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Old 04-11-2004, 04:42 PM
Mike Prager
 
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Default Ashes in garden?

We live in an area where we burn leaves and other yard waste.
Would the resulting ash be high in trace elements and be good
to sprinkle around plants?

Also, I have heard ash is alkaline. Should I mix in some
powdered sulfur before sprinkling? Most of our plants are
acid loving (viburnums, azaleas, camellias).


Mike Prager
Beaufort, NC (on the coast in zone 8a)
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Old 04-11-2004, 06:18 PM
Phisherman
 
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Ashes are potash-rich for most plants. Avoid putting ashes on plants
that are acid-loving. You can store the ashes in bins--it will keep
as long as you keep the ashes absolutely dry. Ashes are great for
creating barriers around plants that are attacked by slugs or snails.
But, why burn leaves when you can make a compost pile?


On Thu, 04 Nov 2004 15:42:04 GMT, Mike Prager
§kill-spam§mprager@§alum.§mit.§edu wrote:

We live in an area where we burn leaves and other yard waste.
Would the resulting ash be high in trace elements and be good
to sprinkle around plants?

Also, I have heard ash is alkaline. Should I mix in some
powdered sulfur before sprinkling? Most of our plants are
acid loving (viburnums, azaleas, camellias).


Mike Prager
Beaufort, NC (on the coast in zone 8a)
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Old 04-11-2004, 06:32 PM
Snooze
 
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"Mike Prager" §kill-spam§mprager@§alum.§mit.§edu wrote in message
...
We live in an area where we burn leaves and other yard waste.
Would the resulting ash be high in trace elements and be good
to sprinkle around plants?

Also, I have heard ash is alkaline. Should I mix in some
powdered sulfur before sprinkling? Most of our plants are
acid loving (viburnums, azaleas, camellias).


Check out this website
http://www.hort.purdue.edu/ext/woodash.html

Only thing I recall hearing is, don't use the ash from store bought
charcoal, and the ash from wax logs, like duraflame.

Snooze


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Old 04-11-2004, 06:53 PM
GrampysGurl
 
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We live in an area where we burn leaves and other yard waste.
Would the resulting ash be high in trace elements and be good
to sprinkle around plants?


Why do that, they make wonderful compost or mulch for the plants if you chop
them up with the mower. I put a huge pile out in and area I'll be planting in
next spring, hoping to amend the area as much as I can naturally.
Colleen Ann
Zone 5 CT
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Old 04-11-2004, 11:34 PM
Christopher Green
 
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Mike Prager §kill-spam§mprager@§alum.§mit.§edu wrote in message . ..
We live in an area where we burn leaves and other yard waste.
Would the resulting ash be high in trace elements and be good
to sprinkle around plants?

Also, I have heard ash is alkaline. Should I mix in some
powdered sulfur before sprinkling? Most of our plants are
acid loving (viburnums, azaleas, camellias).


Ash is quite alkaline. Just as a rough guesstimate, about half as
alkaline as the same quantity of lime. Using a substantial amount of
it can raise soil pH more than two points. There's a discussion in
Gulf Coast Gardening at
http://www.gulfcoast-gardening.com/N...Jan_2_2002.htm

If your soil and plants can tolerate an alkaline amendment, ash is an
especially good source of potash and phosphate, hardwood ash in
particular.

Acidophiles do not sound like a good choice for mulching with ash.
Azaleas are especially sensitive to anything alkaline and will go
chlorotic.

--
Chris Green
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Old 05-11-2004, 12:11 AM
Mike Prager
 
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Thanks, everyone, for the helpful answers. Many asked, why
not compost the leaves? While I appreciate the idea, the lot
is exposed on three sides, and we haven't found a good place
for a compost heap. Also, the leaves are all oak & in my
experience take years to rot. If I mow over them first, they
aren't picked up well by the sweeper and are hard on the
grass. The yard is too large for us to rake by hand.

