Thanks very much, both of you! The discussion of "soil" as a possible topic of an "ATP Plant Week" made me start writing an article, but polishing an article takes a lot of time.
After I got this half typed, I decided to make it a thread, instead, and see if it would attract any other rough drafts for articles about composting, amending soil or mulching. We could make a "soil series" by linking articles to each other, like articles in a magazine or chapters in a book.
I'm accumulating several rough drafts for articles, mostly about saving, drying and storing seeds. But I want to include photos, and
good photos are hard to get.
Also, my Impossible Dream is to make them less wordy!
In this case, "composting", there are several more ideas I would want to get in, like:
- how compost helps soil (feeding microflora, soil structure, tilth, aeration, drainage, water retention
- mineral nutrients aren't very concentrated in compost, like 1-1-1 (*)
- whether the the FSMA rules about composting animal manure are too fussy
- the risk of putting persistent herbicides into compost
- more ideas for finding raw materials
I figure that many or most ATP members already know anything I have to say about composting, but I still hope for "on the other hand" posts, or "I do it this way" posts. With the authors' permission, I would work those into an article and give credit. That's how I learned about lasagna gardening / sheet composting and planting in it right away.
Someone else started a compost thread, a year or more ago, but I think that experienced gardeners mostly react "yeah, I know".
(*)
http://www.lundproduce.com/N-P...
http://www.sunset.com/garden/g...
