- Joined
- Jan 11, 2020
- Messages
- 58
- Reaction score
- 40
- Hardiness Zone
- Plant Hardiness Zone 6b - near border 6a, Heat Zone 7
- Country
Soil amendments listed as "organic" should be viewed suspiciously. After all, look at bags of Milorganite. It is listed as 100% natural - which legally means next to nothing and is corporate green-washing. Additionally, many bags are listed as being "organic". Funny, most of us would not consider metropolitan wastewater as organic. It is not just urine and feces and water but household chemicals, industrial chemicals from businesses, and a wide array of other inputs you would not normally desire to have in your plantings. YMMV, but this is just one example of the odd notions in the soil "improvement" market. You will probably be better off going through the initial hassle of making your own.
BTW, many bagged amendments also look surprisingly similar these days regardless of whether they say garden soil, soil, manure, or compost. If you took out the ground up pallet wood and sand, there would be very little left!
I live on a small urban (not suburban) lot. Each Fall I gather hundreds of large paper bagged leaves. That forms the backbone of my composting "browns". Surprisingly, near me, people are still bagging leaves and twigs they left out all winter...so they're already partially processed. Win win!
Every week I pick up an average of about 1500 eggshells (roughly 8 cases of 15 dozen) from a local bakery. I dry, crush, and powder them here onsite. It's not just the large load of calcium I'm after but there is much more in those shells. Then there is the eggwhite that is all over the eggshells. That dries and powders up as well.
I get spent cracked grain from a local brewer. NOTE: If you live near people, spent grains are so rich they start to hot compost in a day and will smell bad very quickly. COVER them with something to mediate the smell. Worth the effort and the worms like it.
My coffee source dried up. I'm looking for another and have been for more than a year. I used to get an average of 30-40 gallons a week (2 location totals). That ran dry. Now, not even the local stores from a certain nationally known coffee chain known for saving spent grounds for people will save the grounds near here. We get a little from Ms UrbanWild's office...maybe 0.5-1 gallon container any given week. I'll take what I can get as I don't even drink coffee.
I get spent tea fixings (tea, hibiscus, mint, etc) and SCOBY (Symbiotic Culture Of Bacteria & Yeast) from a small local kombucha manufacturer. SCOBY is like worm crack. Seriously, they mass up around it like me on cookies! I now pass on the high oil hops. After a couple of years worth of experimenting, it isn't worth the trouble. Worms don't like it, it doesn't break down easily, and I have limited space. If I had acreage, I'd dedicate one section to the long-term breakdown of hops and just walk away. It will be years and not much helps it along.
Given herbicides in straw passing through mammals and even making it through the compost stage and killing garden plants, I have yet to find a local source of safe manure. The search is still on. So, I add alfalfa to beds...meal, pellets, or blocks depending on what is on sale. That is purchased from feed stores.
I'd love to be able to harvest my own seaweed but like you, I'm landlocked.
I want to purchase powdered biochar (& maybe just small chunks) but can't get it here and the amount I'd like to have makes shipping costs an issue. I can't find crushed basalt (dust) which I'd like to have as well.
BTW, while it isn't organic and not compost, have you heard about EcoScraps? I use it for some beds.
Anyway, I don't have answers for some potential inputs, but if you look around, many can be free for your work efforts. One thing I will say is that if you make arrangements with people or businesses, DO NOT flake out on them. You'll never get considerations again and people who follow in your footsteps will probably also be told no. Consider these relationships advantageous to both and don't leave people hanging. I also tend to shift some purchases their way when I can.
BTW, many bagged amendments also look surprisingly similar these days regardless of whether they say garden soil, soil, manure, or compost. If you took out the ground up pallet wood and sand, there would be very little left!
I live on a small urban (not suburban) lot. Each Fall I gather hundreds of large paper bagged leaves. That forms the backbone of my composting "browns". Surprisingly, near me, people are still bagging leaves and twigs they left out all winter...so they're already partially processed. Win win!
Every week I pick up an average of about 1500 eggshells (roughly 8 cases of 15 dozen) from a local bakery. I dry, crush, and powder them here onsite. It's not just the large load of calcium I'm after but there is much more in those shells. Then there is the eggwhite that is all over the eggshells. That dries and powders up as well.
I get spent cracked grain from a local brewer. NOTE: If you live near people, spent grains are so rich they start to hot compost in a day and will smell bad very quickly. COVER them with something to mediate the smell. Worth the effort and the worms like it.
My coffee source dried up. I'm looking for another and have been for more than a year. I used to get an average of 30-40 gallons a week (2 location totals). That ran dry. Now, not even the local stores from a certain nationally known coffee chain known for saving spent grounds for people will save the grounds near here. We get a little from Ms UrbanWild's office...maybe 0.5-1 gallon container any given week. I'll take what I can get as I don't even drink coffee.
I get spent tea fixings (tea, hibiscus, mint, etc) and SCOBY (Symbiotic Culture Of Bacteria & Yeast) from a small local kombucha manufacturer. SCOBY is like worm crack. Seriously, they mass up around it like me on cookies! I now pass on the high oil hops. After a couple of years worth of experimenting, it isn't worth the trouble. Worms don't like it, it doesn't break down easily, and I have limited space. If I had acreage, I'd dedicate one section to the long-term breakdown of hops and just walk away. It will be years and not much helps it along.
Given herbicides in straw passing through mammals and even making it through the compost stage and killing garden plants, I have yet to find a local source of safe manure. The search is still on. So, I add alfalfa to beds...meal, pellets, or blocks depending on what is on sale. That is purchased from feed stores.
I'd love to be able to harvest my own seaweed but like you, I'm landlocked.
I want to purchase powdered biochar (& maybe just small chunks) but can't get it here and the amount I'd like to have makes shipping costs an issue. I can't find crushed basalt (dust) which I'd like to have as well.
BTW, while it isn't organic and not compost, have you heard about EcoScraps? I use it for some beds.
Anyway, I don't have answers for some potential inputs, but if you look around, many can be free for your work efforts. One thing I will say is that if you make arrangements with people or businesses, DO NOT flake out on them. You'll never get considerations again and people who follow in your footsteps will probably also be told no. Consider these relationships advantageous to both and don't leave people hanging. I also tend to shift some purchases their way when I can.