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Sat, Sep 24, 11 at 10:31
| I am thinking of totally redoing one small bed that I have. The bed is only about 6 ft wide by 6 ft deep. Right now it has a struggling hydrangea in it along with a daylily, and a geum, some asters that are taking over the bed.
I am shovel pruning the asters after they bloom now because they are taking over the small bed and look uninteresting most of the year. Maybe I'll move them somewhere else. Can I use my unfinished compost this fall to dig into the existing soil in the bed and plant in spring? The compost is composed of shredded leaves from last fall (oak and maple mostly) already half composted, along with all my spent veggie plants, clippings, etc. It is about half composted in all. I thought if I could utilize this compost now and plant in spring, the compost may be almost finished then, but may leach out some nitrogen because the leaves are not fully composted. I could add nitrogen in spring too. I have a soil test done that should be back any day now on the bed too :) |
Follow-Up Postings:
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- Posted by jonhughes So.Oregon (jonehughes@hotmail.com) on Sat, Sep 24, 11 at 11:42
| Hi Kenstar, Whenever you venture into a gray area all bets are off, it may work wonderfully (adding some nitrogen would be in order if the plants grew like they were lacking some), I did pretty much what you described and put 1500 lbs of Cabbage leaves (all bolted) and planted in that pile within a month, my plants never seemed to have any issues associated with being planted on hot hot hot bed of fresh from the garden leafs. I assume that if I had asked before doing it ,I would have received unfavorable answers that were based on so many unknowns....but I digress....plant away ,take pics and let us know how it went. All of the remaining cabbage plants that are still in the beds in the background got thrown onto the pile also ;-)
I put 4 yards of compost on top of the leaves
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| I would be adding the unfinished compost now, but not planting anything until spring. So, a lot later on then 26 days. It would have all winter to finish more. I don't know, I just want finished compost now and I'm impatient! :) Maybe I can use cow manure for now until it's done, but I absolutley hate using any of those bags of stuff from the big box stores and I don't have a good supplier of cow manure. |
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- Posted by rosiew 8 GA (rosemarywalsh@bellsouth.net) on Sat, Sep 24, 11 at 17:35
| kenstar, your partially composted stuff should be great for this bed. Perhaps place it in a pile rather than spreading over the whole area. This might accelerate the composting process. |
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| I suppose as long as I place it on top of the bed and just plant around it, that way it won't leach anything like nitrogen out of the soil, and it could finish in place like lasagna gardening. :) |
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| Most of the Nitrogen in compost, finished or unfinished, is is a fairly stable form so leaching should not be a problem unless you put that compost in a very large amount of water. |
Here is a link that might be useful: nutrients in compost
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- Posted by toxcrusadr (My Page) on Mon, Sep 26, 11 at 10:21
| You can also layer the partially composted stuff on top of the bed, and perhaps put a mulch over top for winter. I often do this when improving beds - any finished compost first, half done material second, and a mulch of fall leaves, leaves/grass mix, yard waste, etc. on top. The materials will continue to decompose and be incorporated over the winter and the worms will till them in. In spring you can dig or till if you want, or just plant through the layers if you'd rather not disturb the soil (if it's clay, for example). Just an idea that I know works if it sounds good to you. |
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| Since I don't have any finished compost yet, what I will do is first layer the half composted down, then shredded oak leaves on top for the winter, and till in springtime. Should be ok then. |
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