I have bought quite a few seeds from the Real Seeds Catalogue but maybe I should have tried a little harder to buy heritage seeds.
http://www.realseeds.co.uk/
However, if you want disease resistant varieties because you need to grow without pesticides then sometimes you need to compromise. Also, I want to be able to keep some of my vegetables stored over winter and these good keeping varieties are not necessarily heritage. Cauliflower: Brassica oleracea botrytis 'Clapton F1 Hybrid' is a club root resistant variety so I thought that I would try it. It was also half price in an end of season sale so I could not resist it. (Several others of the F1 seeds were in the sale as well so I got them too) I have been growing Daucus carota 'Flyaway F1 Hybrid' for years to combat carrot root fly. This year I am growing Resistafly F1 Hybrid.
The bottom line is to produce some organic carrots to eat. To make this a little more certain I will be growing crops that are resistant to pests.
I would like to believe that heritage plants have a greater affinity for mychorrhizal fungi and grow even better with charcoal but I have not found any significant difference between modern varieties and heritage grown with charcoal. Both types of plants seem to benefit from the application of inoculated charcoal and mychorrhiza. Keeping the old varieties going is more to do with biodiversity than anything else.
I have two dust bins full of marinading lump wood, barbecue charcoal. The liquid is made up of comfrey, nettle, sweet cicely, worm bin and diluted pigeon manure. It has been marinading for at least five months now and I will not use it until the spring. I reckon that will be ample time for the charcoal to take up nutrients.
It will be used on the potatoes first. I cannot get barbecue charcoal at the moment because there is none in the shops, however I still have the Takesumi charcoal to experiment with.
While some of the old vegetable varieties are better flavoured there are many that are not and they are not so disease resistant either.
Looking around the allotment site people are using the same varieties year after year because they grow well in our allotment soil with our north facing aspect. These varieties are more or less the same as I am growing some of which are F1 hybrids. I think that I will continue to buy F1 seed at the moment.
Finally, I have got into growing particular varieties and want to carry on if I can.
This is why I kept some seed in 2011 and I am going to sow it during next season (2012). Seed saving has been quite successful this year so I am going to continue to collect my own seed. For this I need non F1 hybrids because only these will breed true. Maybe this is an argument for selecting heritage seeds. So, there are good reasons for getting both F1 hybrids and heritage seed and I will be using both.
Showing posts with label mychorrhizal fungi. Show all posts
Showing posts with label mychorrhizal fungi. Show all posts
Thursday, 22 December 2011
Thursday, 24 November 2011
Finished digging the new potato bed
I haven't really finished digging because I haven't dug the area where the roots are. I will dig this new area quite deeply like I did on the other half of the bed and remove all the stone using the bread tray sieve. I think that I have done this fairly well in the area I have dug already.
I have removed considerable amounts of stone. This has been replaced by topsoil, horse manure and pigeon manure. All the soil and manures went through the makeshift bread tray sieve because it helps to mix them together.
The new topsoil has come from turfs left in the bins by the allotment gate. I sieved out the topsoil using the bread tray sieve. The grass was put at the bottom of the double digging trenches.
One of the advantages of digging is that it mixes well and manures get distributed throughout the soil profile.
If you look at the horticultural textbooks, it tells you that some nutrients come from the weathering of rocks. I considered this carefully. Stones come from rock. I am removing lots of stones from this soil. Maybe if I weather these stones by hitting them with the bull hammer and return the dust to the soil, this would add nutrients to the soil.
There may be few nutrients in quartz and sandstone but I still give them a tap with the bull hammer. Plants do not need a great deal of micro nutrient from the soil so the little that I get from stone might be sufficient.
As I was sieving out the stone from the soil, I also sieved out large pieces of inoculated charcoal that I had used in planting holes. I don't think that the larger pieces of charcoal are doing very good jobs so I am hitting them with a bull hammer to crush these too. It is all getting mixed into the topsoil through the sieve.
When using a no dig system of gardening, nutrients are put on the top of the soil in the form of compost and worms are used to distribute this throughout the soil profile.
Although digging seems to kill a few worms, there are still a great many worms to do a similar job when the soil is dug. Also there is nothing stopping me from putting a layer of compost or manure over the dug bed. In other words you can go up adding compost to the soil surface or you can go down adding compost or manure to the subsoil. Or you can do both. I would rather do both.
