More Soluble Fertiliser Was Needed
Вставка
- Опубліковано 14 лип 2024
- The potatoes have been harvested from one of the big grow bag trial that we repeated this year, and the results are better than last year, but not as good as I had hoped. The plants that were regularly fed with a soluble form of nitrogen did a lot bette, and I think this solubility of nitrogen and other nutrients might be why the other plants struggled.
0:00 Second year of large trial
0:58 Slight change to trial
2:34 Only slightly better results
4:16 Soluble feeding worked better
5:29 New batch of compost
7:45 Nitrogen just isn’t available
9:30 Is this compost useful?
11:35 Plans for next year
12:58 Enjoying these trials
Help me develop these gardens and make more videos through regular contributions / redgardens
Or use www.paypal.me/redgardens as a simple, once-off way to support this project and the time and energy that goes into making videos. Thanks so much!
Part of the Cloughjordan Ecovillage, Tipperary, Ireland www.thevillage.ie
One of the reasons peat moss and coco coir are used in potting soils is due to their relatively high cation exchange capacity, CEC, which is their ability to hold and slowly release plant nutrients. The municipal compost you are using may have a low CEC due to the coarse woody structure. Perhaps mixing the municipal compost with a high CEC medium could greatly improve your results with the same amount of fertilizer. You can find lists of common soils and mediums and their approximate CEC with a simple web search. Thanks for the great videos, always a treat when you post!
That would be a really good thing to look into, especially if I wanted to use this type of compost as a dedicated growing medium.
But he is looking for cheap, susatinable and local sources of fertility. Peat and coir are neither of these things. Peat use is being banned as the substrate is too valuable to be used for gardening and coir is flown from the other side of the world and drenched in salt until washed heavily.
@@FireflyOnTheMoonThey didn't suggest that, just looking up mediums online.
Regardless of whether compost begins with a high or low CEC, it will always need amending as it decomposes to humus.
Organic matter is not dirt (with clay) which holds a negative CEC due to the fact that the parent material is rock. The isomorphic negative CEC charge in dirt (with some % of clay) is permanent.
The CEC in organic based compost is not permanent & pH dependent & also depletable as it decomposes.
You can grow sphagnum moss pretty easily, and it’s often used for carnivorous plants as a replacement for proper peat moss (which is sphagnum that’s decayed anaerobically for many many years, and thus isn’t renewable on human lifespan). Probably grows too slowly for major use in farming still, but it’d be interesting to see the properties.
All those seeped nutrients are just waiting to be used under the fabric. A seasonal rotation of bags and soil crops might be the efficient way to go.
It's a trial. That's why he's using bags
I wonder how far down they will wash. It makes me realise that in the outside gardens where I use thick layers of compost on the surface, a lot of the fertility will also be washed out, perhaps below the reach of the plant roots.
Vertical soil test!!!
every 10cm? down 7/10 a meter? maybe more?
There is a new study that shows clear, that the growth of the potatoes is mainly related to the potassium, not the nitrogen. Of course more nitrogen produces bigger and healthier plants and by this more potatoes. I added big amount of potassium to my pots(similar size as your bags) this year(and still nitrogen). I got about 50% more harvest than last year, and much higher percentage in big potatoes.
The compost I am using apparently already has high levels of potassium. Plants seem to get the biggest boost from the nutrient that is least available. In your case it was likely potassium, in this trial nitrogen seems to be the thing that was holding back the plants, but I do wonder what would have happened if I had added more potassium as well.
I wonder if wood ash would be a good amendment. That would add potash and micro nutrients. You'd have to be careful not to raise ph too high with potatoes.
Bruce, this video cleared up for me why the compost I brought in to fill some raised beds has been so terrible. I won't go into my boring experiments to try to figure it out, but finding out just how much soluble nitrogen you needed to add to see even okay results finally made me understand that my problem was that I had basically bought very expensive bark mulch. I've tried so many things for such anemic results, including lots of balanced organic fertilizer. Now I'm realizing that it just wasn't nearly enough immediately available nitrogen. It also clarifies why the one bed I used to dump kitchen scraps on is the ONLY bed where the cover crop mix I planted actually took off. I guess that's my answer, it needed nearly unreal amounts of readily available nitrogen to offset the carbon. Thank you so much! You are my very favorite garden youtuber. I think of you as my teacher. My thanks.
Thanks for that comment. It makes all this exploration worth while. I know a lot of people who have really struggled with using this type of compost, including myself, and it is good to get a better understanding of how it can be improved.
