclaims itself to be peat free. No sign of fungus nor of finely chopped wood for that matter.

Dod

I'm sure one can mention brands as long as the post is fair comment and not libelous, and it's not a disguised advert for something one has a finacial interest in

OK, so I read the other day (can't remember whether it was Which or Gardeners World) that Homebase and B & Q all purpose were the best. I don't remember what I bought last year either but it was terrible; didn't hold moisture at all.

Just got through a bag of Wickes compost. Seems to be 100% macerated wood.

Nimrod103 wrote:Just got through a bag of Wickes compost. Seems to be 100% macerated wood.

Is that any better than peat-based compost?

Must admit I don't really understand the big problem with peat-based, other than it releases the embedded CO2 to atmosphere, I think. Surely shredded wood would do just the same.

Mike4 wrote:

Nimrod103 wrote:Just got through a bag of Wickes compost. Seems to be 100% macerated wood.

Is that any better than peat-based compost?

Must admit I don't really understand the big problem with peat-based, other than it releases the embedded CO2 to atmosphere, I think. Surely shredded wood would do just the same.

What about home made compost and leafmould? Are they environmentally friendly and are they ok for potting? I have plenty of both and use for mulching.

Bouleversee wrote:What about home made compost and leafmould? Are they environmentally friendly and are they ok for potting? I have plenty of both and use for mulching.

Yes, definitely environmentally friendly. Leafmould is highly regarded as a potting compost. You might want to pass it through a fairly small riddle\sieve first.

RC

Thanks, RC. I have more leafmould than ordinary but I thought it might suit only ericacious plants. I do use a sieve sometimes. If sieved would either be ok for seeds or too strong?

Bouleversee wrote:Thanks, RC. I have more leafmould than ordinary but I thought it might suit only ericacious plants. I do use a sieve sometimes. If sieved would either be ok for seeds or too strong?

Leafmould is approximately neutral so it should be good for most plants. Leafmould is generally not 'strong', ie contains low levels of plant nutrients but is excellent for root development and as a soil conditioner. Well suited for planting seeds.

The typical ph (acidity/alkalinity) of leafmould is between 6.5 and 7.5 ie about neutral. A preponderance of conifer an evergreen leaves or needles will tend to produce a more acidic leafmould. Such acidic leafmould would be excellent for acid loving plants such as azaleas and rhododendrons

https://www.originalorganics.co.uk/blog/how-to-make-great-leafmould#:~:text=The%20typical%20ph%20(acidity%2Falkalinity,such%20as%20azaleas%20and%20rhododendrons.

RC

Mike4 wrote:Must admit I don't really understand the big problem with peat-based, other than it releases the embedded CO2 to atmosphere, I think. Surely shredded wood would do just the same.

The carbon question is a question of timescales - obviously carbon gets recycled into the atmosphere, there's not a lot you can do about the short-term stuff like your grass clippings breaking down within a year or two, but it's not ideal to be bringing back CO2 from 400 million years ago by burning coal. Peat is in the middle, it can store carbon for thousands of years - and can end up turning into coal and locking it away for millions of years.

Equally importantly, it's a really rare, fragile habitat for lots of wildlife, and it also has an important role as a "sponge" for water that would otherwise cause floods. See eg https://www.forpeatssake.org.uk/issue

On the subject of riddles, I found it weirdly hard to get one locally, but Screwfix give you a choice of three sizes and they're quite well-built, they have a bit of flashing at the join between mesh and sidewall so hopefully should last a bit longer than some as that's where they tend to rust. But ouch - I'm sure they were less than £8 when I bought mine less than a year ago, now they're a tenner each. When I'm riddling I "pre-filter" my compost into a wheelbarrow through some chicken wire to get rid of the big lumps - chickenwire also works nicely for bonfire woodash.

ReformedCharacter wrote:

Bouleversee wrote:Thanks, RC. I have more leafmould than ordinary but I thought it might suit only ericacious plants. I do use a sieve sometimes. If sieved would either be ok for seeds or too strong?

Leafmould is approximately neutral so it should be good for most plants. Leafmould is generally not 'strong', ie contains low levels of plant nutrients but is excellent for root development and as a soil conditioner. Well suited for planting seeds.

The typical ph (acidity/alkalinity) of leafmould is between 6.5 and 7.5 ie about neutral. A preponderance of conifer an evergreen leaves or needles will tend to produce a more acidic leafmould. Such acidic leafmould would be excellent for acid loving plants such as azaleas and rhododendrons

https://www.originalorganics.co.uk/blog/how-to-make-great-leafmould#:~:text=The%20typical%20ph%20(acidity%2Falkalinity,such%20as%20azaleas%20and%20rhododendrons.

RC

Many thanks for that link and information. It seems I have been doing the right things as regards making the leafmould and compost (apart from adding urine and only using an accelerator for compost). My leaves are all from oaks and my two cages are not really enough and I end up bagging some of them and taking some to the dump. The recipes for using them will be extremely useful. I may never buy seed or potting compost again!

Hallucigenia:

Is it OK to have bonfires or burn sticks in an incinerator bin? I have nowhere to have a bonfire in my garden so I bought a bin with a lid so I could safely make a bit of wood ash for my roses with the sticks that fall off the trees but haven't ever used it as I read that log burning stoves caused a lot of pollution. Perhaps it's just a question of degree. I wouldn't be doing it very often.

Bouleversee wrote:Hallucigenia:

Is it OK to have bonfires or burn sticks in an incinerator bin? I have nowhere to have a bonfire in my garden so I bought a bin with a lid so I could safely make a bit of wood ash for my roses with the sticks that fall off the trees but haven't ever used it as I read that log burning stoves caused a lot of pollution. Perhaps it's just a question of degree. I wouldn't be doing it very often.

Depends from what perspective - yes there has been concern about wood fires, particularly open ones do generate a lot of small particulates in particular, such that now vehicles do a pretty good job of cleaning particulates from their exhausts then the 8% of houses with wood burners generate more particulates than the entire vehicle fleet. OTOH, I wouldn't sweat it too much if it's just a small bin's worth once or twice a year, although I'd probably wait for a bit more air movement than we've got at the moment, pollution can tend to "sit" in these periods of balmy weather without much wind.