Meadowlark
No N-P-K Required
- Joined
- Feb 5, 2019
- Messages
- 2,864
- Reaction score
- 2,384
- Location
- East Texas
- Hardiness Zone
- old zone 8b/new zone 9a
- Country
Previous professional soil tests of my cow manure compost yielded an overall result of "No N-P-K required" with all key elements at or above optimal levels. Since that test was made, I've always wondered just how my household compost would fare in comparison.
One way to find out...run another soil test. The results came back today and to me were stunning. The recommendation again was " No N-P-K required". The household compost results in all elements were comparable to the Cow manure compost results. For example, total Nitrogen was about 35 ppm in the Household compost vs 39 ppm in the Cow manure compost. This was a huge surprise as I was expecting my household compost to be low in total Nitrogen.
Interestingly to me, the ph in the household compost was about 8% higher than the cow manure...good to know for certain veggies.
All household compost can be expected to test out at different levels... just as cow manure compost will test out differently. It depends on the ingredients and how its all processed.
There is no way to know how good, bad or indifferent your compost is without testing it. You may be surprised.
The data for my household compost (ppm):
One way to find out...run another soil test. The results came back today and to me were stunning. The recommendation again was " No N-P-K required". The household compost results in all elements were comparable to the Cow manure compost results. For example, total Nitrogen was about 35 ppm in the Household compost vs 39 ppm in the Cow manure compost. This was a huge surprise as I was expecting my household compost to be low in total Nitrogen.
Interestingly to me, the ph in the household compost was about 8% higher than the cow manure...good to know for certain veggies.
All household compost can be expected to test out at different levels... just as cow manure compost will test out differently. It depends on the ingredients and how its all processed.
There is no way to know how good, bad or indifferent your compost is without testing it. You may be surprised.
The data for my household compost (ppm):
pH | 6.94 | ||
Total Nitrogen (N) | 34.97 | ||
Nitrate (NO3-N) | 32.89 | ||
Ammonium (NH4-N) | 2.08 | ||
Phosphorus (P) | 62.33 | ||
Potassium (K) | 122.29 | ||
Sulfur (S) | 11.51 | ||
Calcium (Ca) | 428.59 | ||
Magnesium (Mg) | 37.81 | ||
Sodium (Na) | 23.93 | ||
Iron (Fe) | 1.15 | ||
Manganese (Mn) | 6.44 | ||
Zinc (Zn) | 1.02 | ||
Copper (Cu) | 0.1 | ||
Boron (B) | 0.05 |