Growing medium

[Sandyback]

Bit ambiguous but this is the only section I can see that relates, after all the soil is a growing place

I have access to clean and fairly clean shavings as used for horse bedding. I can also access grit, I have liquid from a wormery and have decided to go down the raised bed route.

At present the beds are partially filled with the garden soil and compost from my heap. I will be looking to top the beds up in due course and would like to try and retain a lightish medium.

Could the above ingredients be a contender?

[Santa_stunt_double]

The quick answer on fresh wood shavings is probably 'do not use yet'.

When fresh wood particles are mixed into soil, they tie up nitrogen that would otherwise be available to plants. But when sawdust or wood chippings are used to mulch, or used to make compost with high-nitrogen materials, such as grass clippings, they pose no threat to nitrogen-hungry plants.

As long as you wait until the sawdust or wood chips have decomposed, when they are dark brown or black in color, they are among the best materials you can use to improve your soil’s texture, mixing them into the soil.

But the better idea is to see if you can get the manure from the Horses using the bedding - when composted for a period, this is ideal mixed in.

Paul

[Ricard with an H]

And just to illustrate what Paul has said, where I cut wood the new chainsaw Chipping's actually kill-off the grass or anything else. When they have rotted to the black-state I then mix them into soil.

Just to test that it works I raised seedlings in a compost made of rotted chainsaw Chipping's.

When I fell a tree or a bough anything under 40mm goes through the cruncher, the crunching's form a walkway alongside a raised bed and nothing grows through them until they are very black, then you see the weeds starting to encroach.

[Sandyback]

So the consensus would be get them, and mix with the compost to help rot down.
I did consider getting the used shavings but wasn't sure how much barley (if any these days) was likely to be present.

[Ricard with an H]

So the consensus would be get them, and mix with the compost to help rot down.

Will that slow your composting down, I know what you're trying to do because I've just gone through it after creating five larger than most raised beds in two seasons, the raised beds are easy to make compared to filling them with suitable growing medium.

Dont forget to put some ex-met down before you fill, the moles love all that lovely stuff you're going to put in your raised beds because it attracts worms. I made the mistake of not putting ex-met down and the furry little buggers treated it like a swimming pool.

Starting last back-end I'm collecting sea-weed from the beach to gee-up my composting though I can't report anything yet in the way of wonderful results.

[Sandyback]

he's another slant,me mate who has the farm where the shavings are said chuck in some slow release Nitrogen pellets.
Whether that would be a solution during rotting or after is another question.
It was getting close to closing time so maybe......

[Santa_stunt_double]

And of course, you could also use that commonly available fertiliser of which each application will release 11g nitrogen/urea, 1g phosphorus/super-phosphate and 2.5g potassium....

Especially plentiful after a night in the Pub, but possibly more diluted at the end of the night.

Paul

[Ricard with an H]

I've done that and it works quite well getting a stalled compost going, I just checked my two compost bins and they are both dry at the bottom and not well rotted.

It's such hard work turning it so I'm hoping a few pints of the amber-liquid will do the trick.

[Geoff]

If you can only get bedding with very little manure it will, as others have said, be quite a slow process to produce anything usable. If you have the space I would make an enclosure and fill it with the bedding. Your photos show quite a bit of grass so each time you mow I would mix/layer the clippings with some of the bedding in a new heap. If you could also add comfrey and amber accelerator (you look a little urban for direct addition) from time to time, by next year you would have some good stuff to add to your beds.

[Sandyback]

Thanks for the feedback. I don' think space is a problem Geoff, I can make the enclosure using the zinc's off the garage roof, (its being felted today) I'll go to the farm later and see how much 'oss muck is in the shavings.

I'll check out the rooms with a view for direct addition of the Amber Accelerator, I think I could get away with it, I'm as near as dammit at the end where the field begins, however I will start some notes for the police to take into consideration just in case.

Screenshot 2014-03-27 08.19.44.png (564.35 KiB) Viewed 3823 times

I also have option of adding recycled dog food, although I still haven't seen enough literature to weigh up the pro's and con's.

[Geoff]

I also have option of adding recycled dog food, although I still haven't seen enough literature to weigh up the pro's and con's.

Don't go there! To do with vegetarians and carnivores. To be fair I don't pick up from my garden apart from with the mower so some gets in.