Digging might destroy mychorrhizal symbiotic associations and this is one of the few disadvantages to digging. However, this will occur when crop plants are harvested anyway and new associations can be promoted using commercial mychorrhiza spores. The subsoil in this bed was so hard that I could not get a spade into it. I had to use a fork. Although there were a few resourceful worms that had worked their way into it there was little evidence that many other organisms were making it their home. When I was sieving this subsoil I was mixing in topsoil from the turfs, horse manure and pigeon manure and this gave it a very friable texture. Introducing carbon (organic matter) throughout the soil profile should mean that there is a source of food for a wide range of soil organism. This should increase the soil micro organism population and diversity.
There are times when there is no need to dig so I don't dig. However, passing the soil through the makeshift sieve has produced a really fine tilth and this makes all gardening jobs much easier. I will have to earth up the potatoes next spring and summer and having this really fine tilth soil will make it much easier.
I raked over the soil after finishing digging and it was a delight because it was so easy.
Put some xCupressocyparis leylandii shreddings on the pathway between 25(b) and 26(a) and I am going to plant a little hedge of Lonicera nitida, which is a honeysuckle would you believe, along the path. Lonicera nitida doesn't have a honeysuckle sent though.
I have removed considerable amounts of stone. This has been replaced by topsoil, horse manure and pigeon manure. All the soil and manures went through the makeshift bread tray sieve because it helps to mix them together.
The new topsoil has come from turfs left in the bins by the allotment gate. I sieved out the topsoil using the bread tray sieve. The grass was put at the bottom of the double digging trenches.
One of the advantages of digging is that it mixes well and manures get distributed throughout the soil profile.
If you look at the horticultural textbooks, it tells you that some nutrients come from the weathering of rocks. I considered this carefully. Stones come from rock. I am removing lots of stones from this soil. Maybe if I weather these stones by hitting them with the bull hammer and return the dust to the soil, this would add nutrients to the soil.
There may be few nutrients in quartz and sandstone but I still give them a tap with the bull hammer. Plants do not need a great deal of micro nutrient from the soil so the little that I get from stone might be sufficient.
As I was sieving out the stone from the soil, I also sieved out large pieces of inoculated charcoal that I had used in planting holes. I don't think that the larger pieces of charcoal are doing very good jobs so I am hitting them with a bull hammer to crush these too. It is all getting mixed into the topsoil through the sieve.
When using a no dig system of gardening, nutrients are put on the top of the soil in the form of compost and worms are used to distribute this throughout the soil profile.
Although digging seems to kill a few worms, there are still a great many worms to do a similar job when the soil is dug. Also there is nothing stopping me from putting a layer of compost or manure over the dug bed. In other words you can go up adding compost to the soil surface or you can go down adding compost or manure to the subsoil. Or you can do both. I would rather do both.
Digging might destroy mychorrhizal symbiotic associations and this is one of the few disadvantages to digging. However, this will occur when crop plants are harvested anyway and new associations can be promoted using commercial mychorrhiza spores. The subsoil in this bed was so hard that I could not get a spade into it. I had to use a fork. Although there were a few resourceful worms that had worked their way into it there was little evidence that many other organisms were making it their home. When I was sieving this subsoil I was mixing in topsoil from the turfs, horse manure and pigeon manure and this gave it a very friable texture. Introducing carbon (organic matter) throughout the soil profile should mean that there is a source of food for a wide range of soil organism. This should increase the soil micro organism population and diversity.
There are times when there is no need to dig so I don't dig. However, passing the soil through the makeshift sieve has produced a really fine tilth and this makes all gardening jobs much easier. I will have to earth up the potatoes next spring and summer and having this really fine tilth soil will make it much easier.
I raked over the soil after finishing digging and it was a delight because it was so easy.
Put some xCupressocyparis leylandii shreddings on the pathway between 25(b) and 26(a) and I am going to plant a little hedge of Lonicera nitida, which is a honeysuckle would you believe, along the path. Lonicera nitida doesn't have a honeysuckle sent though.
Tuesday, 2 August 2011
More thoughts on Terra preta soils.
I am attempting to create a Terra preta type soil using lump barbecue charcoal. (Have a look at the links on the right to see the Terra preta film.)
This type of very fertile soil has been found in South America and has been made by people over thousands of years using charcoal as a soil amendment. The evidence that I originally read was that charcoal reduced the fertility of the soil when it was initially added to the soil. This discouraged me from doing experimenting on my allotment. However, after reading around the subject and talking to people on various websites such as Allotments.uk I developed the hypothesis that an "inoculated" charcoal may be able to be used as a beneficial soil amendment to produce a sustainably fertile soil.
Some people are still trying to develop an inoculated charcoal that is very similar to that found the South American Terra preta. My reasoning was that this seemed to be over complicated because if the charcoal could be amended by Amazonian nutrients then it should be able to be inoculated with nutrients originating in my local area.