@@REDGardens - Exactly. many new or relatively new gardeners (myself included) just hear "add compost" and what we are really adding is a carbon source to lock all nitrogen for a few growing seasons that give us sub par results and more confusion.
Interesting.
I guess the better approach is, to make sure that, in addition to seasoned compost, a "steady diet" thru the season, of some readily available (soluable) fertilizer is best. My first year using grow bags, is when I learned that the permeable nature of the grow bags, means, a constant feeding is needed. Particularly during a wet, rainy season. I've managed to finally build enough compost, to be able to add
1/3 of my year old compost (compost bins that've been sitting for at least a year),
1/3 new mix (part new soil, part new compost, part peat),
1/3 old soil (from last year's bags: I mix them all together at the end of season, and refresh with granular fertilizer, as I fill the bags, in March, before planting in May.
This allows me to build up my base soil for the next year, as all the dead wood, plants, grass clippings, leaves, shredded paper and cardboard, and kitchen scraps makes for the current compost bin to season a full year.
I have come to realise that "steady diet" is so important, and in so many other growing spaces, I kind of assume, or hope that the soil an amendments and compost is able to supply enough for the whole season.
Thank you for another year of this trial. It would be interesting to test these potatoes for nutritional value.🖖
I wish I was able to do that, but not nearly enough funding for that kind of exploration.
I like the fact that you are able to prove that urine works in the garden.
I used the coconut noir from Costco to amend our potted container soils and also for amending the in-ground soil while rototilling.
This spring, we plan to plant a rather large asparagus in-ground garden with potatoes and yams inside containers.
Many retailers sell those triple probe detectors that show, soil moisture, soil Ph, and the amount of sunlight. These detectors are intended for portable use only, and are not intended or designed to be left unattended while imbedded in soils indefinitely; only while pre-planting, while watering, and intermittently during the growing season.
Thanks for this’s year’s experiments. I had sort of missed the fact you were testing how to grow with the compost rather than potatoes. I’d love to know more about how you used the urine, how fresh it was and what dilution when diluted etc, I’d heard it has a short shelf life. Lots of varying information out there. Maybe this could form part of a future experiment, maybe I’ll experiment more with urine next year but I need to know more about how long it can keep and still be of use. Thanks again.
Yeah, there is a lot of varying information out there about using urine. I tend to use it within a week of 'collecting' it, more to prevent having tor store it. But I have heard from people who say they store it for much longer without issues, and that it can actually improve, or be more available to the plants, but I don't know about enough about that. I usually dilute it 10:1, or about 1L urine in a 10L watering can.
@@REDGardens There's a Umich study from 2020 that tested aged urine for bacterial antibiotic resistance transfer, they used 12 month plus old urine, reporting that the bacterial DNA is broken down during aging so there's no worry about transfering resistance, they also reported aging increases the amonia level, decreasing pH. I've been using urine a lot for 3years, diluted 12:1, I prefer to add LAB mixed 50/50 with molasis but only a cap full from a 4 pint milk bottle in a 2 gal watering can, the theory being LABs convert nitrates into long chain amino acids more easily taken up by the plant/plant uses less energy to produce protiens; the molasis also provides a Carbon source as the nitrate to amino acid conversion uses a lot of carbon, I've used it with/without the LAB mix with no issues, tho charging biochar in urine has had negative pest pressure results (beans in a new biochar/urine bed attacked with severe blackfly within 2 weeks, while the same beans in an established bed were unaffected - John Kempf has an excellent presentation on why plants with nitrates attract pests) 2 of us produce way more urine than I can use as fertiliser, I'm now about a year in front storage wise, so much so I've been adding it to a Johnson-Su Bioreactor instead of storing it!
Garden Like a Viking says fermented urine has an indefinite shelf life. I've made quite a bit, but am certain I haven't applied enough of it. Also have homemade fish hydrolysate and fermented plant juice. Will add a lot more of it next year. Also topping grow bags with wood ash this fall, and perhaps early next year. Apparently it needs time to break down. I don't have winter rains, just lots of snow, on frozen pots, so not much leaching goin on. Also planning on starting several pots quite early in my heated greenhouse. Thanks for your perseverance in conducting these tests.
Love your content man and fully appreciate the hard work involved. There's not a lot of local Irish based content out there so it's really appreciated.
🙂
I live following your trials. Your bold work is much appreciated. Since your compost is high in carbon what about adding grass or other green clippings over winter to offset the carbon? Much like lasagna layering.
