Horse manure and green waste soil improver.

[Phil RParticipant]

Hi everyone [Phil_waves]
I have just recently taken over a plot of 9.1m (30ft) by 12.1m (40ft). I have cleared it of everything but the odd annual “weedling” that pops up and now it’s time to get the thing covered. I have access to “green waste” soil improver that has been made from garden waste, not food waste and sieved down to 12mm or less. It has these features:
“Properties of typical composted green waste soil conditioner
Nutrients (Total nutrient kg per tonne of moist compost based on typical analysis)
Nitrogen Phosphate Potash Magnesium Sulphur
as N as P2O5 as K2O as Mg as S
8.1 3.3 6.6 2 1

Potentially Toxic Elements – (Typical values compared with the Composting Association Standard for Composts)
Element Cadmium Chromium Copper Lead Mercury Nickel Zinc Units
Typical 0.71 19 45 108 0.17 18 186 mg per kg
Standard 1.5 100 200 150 1 50 400 dry matter
Other parameters

pH – Around 8.5 (Measures acidity)
Electrical conductivity – Around 770 mS /cm (Measures concentration of soluble salts)

Bulk Density – About 0.6 kg/litre or 1.6m3 per tonne

Loss on Ignition – About 20% (Measures organic matter content)

Carbon: Nitrogen (C:N) ratio – About 12″

…and I presume the odd but of plastic ;O)

I also can probably get hold of well rotted horse manure from a local livery stable(I don’t yet know if it’s straw bedded or chip bedded) for £25 a tonne delivered. My question is this: Do I just go the whole hog and get only well rotted horse manure or do I use lots of green waste with some horse manure on top or perhaps mostly horse manure with green waste paths?

Anybody care to figure the amount required?(ish) This is the first large amount required to initially set up a no dig system on 110 square meters (1200sq ft) 9.1m x 12.1m(30′ x 40′) so it’s a large amount for a good thick layer and I don’t want to skimp on it. Thanks very much for your help.

regards, Phil:O)

[Phil RParticipant]

…I also have 30kg of rock dust which i was planning to spread over the top to help “re-mineralise” the soil as it’s been an allotment for a while now. Thanks. )

[charlesModerator]

 Good project here Phil, I would use the well rotted horse manure on your beds with an inch or two of the green waste on top, making a surface with few weed seeds. Any spare green waste in the paths.  

[Phil RParticipant]

Thanks Charles, that’s just the kind of direction I needed. I’ll let you know how it goes. Concentrating on setting up and covering everything and getting a shed and poly-tunnel up before I start the growing. Thanks again, :o)

[ChristineNewbyParticipant]

Hi Charles
Could you please let me know why you would use green waste in the paths? Could you also let a newby like me know what is the defination of green waste? I know someone said coffee grounds is classified as ‘green’. Thank you in advance.

[charlesModerator]

 These are other names for green waste compost, for compost made of peoples’ garden and other organic wastes in council or corporate or fearm sites. It used to be cheap and I used some for paths, still do sometimes, to make a more friable surface, cleaner to walk on and easier to weed.

Strictly speaking any compost is green waste, so yes it is a bit confusing.

[RhysParticipant]

Here’s what I’ve seen:

1. Asparagus coming through in leaps and bounds right now – 45 spears visible on a 5m * 1m row of crowns and we’ve already eaten 4 spears last week. As good if not better than last year.
2. Huge increase in the worm population and worm size both on main beds and fence-side beds. Up to 15cm in length and 1cm wide.
3. 100% take rate of garlics in March. Winter onions and autumn garlic have grown on tremendously with a top dressing of horse manure put on when the rains got ridiculous(around January)!
4. Autumn raspberries planted last summer have tremendous foliage this April (here the manure was put down in March after rotting for 4 months).
5. Brilliant flowering of pear, plum and cherry trees (no doubt due to the mild spring too).
6. Phacaelia germinating very rapidly after spreading on a hedge-side bed covered last autumn with horse manure.
7. Comfrey and rhubarb have roared away this spring: already cut comfrey leaves for the early April potato plantings and we’ve already had 5 pickings of rhubarb.

The verdict on the potato beds I still await.

So, overall, you won’t harm your beds using horse manure as a top dressing and you’ll improve the worm population enormously.

[ChristineNewbyParticipant]

Thank you for that Charles. I am taking delivery of 5 tonnes horse manure this afternoon. Can you advise whether I could just put 2-4 inches of these on top of undug grassy soil and then immediately plant directly into them with potatoes, garlic and onions?

The horse manure is more than a year old. I expect I can plant bare root fruit trees with the manure on top too – or should these be incorporated into the soil?

Many thanks.

[charlesModerator]

 Two inches could see grass growing through, it needs to be smothered enough so that no new blades can appear before the roots die.

With four inches, yes plant potatoes straightaway – or more simply, put them on the grass with manure on top. 

For fruit trees backfill planting holes with soil only, organic matter on top as mulch, see pp 53-4 of Myths book.

[ChristineNewbyParticipant]

Thank you that the advise. Will also find the Myths book!

[AllotmentmanyorkMember]

I have used free municipal compost for a few years now in York, and it has been very good. This year i have a had a problem with it. I used some to mix in to make growing soil for some tomato plants growing in buckets. The tomato plants were fine when they went into the buckets, but i noticed that the new growth at the top and in the leaf axils was green but small stunted and twisted. I am guessing that this is the result of weedkiller remaining in the compost. Probably caused by someone putting grass cuttings in their green bin that has been treated with weed and feed. Be aware that this can happen with municipal compost. 

 

[charlesModerator]

Thanks for posting this about municipal compost, it must be from people using the horrible clopyralid on lawns and it makes me wonder how general that is. Aminopyralid weedkiillers should never have been re-allowed, nobody really knows how persistent they are,  from what I have seen.

So sorry about your tomatoes, are they growing at all?

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