I am experimenting with using comfrey, nettle and sweet cicely liquid fortified with worm bin liquid.
Inoculated charcoal is charcoal that has been marinaded in nutrients. Charcoal has some remarkable properties that allow it to absorb or adsorb chemicals within its labyrinthine structure. We can use this property to enable us to deliver nutrients to the soil in a form that might not readily leach away.
I would conjecture that the charcoal acts as a kind of buffering mechanism that allows nutrients to diffuse into the soil when there is a low concentration of them while adsorbing them when there is an excess.
The structure of charcoal also gives a relatively safe place for beneficial bacteria and fungi to live adding more nutrients to the soil.
Research has found that Terra preta soils also contain mychorrhizal fungi which form a symbiotic relationship with plants. The charcoal could give these fungi a source of nutrient that can be transferred to plants and also a protected environment for their spores.
Now all of this is complete conjecture because research in this area is in its infancy. We are trying to follow in the footsteps of ancient Amazonian peoples and it is difficult.
I have had impressive results this year after adding charcoal to the soil. Whether this is due to the charcoal or to some other factor this year, I don't know. We are attempting to replicate a soil that has developed in the Amazonian rain forests areas. There is no evidence that this can be replicated in places like England.
I would like to think that I have not wasted quite a lot of money buying charcoal and that it does have some beneficial effect on the fertility of the soil. What worries me is that there is not a rush to add charcoal to the soil by farmers and market gardeners. Is this because the data is inconclusive or for some other reason such as the cost effectiveness of charcoal.
Now as a warning, I need to emphasise that it is the genuine lump wood charcoal that should be used not the briquets. Charcoal briquets are made with cement and will alter the pH of the soil significantly. Charcoal itself is alkaline so any further raising of the pH will significantly change the character of the soil.
Is adding charcoal to the soil any better than just burying unburnt brush and logs? Hugelkultur raised bed systems, which the South Americans also developed, would suggest that there is little difference. Both are good ways in which to add large quantities of carbon to the soil. Is the quantity of carbon in the soil significant in raising its fertility?
Although plants need relatively large amounts of carbon dioxide and water to produce their food, the amount of other nutrients they require is very small.
Anything added to the soil that will help to retain moisture will be beneficial to plants. There is evidence that charcoal helps to retain moisture in the soil. Together with water retention there is also a benefit in that addition of long lasting carbon will help with drainage of the soil.
I would conjecture that there is an overall benefit of adding charcoal to the soil and this is similar to adding unburnt organic matter to the soil.
This type of very fertile soil has been found in South America and has been made by people over thousands of years using charcoal as a soil amendment. The evidence that I originally read was that charcoal reduced the fertility of the soil when it was initially added to the soil. This discouraged me from doing experimenting on my allotment. However, after reading around the subject and talking to people on various websites such as Allotments.uk I developed the hypothesis that an "inoculated" charcoal may be able to be used as a beneficial soil amendment to produce a sustainably fertile soil.
Some people are still trying to develop an inoculated charcoal that is very similar to that found the South American Terra preta. My reasoning was that this seemed to be over complicated because if the charcoal could be amended by Amazonian nutrients then it should be able to be inoculated with nutrients originating in my local area.
I am experimenting with using comfrey, nettle and sweet cicely liquid fortified with worm bin liquid.
Inoculated charcoal is charcoal that has been marinaded in nutrients. Charcoal has some remarkable properties that allow it to absorb or adsorb chemicals within its labyrinthine structure. We can use this property to enable us to deliver nutrients to the soil in a form that might not readily leach away.
I would conjecture that the charcoal acts as a kind of buffering mechanism that allows nutrients to diffuse into the soil when there is a low concentration of them while adsorbing them when there is an excess.
The structure of charcoal also gives a relatively safe place for beneficial bacteria and fungi to live adding more nutrients to the soil.
Research has found that Terra preta soils also contain mychorrhizal fungi which form a symbiotic relationship with plants. The charcoal could give these fungi a source of nutrient that can be transferred to plants and also a protected environment for their spores.
Now all of this is complete conjecture because research in this area is in its infancy. We are trying to follow in the footsteps of ancient Amazonian peoples and it is difficult.
I have had impressive results this year after adding charcoal to the soil. Whether this is due to the charcoal or to some other factor this year, I don't know. We are attempting to replicate a soil that has developed in the Amazonian rain forests areas. There is no evidence that this can be replicated in places like England.
I would like to think that I have not wasted quite a lot of money buying charcoal and that it does have some beneficial effect on the fertility of the soil. What worries me is that there is not a rush to add charcoal to the soil by farmers and market gardeners. Is this because the data is inconclusive or for some other reason such as the cost effectiveness of charcoal.
