Does anybody know if coal dust has any uses in the garden?

"George Robinson" wrote in message
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Does anybody know if coal dust has any uses in the garden?

Starting bonfires would be good

;-)

"George Robinson" wrote in message
...
Does anybody know if coal dust has any uses in the garden?

Depends how snowy it is. In some mountainous places in the US, they sprinkle
coal dust on the snow over the roads which have been closed all winter in
order to hasten the melt. You need some assistance to clear 12 feet of
winter snow.

"George Robinson" wrote in message
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Does anybody know if coal dust has any uses in the garden?

Well I can tell you one thing, my house is built on top of an old coalmine,
watering the veg patch seems to bring bits of coal to the surface and my
potatoes, onions, leeks etc are all thriving.

Redman

Beware. We had a discussion on coal ash about 1-2 years ago. Coal can be up
to about 20% ash and some coal ashes are quite toxic to plants, containing
several tens of ppm of boron or copper.
The national Coal Board spent a lot of effort trying to reclaim toxic pit
heaps by selective breeding of specimens that survived the planting.
There are still spoil heaps in the country without growing vegetation.
Coal also contains volatile phenolic and other compounds that I would
prefer to keep off edible crops.
On the other side of the coin chimney soot was a popular fertiliser for
leeks when I was a lad in Durham.
Regards
David T
"Redman" wrote in message
...

"George Robinson" wrote in message
...
Does anybody know if coal dust has any uses in the garden?

Well I can tell you one thing, my house is built on top of an old
coalmine,
watering the veg patch seems to bring bits of coal to the surface and my
potatoes, onions, leeks etc are all thriving.

Redman