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| I'm starting a garden with my neighbor in our shared backyard. We're using straw bales as the walls of our raised beds. I've looked around and everyone says use compost or manure. So, I found a lady giving away free old horse manure!! I got two truck bed loads and mostly filled two of the beds. Also one bed has some compost from my compost bin. Then I started reading about raised beds and people are saying to mix the compost with other dirt. My question is... Is old compost dirt or not? What is the difference between soil and compost? I am having a hard time understanding this. I'm also afraid of spending too much money on this garden. I am on a tight budget... :(
I went to home depot and check out on the "garden soil" guess what the ingredients were? Compost, Manure, Sphagnum moss... http://warfieldgarden.blogspot.com/
I feel frustrated... |
Follow-Up Postings:
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| Soil contains a mineral element, the particles of sand, silt, and clay that make up the soil type you have. Compost does not contain any soil, usually, and is partially digested organic matter that will continue to be digested as time passes. A mixture of 6 to 10 percent organic matter, compost or other vegetative waste, in soil is a good garden soil to work toward. Spending money on something called "garden soil" usually is a waste of yours. If necessary, because you do not have any, spending money on compost can be justified. |
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| check out our bale garden presentation we use lots of mushroom compost from the farm, have never added any soil, plants have never suffered. len |
Here is a link that might be useful: lens straw bale garden
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- Posted by borderbarb San Diego county (My Page) on Sun, Feb 27, 11 at 17:09
| This video might help you with your plans. If you google on key words "straw bale gardening" you will find many methods and sucess stories for each method. Re: soil in the planting bed ... from what I gather from the hay/straw bale garden articles ... plants grow well in the bale .... so seems that they will also thrive in compost. If you have enough water and sunlight, your garden should do well ! |
Here is a link that might be useful: Video - straw bale garden
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| Len oh my gosh!! I've read your blog before! By the way, great job! I actually designed our beds after yours, I'm so glad I've gotten to "meet" you! :) I used clippings from the yard and noticed horrid "hulk" ivy (that's our nickname for it) growing out between and under the bales... I had to take it all apart today and get that ivy out.. ugh! I think we're going to add some soil from the back yard just to help fill in the gardens.. We still have one more bed to fill and I'm tired of getting truck loads of manure. It's tough filling and unloading a truck bed with manure! Phew! |
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