Now as a warning, I need to emphasise that it is the genuine lump wood charcoal that should be used not the briquets. Charcoal briquets are made with cement and will alter the pH of the soil significantly. Charcoal itself is alkaline so any further raising of the pH will significantly change the character of the soil.
Is adding charcoal to the soil any better than just burying unburnt brush and logs? Hugelkultur raised bed systems, which the South Americans also developed, would suggest that there is little difference. Both are good ways in which to add large quantities of carbon to the soil. Is the quantity of carbon in the soil significant in raising its fertility?
Although plants need relatively large amounts of carbon dioxide and water to produce their food, the amount of other nutrients they require is very small.
Anything added to the soil that will help to retain moisture will be beneficial to plants. There is evidence that charcoal helps to retain moisture in the soil. Together with water retention there is also a benefit in that addition of long lasting carbon will help with drainage of the soil.
I would conjecture that there is an overall benefit of adding charcoal to the soil and this is similar to adding unburnt organic matter to the soil.
Friday, 15 July 2011
Harvesting
I have been seriously cropping the peas this week. Overall I have 11.5kg (25 lb) of podded peas, which is about 2.9 kg (6.3lb) per row. The rows were 3.65metres (12ft) long and for this I should be getting at least 4lb per row.
So not bad. With charcoal and mychorrhizal fungi there is an increase of 2lb a row. The peas were fertilised only with a top dressing of sieved home made compost and comfrey liquid. So no bought fertilisers. That can't be bad.
The harvest of strawberries has finished now. The last ones I picked were on the 22nd June. I got about 20.5kg off five rows and this seems eminently satisfactory.
At the moment I am harvesting brocolli, calabrese, raspberries, blackberries, broad beans, peas, courgettes, turnips, lettuce, carrots, beetroot and potatoes.
It is amazing just how much time it takes to harvest the vegetables and fruit. I need to speed up a little.
I have taken out the summer purple sprouting and the calabrese and these will be replaced by one line of calabrese. The broad beans have been taken out but new ones have been planted where the garlic has been taken out. The winter cauliflowers growing under the broad beans need to be earthed up and given some comfrey liquid.
The broad bean tops have been taken off with a pair of secateurs and the roots left in the ground. The roots are infected with rhizobium bacteria which fixes nitrogen from the air and converts it into ammonia which is a natural fertiliser for plants. The nitrogen is taken up by the plants - such as broad bean - to make proteins. So to gain this nitrogen we can use the broad bean plant as a green manure. If the roots are left in the soil they will provide about 30% of the available nitrogen but if the tops are dug in as well they will provide about 60% of the available nitrogen to the soil.
Lots of people leave the roots in the soil but burn the tops. They are wasting 60% of the natural nitrogen fertiliser.
As there are winter cauliflowers in the way, the tops will not be dug in but put on the compost heap. They will provide a little nitrogen for the rotting down process.
The peas have been harvested but there are a few left on to fatten up. When these last few are cropped the plants will be dug into the same ground as they grew on as a green manure. As with the broad beans, their roots are infected with rhizobium bacteria which has been fixing nitrogen from the atmosphere. Digging them in will add nitrogen to the soil.
They will be replaced by a late crop of peas.
It could be argued that peas should not be planted where peas have been growing recently but there is little chance that there would be any problems. The peas will be planted with mychorrhizal fungi and inoculated charcoal again. This will just add to the charcoal already on this bed.
Some of the sweet peas will be layered this weekend. This involves them being taken off the cane supports and laid down along the ground to go up another cane support. This will be time consuming too.
Just cropping and weeding the rest of the allotment.
So not bad. With charcoal and mychorrhizal fungi there is an increase of 2lb a row. The peas were fertilised only with a top dressing of sieved home made compost and comfrey liquid. So no bought fertilisers. That can't be bad.
The harvest of strawberries has finished now. The last ones I picked were on the 22nd June. I got about 20.5kg off five rows and this seems eminently satisfactory.
At the moment I am harvesting brocolli, calabrese, raspberries, blackberries, broad beans, peas, courgettes, turnips, lettuce, carrots, beetroot and potatoes.
It is amazing just how much time it takes to harvest the vegetables and fruit. I need to speed up a little.
I have taken out the summer purple sprouting and the calabrese and these will be replaced by one line of calabrese. The broad beans have been taken out but new ones have been planted where the garlic has been taken out. The winter cauliflowers growing under the broad beans need to be earthed up and given some comfrey liquid.
