The joys of compost

[redback]

Turning the heap is not only good exercise but it's also like a joy of discovery - an archaeology dig. The oldest, most decayed and compacted bottom of the pile comes to the surface. You know you have succeeded and set in progress the new mixture.

 

[Meadowlark]

Although I've composted for decades, I still marvel at the results of good compost processes. It is amazing to watch material change colors from greens to browns to finally a black rich medium that works absolute magic on garden veggies. I view finished compost much like a standing cover crop both as things of beauty which promise great things to come in the garden.

 

[redback]

It's full of life too. When the summer here becomes too hot, I upend my worm farm into these bins. That saves the worms and each of these bins have thousands of worms as well as numerous other life forms. Commercial compost isn't allowed to be alive.
You're right about the green manure. Tilled or not it introduces fresh food to the soil.

 

[Ernst]

Turning the heap is not only good exercise but it's also like a joy of discovery - an archaeology dig. The oldest, most decayed and compacted bottom of the pile comes to the surface. You know you have succeeded and set in progress the new mixture.

Such poetry should be rewarded!

 

[Ernst]

Although I've composted for decades, I still marvel at the results of good compost processes. It is amazing to watch material change colors from greens to browns to finally a black rich medium that works absolute magic on garden veggies. I view finished compost much like a standing cover crop both as things of beauty which promise great things to come in the garden.

I remember reading what Charles Darwin had to say with his latter works:

The Formation of Vegetable Mould Through the Action of Worms​

While this is topic of composting these things are not mutually exclusive.
It's all about the soil for me.
Nice thread.

 

[redback]

Thanks. Now all I need is the rhyming.

 

[Ernst]

Thanks. Now all I need is the rhyming.

I was just watching a Movie on Amazon called Tracks. Is it really true Australia has feral Camels?
If so I wonder what Camel Dung adds to compost.
I know off topic but hey..

 

[redback]

The Afghans used their camels to cross the deserts in the early years of colonization. Is there a reason to hunt down this particular source of manure? We actually sell the camels to Saudi Arabia and others. There are heaps of them running wild and knocking down fences, in the outback regions, to get at gardens.
Apparently, poetry includes consonance and assonance as well as rhyme. Damn this is going to be harder than I thought. Your quote from Darwin is probably on track - I'll look it up next.

 

[redback]

I like that Charles Darwin studied earthworms for forty years. They illustrate that, although slow, their impact is significant and accumulative.

 

[redback]

If you have access to slower to compost things like banana tree's that have been cut down to harvest or sugar cane that you grow just to add to the compost, I can confirm this is a great way to multiply worms. Both components provide cavities for the worms to both eat and lay eggs in and the pile ends up with tons of them.

The compost itself is a one-year cycle and can't tolerate larger pieces unless I get a mulcher. However, I am burning my prunings and fallen branches. It's pretty dry here and woody stuff doesn't decay as quickly as it would in the sub-tropics. I had a banana and I know the yearly culling cycle. I haven't got one at present. I don't really like my bonfire and I have started putting bamboo and some wood on the ground of my poultry run. Termites are prevalent and the hens will eat them if I turn the wood over to expose the insects underneath. Your idea does keep me thinking of the alternative to bonfires each year. Thanks.

 

[redback]

Here's my experience, just chop the sugar cane between nodes before adding and the worms will bore out all of the insides and you can quite easily remove the big empty sugar cane skins when your compost is ready and just add them to your bonfire. Right now my compost piles are on a no turn strategy as I get too much organic matter to start new piles with so slow composting makes more sense and gives more time for the bio char to be inoculated, big items actually work better in this type of slow composting and this no turn composting I'm doing generally takes about a bit less than 1 year with a lot of credit going to the worms reproducing at a high rate.

I can't grow sugar cane here in the temperate zone of Australia because of the lack of rainfall. It is grown north of here along the Queensland coast. The sentence "so slow composting makes more sense and gives more time for the bio char to be inoculated" is interesting. Do you make your own bio char and what are you inoculating with it? Or are you inoculating biochar with the compost?
I put the wood ash from the bonfires on my compost and beds needing potash and lime. I am interested in the use of inoculation of seed with bacterial and fungal mixtures. But are you saying you can also inoculate bio char and/orcompost?

 

[Meadowlark]

Have you ever had a lab test your compost for nutrients? Not all compost is the same certainly and what it is applied to isn't the same either in terms of need. Testing enables one to customize your compost to be a perfect match for the application.

In order to develop a perfect compost for a particular application, a soil test is invaluable. Over the years, I have developed what I consider a perfect compost for garden veggies with the help of soil tests to get the right mixture of legumes, hay, and cattle manure. I don't have to test it any longer because I already know if I mix it right, it will be perfect for my garden.

Here is my compost nutrient profile along with a nutrient density score of 95%. No N-P-K required when this is added to my garden soil.

Nutrient	Your Results	Optimal Range	Rating
pH	6.37	5.8-7.0	Optimal
Total Nitrogen (N)	38.91	32.0-60.0	Optimal
Nitrate (NO3-N)	30.14	-	-
Ammonium (NH4-N)	8.77	-	-
Phosphorus (P)	31.59	8.0-20.0	High
Potassium (K)	114.79	38.0-80.0	High
Sulfur (S)	9.92	7.0-22.0	Optimal
Calcium (Ca)	83.01	80.0-320.0	Optimal
Magnesium (Mg)	33.68	27.0-70.0	Optimal
Sodium (Na)	13.81	0.5-30.0	Optimal
Iron (Fe)	1.27	3.0-10.0	Low
Manganese (Mn)	4.7	4.0-10.0	Optimal
Zinc (Zn)	0.17	0.1-0.25	Optimal
Copper (Cu)	0.03	0.06-0.3	Low
Boron (B)	0.01	0.2-0.6	Low

 

[Meadowlark]

...or sugar cane that you grow just to add to the compost,

A few years back, I looked into growing sugar cane for composting. What I found, however, was far superior in all respects for my needs...Sunn Hemp. It adds incredible amounts of nitrogen... arguably more than any other plant on Earth and generates mind boggling amounts of organic matter. Very easy to grow, seed is very reasonable, and you need 10 to 12 weeks of warm (above 60 deg. F temps). It generates amazing amounts of nitrogen and organic matter in a short time.

 

[redback]

I make my own biochar and add it to a slow compost pile in little silo's the county provides for free which the biochar should sit in for at least 6 months in my opinion but is closer to 1 year in my practice. https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-1-d&q=sugar+cane+drought I see that it's becoming harder to grow sugar cane in certain areas, I also see that they are working on breeding drought resistant strains. Have you heard about the citrus breeding program happening right now to counter act the pest spread disease that's spreading? It's an interesting read if you look it up and certainly points towards land race gardening being a smart strategy which if you are not familiar I also suggest looking up, I've seen cases of people slowly breeding plants in their area that famously couldn't grow there but through genetic evolution was able to by diverse breeding varieties.

The slow composting, worms and multiple species seed saving are all commendable, but the word 'inoculate' means more than just 'mixing' or 'blending'.
I will check my reference - and explain why it's important to realize that seed come with their own microbes. I prefer to use my old thread 'inoculants' for the explanation since it's not a composting item.

 

[redback]

Land race is a worrying strategy in my book. Why in the world would you try to achieve biodiversity by propagating hybrids? There are millions of non hybrids that are free of seed coverings. I only watched one video and he gave no evidence of success. But why try?
Your jackfruit, sugar cane and banana worm-laden compost sounds great. You could honor this thread with photos of your bio-char and compost if you wish.