I was thinking that would be an interesting option. Unfortunately the grass grows faster and with more nitrogen in the spring and early summer, just when I would want to be growing the plants. But perhaps even a good layer of autumn grass would help.
I love your long-time experients. Looking forward the results at 2024 :)
Thank you for testing and sharing the results. I brought in compost for raised beds and will add high amounts of nitrogen to see if that helps my crops.
🙂
Thanks as always, I’m looking forward to your new trial!
I really apreciate second potato try from these year. Thank you Bruce
It takes 4 months for the nitrogen to break down enough to allow the plants to use it. So i was told to apply at the end of the growing season and then to top with manure and then cover with mulch. I hope this helps my garden. Thank you for this information. 😊
that timeline likely depends on the type of fertilizer applied. I've used liquid fertilizers and seen dramatic results in days-weeks, certainly nothing even close to 4 months.
Try covering some of the bags with shredded leaves this fall. They'll break down over the winter and feed the soil. Not only that it really helps to retain moisture
Covering a garden with leaves like that would definitely help to 'feed' the soil a lot of carbon and a few other nutrients, but apparently most autumn leaves have a carbon to nitrogen ratio of over 30:1, so adding more carbon than nitrogen. The compost I am trying to improve is likely made with a lot of autumn leaves already. It seems nitrogen is the key missing ingredient. if I want to grow vegetables in it.
Glad I watched this. This info should aid me to produce a better potato harvest next year.
this is fascinating, I run all kinds of "experiments" on my farm but im not a market garden, just for a family of 5. with potatoes I always grow twice what i think I'll need so I never fall short. composted leaves fed with a tank of rain water i ferment all my weeds in seems to do the best for me. On bad years I break even...on good years ive been known to boil my leftover tators in the spring in 55 gallon drums for the hogs. Great video! and please keep them coming. Thanks
funny side note, one year i got 800 lbs of them...next year I got less than 250...while lamenting over the harvest my 8 year old son looked at the pile and said "Thats alot of tators Dad!" point taken
Thanks! Experiments are great, especially when you have the space to grow extra!
Thanks for the hard work and useful information.
Wow. Thank you for sharing your experience, Bruce!
🙂
Thanks for doing all this. Very interesting 👌
Very interesting experiment, a lot of work. Thanks
Thanks for sharing
Great video and experiment! I look forward to next seasons results as well!
Thank you 🙏!
Yet another great video 🎉
Compost is just a medium for holding water and nutrients so they are available to the plant roots.
You have to add lots of nutrients.
Awesome... Thank you for your knowledge. :)
3 yrs ago I took all of my soil in my raised beds and compost I made of the summer/fall. Then put it on a tarp and added worms and I through garden vegetables in on top of the soil for the worms to have. Then I covered it with another tarp all winter. Then spring put it all back in my begs. I had a great crop that next falls. Was surprised at how the worms made a very good soil for me to use. I added nothing to it except more worms when I filled my grow bags. I dont know if this will help you with what you are trying to do, but I had to share it with you. Thank you for the video it has been a yr without a garden because I moved and now I am going to start over. Good luck on your grow season
Thanks. That is interesting, mixing the soil in with the composing process before adding to the bags sounds like a useful method to explore. Hope you are able to get back to the garden next season!
Thank you
Great video! Very intersting to see your results from the compost. It also reinforces how important the haber bosch process is to feeding the world.
It is quite essential at the moment, but we need to find ways to rely on it a lot less, and at scale!
Great that you show the results in all honesty. Thank you very much for that. When I look at it this way, I don't know whether you will exceed the 5 kg per square meter that you can easily achieve by growing in the open ground, especially if you added all that organic matter. All this with much less work and costs. Greetings from a potato breeder from the Netherlands.
Yes, I agree that growing in the ground is generally a lot easier, though not everyone has open ground. I found potatoes to be a useful plant to grow when testing different amendment options, as it enables more control.
Thank you :)
very good, thanks.
good effort
I'm not growing potatoes but other plants in a similar mix with poor results. This is very valuable insight. Thankyou.
Really interesting thanks
When adding nitrogen to grow bags the way you have it, you need to add around 4x the normal rate because the nitrogen requirement is proportional to sunlight, not soil amount. That would work out to around 4 doses of 1oz applications of urea equivalent for 20lbs of soil over the growing season.
Interesting idea, thanks.
