In article , "Mike"
wrote:

I've read warnings not to mix ammonia and vinegar.

That would be bleach & ammonia; the combination releases chlorine gas.
Ammonia & vinegar is no more dangerous than ammonia by itself. Ammonia &
vinegar is a very reasonable mix for household cleaning purposes. They're
caustic enough when used separately, but together the resulting gas can
kill. I've serious doubts about any of it being good for its nitrogen
value in gardens, since what doesn't evaporate before it is utilized by
plants gets rinsed out by rainfall before utilized by plants.

Manure and alfalfa would have to be cut into the soil before planting. Or I
suppose you could make manure tea by putting it in hosiery and soaking in
water.

Alfalfa needs only to be worked into the soil to a quarter of an inch or
so, or have a little soil scratched up to mix with it, enough to keep it
from sitting on the surface as a sterile topcoat that by itself interacts
too little with the soil. The purpose isn't to increase organic component
of the deeper soil, but to excite microorganisms which produce nitrogen.
Rose fanatics do this five or six times a year without disrupting roots &
it works dandy. Manure composts or natural leafmold will excite
microorganisms quite deep into the soil just be being kept moist on the
surface, thanks to the slower rinse-through & do the line of contact
between soil & topcoat, though if laid on thick with no soil mixed in with
a pure manure compost, it will be sterile on the very top (with the effect
of retarding weeds, but also retarding wanted sewn seeds).

Seriously bad soil with insufficient organic matter would need churning
with pete or compost, & no amount of fertilizing or topcoating can fix it
without increasing the deeper organic content. But surface coats of
compost or leafmold do excite worm movement & microorganisms' nitrogen
production. If it were otherwise, then forests would live decades rather
than millenia, big trees instantly depleting the deeper soil & getting
nothing back but some birdshit & leafmold & rotting logs on the surface,
with no giant people with giant spades to work it down.

-paghat the ratgirl

--
"Of what are you afraid, my child?" inquired the kindly teacher.
"Oh, sir! The flowers, they are wild," replied the timid creature.
-from Peter Newell's "Wild Flowers"
Visit the Garden of Paghat the Ratgirl: http://www.paghat.com