The broad bean tops have been taken off with a pair of secateurs and the roots left in the ground. The roots are infected with rhizobium bacteria which fixes nitrogen from the air and converts it into ammonia which is a natural fertiliser for plants. The nitrogen is taken up by the plants - such as broad bean - to make proteins. So to gain this nitrogen we can use the broad bean plant as a green manure. If the roots are left in the soil they will provide about 30% of the available nitrogen but if the tops are dug in as well they will provide about 60% of the available nitrogen to the soil.
Lots of people leave the roots in the soil but burn the tops. They are wasting 60% of the natural nitrogen fertiliser.
As there are winter cauliflowers in the way, the tops will not be dug in but put on the compost heap. They will provide a little nitrogen for the rotting down process.
The peas have been harvested but there are a few left on to fatten up. When these last few are cropped the plants will be dug into the same ground as they grew on as a green manure. As with the broad beans, their roots are infected with rhizobium bacteria which has been fixing nitrogen from the atmosphere. Digging them in will add nitrogen to the soil.
They will be replaced by a late crop of peas.
It could be argued that peas should not be planted where peas have been growing recently but there is little chance that there would be any problems. The peas will be planted with mychorrhizal fungi and inoculated charcoal again. This will just add to the charcoal already on this bed.
Some of the sweet peas will be layered this weekend. This involves them being taken off the cane supports and laid down along the ground to go up another cane support. This will be time consuming too.
Just cropping and weeding the rest of the allotment.
Wednesday, 13 July 2011
What effect do brassicas have on mychorrhizal population of soils.
Brassicas do not form a symbiotic relationship with mychorrhizal fungi so will they have any effect on the the population of mychorrhiza in the soil? Will the spores die or just remain dormant until another mychorrhizal plant grows in that area? Well there is lots of charcoal in the brassica bed because I used it in the planting holes of the sweet peas and runner beans last year and again when I planted out the brassicas this year. The sweet peas and runner beans also got a pinch of mychorrhizal fungi spores. So there must be mychorrhizal fungi in the brassicae bed soil at the moment. This will probably be in the form of spores. I would like to think that they are tucked away in the labyrinthine pores of the charcoal.
Mychorrhiza do not form an association with the brassicas but they might do with other plants around the brassicae bed. The black currant bushes are the most prominent and I am hoping that these will act as a reservoir for VAMs; mychorrhizal fungi mycelium stretching out from the bushes to other plants around that area. Together with this, I have been weeding throughout the allotment and there are a number of weeds - particularly the grasses - that seem to have fungi growing over their roots. Of course this is just conjecture but it is fascinating.
Mychorrhiza do not form an association with the brassicas but they might do with other plants around the brassicae bed. The black currant bushes are the most prominent and I am hoping that these will act as a reservoir for VAMs; mychorrhizal fungi mycelium stretching out from the bushes to other plants around that area. Together with this, I have been weeding throughout the allotment and there are a number of weeds - particularly the grasses - that seem to have fungi growing over their roots. Of course this is just conjecture but it is fascinating.
Although there is an important point in trying to replicate the Terra preta recipe, I am going to continue along the lines of using comfrey. My hypothesis is that the charcoal absorbs or adsorbs nutrients. These can come from things found in the Amazon or from more local sources. As far as I can see neither the charcoal or the plants seem to care where the nutrients are sourced. The charcoal takes it up and the plants seem to access it and use it regardless. I must also admit that other things go into the comfrey bins as well as comfrey. The left over chicken manure and a little bit of blood fish and bone; sugar; quite a bit of nettles and sweet cicely; and whatever comes out of the worm bin. They are all good sources of nutrient.
I have written in the past about the more advanced countries sucking out the nutrients of third world countries by importing fruit and vegetables. Maybe it is not only food miles we should be considering when importing food from other countries. Local sources of nutrient might be better?
I have written in the past about the more advanced countries sucking out the nutrients of third world countries by importing fruit and vegetables. Maybe it is not only food miles we should be considering when importing food from other countries. Local sources of nutrient might be better?
Then, when added to the soil, the charcoal acts as a kind of buffer allowing nutrients to flow out when they are scarce and taking them in when they are in excess.
The charcoal is left in lumps in the marinading dustbins then when I need some I take it out and crush it. If you do it like this it is easier to handle. Crushing the charcoal means that it is easier to incorporate into the soil when adding it to the planting holes. Last year I used some bigish lumps of charcoal but this keeps on being cast to the surface of the soil and will not mix in well. I have started to collect up the larger pieces and crush them just to make them easier to mix with the soil. I think that the mixing of charcoal with the soil is important and this will happen more readily if the charcoal pieces are relatively small.
