(Jay Chan) wrote in message . com...
Plant compost is excellent for improving garden soil, but has little
nutritive value. Start to dig in some of your lovely composted manure
by all means.

I am more than a bit alarmed when I read this. I have been using leaf
compost in my backyard vegetable garden. I prepared the compost in my
backyard using tree leaves from last fall. If what you said is true, I
will have to add more fertilizer than what I am adding now. Please
tell me what type of nutritions are available in leaf compost, then I
can supplement whatever that it is lack of. Thanks.

I will use my leaf compost regardless the low nutrition level that it
may have. The reason is that I depend on the compost to improve the
sandy soil in my vegetable garden.

Jay Chan

compost from leaves has roughly 1/5-1/7 the nutrient content of cow
manure (per unit of dry weight), with similar N/P/K profile, according
to "square foot gardening" author Bartholomew (so 0.4-0.2-0.4 or
less). Leaf compost is the best for soil texture and mellowing of
otherwise too salty or too acid compost, but it is not a fertilizer.
It is also the best mulch for veggies. In my own experience, kitchen
scraps make the most fertile compost, and manure comes in second. Wood
chips are excellent for both perennial and fruit plants (and
potatoes), and since I add them by the ton, they are a fertilizer...

PS. Fresh leaves, composted, have a much higher nutrient profile,
similar to grass clippings. But the tree sequesters anything of value
in the roots come winter.

Thanks for many people who have answered my question about the way to
supplement leaf compost.

compost from leaves has roughly 1/5-1/7 the nutrient content of cow
manure (per unit of dry weight), with similar N/P/K profile, according
to "square foot gardening" author Bartholomew (so 0.4-0.2-0.4 or
less).

This means I cannot totally reply on compost to add enough nutrient to
my vegetable garden.

Last fall, I only added grand total of one beg of manure to the entire
vegetable garden because I was counting on the leaf compost for the
rest. I guess I had made a mistake. This may have explained the reason
why the plants were not growing well early in this season. I finally
had to top dress with chemical fertilizer to boost the plants growth
(I was desperated). I will add more manure to the vegetable garden
when I prepare the soil in this fall.

In my own experience, kitchen scraps make the most fertile compost,
and manure comes in second. ...

I am also playing around the idea of adding kitchen scraps to my leaf
compost piles. Do you have a FAQ on the way to store kitchen scraps
and to use it?

Thanks.

Jay Chan

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(Jay Chan) wrote in message om...

compost from leaves has roughly 1/5-1/7 the nutrient content of cow
manure (per unit of dry weight), with similar N/P/K profile, according
to "square foot gardening" author Bartholomew (so 0.4-0.2-0.4 or
less).

This means I cannot totally reply on compost to add enough nutrient to
my vegetable garden.

Last fall, I only added grand total of one beg of manure to the entire
vegetable garden because I was counting on the leaf compost for the
rest. I guess I had made a mistake.

I don't know about that. If the soil is already moderately fertile, no
mistake.
You should test the soil (of course, by the time I got around to doing
that, I had added so much stuff that the beds were very fertile).

This may have explained the reason
why the plants were not growing well early in this season. I finally
had to top dress with chemical fertilizer to boost the plants growth
(I was desperated). I will add more manure to the vegetable garden
when I prepare the soil in this fall.

In my own experience, kitchen scraps make the most fertile compost,
and manure comes in second. ...

I am also playing around the idea of adding kitchen scraps to my leaf
compost piles. Do you have a FAQ on the way to store kitchen scraps
and to use it?


I store them in a trash can outside, mixed with wood chips or leaves,
until they are too decomposed to be of interest to critters. Then I
dump them onto the compost pile, which is mostly leaves, and mix.
Look, leaves are fine. Add a little rock phosphate and wood ash and
kitchen scraps and it will be a powerful concoction, while retaining
the mild pH of leaf mold.

writes:
I have horses and an abundant supply of manure. I hot compost the
manure, turning frequently, until it is no longer heating.

My question is, is this a good source of fertilizer, (nitrogen, et.
al.), for my veggie garden? I'm fairly new to gardening but my plants
look rather weak and yellow. I started the garden with lots of
compost but didn't add any other fertilizer. Is compost enough or
not?

You are so very lucky to have horses for your fertilizer. If you want to
see what horse manure will do, look at my two-year-old webpage at:
www.pacifier.com/~glenna
It is very out of date and has not been updated since August two years
ago, but it'll give you an idea of how wonderful that stuff is!!!

Sadly, I lost the source I'd been using for three years so now need to do
something else (didn't get *any* last year!). I hauled in several loads
of manure every spring for three years and rototilled it into the soil.
What I got was mixed with oak leaves and so well aged/composted that it
was practically soil. I'm sure that what I was using would be the same
thing folks get when they get spent mushroom "soil." By the time I spread
it on the garden, it was probably the equivalent of four inches thick
overall. There is nothing that didn't grow very well in my garden, and I
give the horse manure combined with thorough surface watering for the
excellent results. It was well worth all the trips out there with the
pickup to get it and the wheel-barreling it into the garden!

I'm hoping to find another such good source in the future, hopefully folks
who pamper their horses as much as these were. This year, I am side
dressing with steer manure (had a dump truck load delivered) because the
tomatoes were planted by the time I was able to get it.

Many people have complained about weeds in it; however, I've not had that
problem. Perhaps because what I was getting had been well composted/aged.
The steer manure, however, was filled with corn. In my case, that will
not be a problem as I'm letting the chickens "process" it before putting
it on the garden.

A dear friend who owns a nursery told me that horse manure is the best you
can get but to throw it in the chicken yard first so the chickens get out
all the seeds. That makes sense, would give you all the benefits without
the negatives. Of course, one must have chickens to do that. She said
another benefit is that it gets mixed in well with chicken manure as well
so the fertilizer is especially good. She sends it to the compost pile
after the chickens have processed it (got all the seeds out).

For the record, I've had no pest problems of any kind. I attribute that to
very healthy plants to which I give much credit to that wonderful
fertilizer. Insects might be helped out by ladybugs purchased every
spring and encouraging the birds by feeding them and leaving my "regular"
compost bin open so there are always insects (usually fruit flies) around
to attract the insect eating birds. While it might be just plain dumb
luck, it isn't because of me because I am a very ignorant gardener . . . I
just plant it, water it, watch it grow, and harvest it. :-)

Horse manure? Yup, it's great!

Glenna
(and, no, I don't use anything thing else, for any reason)