We did try a tumbling compost maker and will put it into
service again to absorb some of the leaves. It's been in the
garage since we tired of moving it in and out during hurricane
season.


Mike Prager
Beaufort, NC (on the coast in zone 8a)
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Old 05-11-2004, 01:52 AM
simy1
 
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Mike Prager §kill-spam§mprager@§alum.§mit.§edu wrote in message . ..
We live in an area where we burn leaves and other yard waste.
Would the resulting ash be high in trace elements and be good
to sprinkle around plants?


wood ash, yes. leaf ash I bet is not as high in micros. Wood ash
is typically 50% Ca, 10% Mg, 8%K, 3%P.


Also, I have heard ash is alkaline. Should I mix in some
powdered sulfur before sprinkling? Most of our plants are
acid loving (viburnums, azaleas, camellias).


The pH is 10.4 and ash is murder for all those plants. Use it for your
other perennials, in the lawn and in the vegetable garden. Specially
in the veg garden, if you have those plants it means your soil is
acid. Adding wood ash will help things like chard, onions or beets a
lot, and will improve the flavor of tomatoes and lettuce too.



Mike Prager
Beaufort, NC (on the coast in zone 8a)
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Old 05-11-2004, 02:10 AM
Phisherman
 
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On Thu, 04 Nov 2004 23:11:52 GMT, Mike Prager
§kill-spam§mprager@§alum.§mit.§edu wrote:

Thanks, everyone, for the helpful answers. Many asked, why
not compost the leaves? While I appreciate the idea, the lot
is exposed on three sides, and we haven't found a good place
for a compost heap. Also, the leaves are all oak & in my
experience take years to rot. If I mow over them first, they
aren't picked up well by the sweeper and are hard on the
grass. The yard is too large for us to rake by hand.

We did try a tumbling compost maker and will put it into
service again to absorb some of the leaves. It's been in the
garage since we tired of moving it in and out during hurricane
season.


Mike Prager
Beaufort, NC (on the coast in zone 8a)
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Hey Mike,

A compost pile is not all that unsightly. We planted an arc of Rose
of Sharon around the compost heaps. The ROS fed by all that compost,
grew rapidly to over 12 feet tall! Now you can't even see the piles,
although they are exposed during the winter months due to the leaf
drop. Compost is so important, almost magical, I can't imagine
gardening without some.
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Old 05-11-2004, 02:01 PM
Mike Prager
 
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Phisherman wrote:

A compost pile is not all that unsightly. We planted an arc of Rose
of Sharon around the compost heaps. The ROS fed by all that compost,
grew rapidly to over 12 feet tall! Now you can't even see the piles,
although they are exposed during the winter months due to the leaf
drop. Compost is so important, almost magical, I can't imagine
gardening without some.


Hmm. . . . I'll have to think again about where to put one and
what we could use for screening. Maybe Viburnum tinus....

M


Mike Prager
Beaufort, NC (on the coast in zone 8a)
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Old 06-11-2004, 05:31 AM
Stew Corman
 
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The pH is 10.4 and ash is murder for all those plants. Use it for your
other perennials, in the lawn and in the vegetable garden. Specially
in the veg garden, if you have those plants it means your soil is
acid. Adding wood ash will help things like chard, onions or beets a
lot, and will improve the flavor of tomatoes and lettuce too.


I plan to use ash just in the veggie garden. Biggest crops are tomato
and cukes, with a few zuchini, pole beans, lettuce, and raised beds
for scallions, garlic, basil, and dill.
I also use tons of rotted hardwood leaf mulch (provided by our local
recyle facility) as a means to mulch down weeds. If all these organics
are rototilled into the soil and I bend in wood ash in the fall,
should I be concerned about ph for the following spring planting of
any of the above? We are upstate NY and snow covers the beds for
several months and a wet spring.

BTW, I have had fantastic tomato flavor and my cherry tomatos are
typically twice the size as sold in the store. I think you've posted
before on this subject and recommended oak wood chips to add back some
acid?

Stew Corman from sunny Endicott
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