Then the charcoal acts as a kind of buffer allowing nutrients to flow out when they are scares and taking them in when they are in excess. I would also conjecture that the mychorrhizal fungi also aid in this buffering system in that they can access the nutrient locked up in the charcoal using single cell mycelium to penetrate the pores of the charcoal.
There does seem to be a synergistic effect when comfrey and charcoal are mixed. When marinaded together for some time they seem to have a much bigger effect on plants than they do on their own.
The time that I leave the charcoal in the marinade bins depends upon when I need to use it. I made some last autumn and did not need to use it until I started planting in the spring. So I thought that the best place to leave it was in the bins. It seems to have been a good decision because it certainly has had an effect on the vegetables in the allotment.
Having said that, I have used the new batch only after about a month of marinading and there still seems to be a good effect.
I have no objection to someone developing their own product to sell but I do object to them then justifying the product by plagiarizing other peoples research. I am convinced that charcoal is a very important way of augmenting the soil but I cannot pretend that anything I have done is remotely scientific. I would love to do proper scientific trials using differing conditions but I do not have the time or the facilities. Also, when having such a remarkable results in the past, it is very difficult not to use the charcoal on every occasion and this does not produce good comparisons - although I can compare with the vegetables on other allotments.
This also suggests that I have a recipe for my charcoal mix. However, it is more like my cooking. Throw a lot of things in together and hope for the best.
I would hope that the charcoal will take up any nutrients that it comes into contact with and the buffering system will allow the right nutrient to be released when it becomes scarce in the soil. So it does not matter where the nutrients come from or how much you put in the mix. Whether the ancient South American peoples refined a formula or whether they just threw everything in the mix can only be conjecture at the moment. I would suspect, from their very advanced horticultural skills, that they had a refined formula
It could work with chemical fertilisers and I expect it would to some extent. However, I would suggest that it would not be any where as effective as using organic sources of nutrients. This is because the vital and most important extra part of the formula are the micro organisms that are part of the mix as well.
If you look at soils that have been augmented with artificial fertilisers for years they are bereft of any life whatsoever. I don't think that artificial fertilisers and micro organisms are compatible. Whether they are EMs or VAMs or other micro organisms or preferably all three, what matters is that there will be micro organisms and these will be added to the soil to make a living, breathing, balanced, growing medium that is sustainable over many years.
This is what I am interested in now - whether there is a retained fertility or whether you have to keep adding inoculated charcoal. I would suggest, from my results, the addition of further charcoal produces a cumulative effect. The fact that plants do not need vast quantities of nutrients means that the charcoal could be a long lived source of sustenance. It is regulating the availability of these nutrients and preventing their leeching away that is of great importance and charcoal seems to be eminently suitable for such undertakings.
It could work with chemical fertilisers and I expect it would to some extent. However, I would suggest that it would not be any where as effective as using organic sources of nutrients. This is because the vital and most important extra part of the formula are the micro organisms that are part of the mix as well.
If you look at soils that have been augmented with artificial fertilisers for years they are bereft of any life whatsoever. I don't think that artificial fertilisers and micro organisms are compatible. Whether they are EMs or VAMs or other micro organisms or preferably all three, what matters is that there will be micro organisms and these will be added to the soil to make a living, breathing, balanced, growing medium that is sustainable over many years.
This is what I am interested in now - whether there is a retained fertility or whether you have to keep adding inoculated charcoal. I would suggest, from my results, the addition of further charcoal produces a cumulative effect. The fact that plants do not need vast quantities of nutrients means that the charcoal could be a long lived source of sustenance. It is regulating the availability of these nutrients and preventing their leeching away that is of great importance and charcoal seems to be eminently suitable for such undertakings.
It is noticeable how much my soil has changed in the number of mini beasts it supports. I think that adding charcoal in this form changes a lot of things within the soil. I would suggest that the increased micro organism population has produced an augmented food chain that has benefited more than just the plants on the allotment.
Hey, what can I say, I am just an amateur gardener so take what I say with a big pinch of salt.
Saturday, 9 July 2011
Inoculated charcoal Terra preta soil
The judges for the allotment competition came back to see my allotment again today. I think that they were interested in the sweet peas but did not really look at anything else.
They were asking what was put on the soil to augment it and I said horse muck, inoculated charcoal, comfrey liquid and mychorrhizal fungi. They could not believe that such a productive allotment could be sustained with so little input of fertiliser.
Most soils will have ample nutrients for plant growth without a great deal of augmentation, although whether these nutrients are readily available to the plant is another question. Making the nutrients available is the work of the mychorrhizal fungi.
Nitrogen input into the soil comes from the legumes growing on the allotment. The allotment is producing a remarkable amount of produce now and the plants are growing particularly big. Is this due to the charcoal experiment?
Inoculated charcoal has been used throughout the allotment during the planting season. It certainly seems to have helped the vegetables grow well. Ordinary lump charcoal for barbecues was used. It was put into a dust bin and comfrey liquid poured over the top of it. The charcoal marinaded in the comfrey liquid for several months during the winter. In the spring the charcoal was crushed with a bull hammer and put into the planting holes of the vegetables. The hypothesis is that the charcoal adsorbs and absorbs nutrient from the comfrey liquid so that it becomes saturated with it.
When it is added to the soil it acts as a type of buffer; releasing nutrient when there is a lack of them but absorbing or adsorbing them when there is a surplus.
Another suggestion is that mychorrhizal fungi can find nutrients in the charcoal and transport them to the plant easily. So they are added to the planting hole as well.
Now it has been said before that there is plenty of mychorrhizal fungi in the soil all ready. However, I think that we destroy these symbiotic relationships when we disturb the ground for digging and cropping. Therefore adding them to the allotment will only help the plants to grow.
They were asking what was put on the soil to augment it and I said horse muck, inoculated charcoal, comfrey liquid and mychorrhizal fungi. They could not believe that such a productive allotment could be sustained with so little input of fertiliser.
Most soils will have ample nutrients for plant growth without a great deal of augmentation, although whether these nutrients are readily available to the plant is another question. Making the nutrients available is the work of the mychorrhizal fungi.
Nitrogen input into the soil comes from the legumes growing on the allotment. The allotment is producing a remarkable amount of produce now and the plants are growing particularly big. Is this due to the charcoal experiment?
Inoculated charcoal has been used throughout the allotment during the planting season. It certainly seems to have helped the vegetables grow well. Ordinary lump charcoal for barbecues was used. It was put into a dust bin and comfrey liquid poured over the top of it. The charcoal marinaded in the comfrey liquid for several months during the winter. In the spring the charcoal was crushed with a bull hammer and put into the planting holes of the vegetables. The hypothesis is that the charcoal adsorbs and absorbs nutrient from the comfrey liquid so that it becomes saturated with it.
When it is added to the soil it acts as a type of buffer; releasing nutrient when there is a lack of them but absorbing or adsorbing them when there is a surplus.
Another suggestion is that mychorrhizal fungi can find nutrients in the charcoal and transport them to the plant easily. So they are added to the planting hole as well.
Now it has been said before that there is plenty of mychorrhizal fungi in the soil all ready. However, I think that we destroy these symbiotic relationships when we disturb the ground for digging and cropping. Therefore adding them to the allotment will only help the plants to grow.
Wednesday, 4 May 2011
Filling up the allotment.
The problem with this time of year is that you don't know when the last frost will strike. Last night the allotment had a relatively mild frost, however it affected my potatoes. They were not cut right back but tonight there might be another frost and this time they will find it very difficult to avoid being affected badly.
There is little I can do because they are quite big now - over 6 inches tall. Even further earthing up would not help. I will just have to grin and bear it.
I planted another row of brocolli and that really fills the brassicae bed except for a small area which I might use to put some turnips into. My daughter wants me to grow an enormous turnip for her F2 reception class. (Four and five year olds) There seems to be a book with a similar title.
I put another row of leeks in and this time I added inoculated charcoal to the planting holes. I haven't been doing this recently because I had run out of charcoal. I also added some mychorrhizal fungi. I was going to leave the leeks exposed to the elements but, after some thought, I decided to cover them with enviromesh and fleece. I used old cloche wires as supports and buried the edges in the soil. I had to use this combination because neither was long enough to cover the row. Now I have run out of things to cover the leeks with so I will just have to take my chances and leave them exposed to the ravages of the leek miner fly.
Now that the allotment is virtually full, there is more time to concentrate on the allotment too far. There will be some opportunity tomorrow to clear a little more of the jungle. I need to take my loppers to cut down a damson sapling and the brambles. I will also try to demolish the corrugated iron compost bins.
I still have not transplanted the celeriac yet and believe it or not I will have to resow my French beans because they have not germinated again. If at first you don't suck seed, try drier grain.
I am hoping the weather will break tomorrow and we will get a little rain. It will not stop the frosts by the looks of the forecast but the ground is so dry that some of the plants have stopped growing.
I will take some pictures of the allotment in early May tomorrow. It is interesting to see how the allotment has changed month by month. I will also write something about identifying soils and soil profiles.
There is little I can do because they are quite big now - over 6 inches tall. Even further earthing up would not help. I will just have to grin and bear it.
I planted another row of brocolli and that really fills the brassicae bed except for a small area which I might use to put some turnips into. My daughter wants me to grow an enormous turnip for her F2 reception class. (Four and five year olds) There seems to be a book with a similar title.
I put another row of leeks in and this time I added inoculated charcoal to the planting holes. I haven't been doing this recently because I had run out of charcoal. I also added some mychorrhizal fungi. I was going to leave the leeks exposed to the elements but, after some thought, I decided to cover them with enviromesh and fleece. I used old cloche wires as supports and buried the edges in the soil. I had to use this combination because neither was long enough to cover the row. Now I have run out of things to cover the leeks with so I will just have to take my chances and leave them exposed to the ravages of the leek miner fly.
Now that the allotment is virtually full, there is more time to concentrate on the allotment too far. There will be some opportunity tomorrow to clear a little more of the jungle. I need to take my loppers to cut down a damson sapling and the brambles. I will also try to demolish the corrugated iron compost bins.
I still have not transplanted the celeriac yet and believe it or not I will have to resow my French beans because they have not germinated again. If at first you don't suck seed, try drier grain.
I am hoping the weather will break tomorrow and we will get a little rain. It will not stop the frosts by the looks of the forecast but the ground is so dry that some of the plants have stopped growing.
I will take some pictures of the allotment in early May tomorrow. It is interesting to see how the allotment has changed month by month. I will also write something about identifying soils and soil profiles.
Friday, 25 March 2011
Double digging - the first trench.
The soil temperature was 14oC today. I think that it is safe to start to sow seeds now.
I took out the first trench putting the top soil and the subsoil in separate piles on the adjacent half of the allotment. The skimmed off weeds are just in front of the the soil piles and I will be adding these to the trench next.
You can just about see the blueish string line that is showing where half the allotment is. The shed is Barry's and not part of my allotment. This part of the allotment is not too weedy probably because the soil is so poor. There are an awful lot of mares tail though. I was pulling the roots out of the third spit of the trench.
You can see the standard of the soil. It is more builder's sand than soil. I have removed two spits of soil and then forked over the bottom spit. The idea is to add a lot of carbon in order to improve the drainage. I put two black current bushes in the bottom of the trench. These were covered with the old brassicae plants and then I put the skimmed weeds on top of that. I skimmed off quite a few of the weeds to the right of the picture and filled the trench with them. I made the trench about 2 feet wide so that I had more room to do things. This means that another two feet of top soil needs to be removed and put next to the piles on the other side of the allotment. Now that I have skimmed off these weeds I will have a relatively clean space to put the soil.
As you can see there are plenty of weeds. The carpet will go. The Allotment Committee is going to order a skip and we are only going to put carpets, glass and car tyres in it. Why do people bring all this rubbish onto the allotment.
Will I get this done this year? I don't know at the moment. Regardless of anything else it will improve this area of the allotment site a little. The bloke who has the one next to this is a good gardener so we will benefit each other if we can keep these allotments clean.
There is still a lot more to do but I will take this very easily.
I planted out all the Blue Danube sweet peas using inoculated charcoal and rootgrow mychorrhizal fungi.
They were watered in with rain water. There is something eating my sweet pea seedlings. It looks a bit like flea beetle damage. I will monitor the plants carefully.
Next, I took out the two blackcurrant bushes that I put into the double digging trench and replaced them with two cuttings with no big bud mite on them.
I began to make a space for the parsnips to be sown into by moving some of the broad beans onto the brassicae bed. I will eventually have two or three lines of broad beans.
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| First trench |
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| Split your allotment into two halves and work down one half then up the other half. |
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| Trench forked over at the bottom. |
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| The bad end of the allotment. |
As you can see there are plenty of weeds. The carpet will go. The Allotment Committee is going to order a skip and we are only going to put carpets, glass and car tyres in it. Why do people bring all this rubbish onto the allotment.
Will I get this done this year? I don't know at the moment. Regardless of anything else it will improve this area of the allotment site a little. The bloke who has the one next to this is a good gardener so we will benefit each other if we can keep these allotments clean.
I planted out all the Blue Danube sweet peas using inoculated charcoal and rootgrow mychorrhizal fungi.
 |
| Mychorrhizal Fungi |
They were watered in with rain water. There is something eating my sweet pea seedlings. It looks a bit like flea beetle damage. I will monitor the plants carefully.
Next, I took out the two blackcurrant bushes that I put into the double digging trench and replaced them with two cuttings with no big bud mite on them.
I began to make a space for the parsnips to be sown into by moving some of the broad beans onto the brassicae bed. I will eventually have two or three lines of broad beans.
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