As always a fantastic video with an easy to follow and understand result presentation. Ive used grass clippings just thrown ontop fresh in recent years and its relatively successful
Thanks! I am beginning to realise how much I have undervalued grass clippings!
What a great experiment, there are so many nutrients in potatoes. I can't remember where I saw it, but I read that urine has a lot of useful minerals in it too. Thank you for the videos, they are always so interesting.
Good stuff
Thanks for the education! I am definitely failing to fertilize on a regular basis. Next year, I'll do better!
I wonder if grow bags versus actually growing in the ground with more biological activity makes a difference? Still great information in your trials
That was my first thought, but others are reporting big crops from buckets.
There would definitely be a lot of differences, but a lot of it would depend on the method used, and how fertile the soil is, the quality of the compost used or other sources of fertility. The big benefit of plants in the soil is access to a much larger volume of soil to forage in.
Patreon here! I’m just a casual gardener but what I see is:
1. Never mind trying to grow potatoes in a bag. Maybe it would work better with a different crop.
2. Switch to a different compost source all together. These municipal compost are probably low fertility due to wood based, low fungal/bacterial biology, lack of diversity of decomposed organic matter or had been lyched of nutrients.
3. I may have missed the point but maybe it’s not about amendments or compost, it’s about farming practices.
This year I grow corn without adding any fertilizer except just a bit of fish bone meal at the planting hole in my no-dig in ground bed that had parsnips as overwinter cover crop (yes, parsnips). Corn did well. I had a couple of volunteer tomato plants (one orange slicing tomato and one Sungold cherry tomato) that gave me an abundant late season yield. They were self-sowed, as I said, and grew well without amendments or usual care (pruning, structural support). I had other volunteers like kale, Swiss chard, celery, leeks, fennels, beetroot, carrot, parsnips, daikon radishes, mustard greens, calendulas, borage, asparagus, practically a food forest without trying!
Sometimes, the best method is simply not putting the work. 😊
He is using bags to trial the composts not the potatoes
@@FireflyOnTheMoon I was wondering if the fertility of compost is not as important as cover cropping. And I was thinking if a different crop such as carrots or sweet potatoes (high nitrogen not recommended in those cases) may give new insights on the various sources of compost. I have yet gotten a good yield on growing bags of potatoes. Anyone?
The purpose of the trial was to test how this compost can be improved, and potatoes seemed a good plant to grow for this purpose, and it was also useful to see how well the potatoes could grow. I think that this is an important issue as this type of low fertility municipal compost is often the only compost that a lot of growers can get. And if we are going to use it, then finding ways to make it a lot better is a useful thing to explore, I think. We do not all have access to great quality compost, or even decent topsoil, and often when growing and gardening we need to make use of resources that are available, and figure out ways to make them more useful if we can.
That is a lot of dedication, well done! I also really want to eat a potato now, a craving I didn’t know I could get.
Thanks! I get those potato cravings too!
Wood chip in the compost, I understand the decomposing wood will rob the nitrogen from the mixture. More manure might offset the effect. Also, perhaps add soil or sand to your compost to dilute the high organic content.
My father tried adding fresh manure as a mulch in the potato field this year. It worked remarkably well, good yield.
Some rainwater flushing should be considered to flush salt accumulation in the medium. I let the pots go all winter uncovered to rinse the liquid salts out then start with essentially a neutral media and refurbish with liquid and granular feed. In working with hydro for many years now, I've learned that creating soil for consistent, healthy veggies, was my biggest issue in years past whereas a complete fertilizer regular feed is much easier. Now, I simply top up the media year after year. It's much more consistent which is important to me to free up time for my breeding work. I am experimenting with worm bins within raised beds for 2024. Mostly, the beds are to ensure even watering capability due to the larger mass of media. For the past few years, keeping up with watering containers has been an issue I want to resolve--raised beds and larger containers--for example. Always enjoy your work. Thanks so much!
That is an interesting idea, to flush the material in preparation of a fresh, balanced supply. I hadn't considered it in that way, but something to think about. Thanks.
I enjoy watching the work and hearing the insight you put into your videos.
Another grow medium you could try is the Mittlieder course sand and sawdust mix as found on the LDS Prepper site with the nutrient formula.
I plan on using it for some of my own trials myself this upcoming season. John S.
Don't despair - this experiment was far from piss-poor. (Sorry, I could not resist. :-) Guess what I will be collecting more of this year. All thanks to you and this excellent channel.
haha!
Interesting! Thank you from Washington state in the U.S. 2024.
Thanks for watching!
I add lots of urine to my homemade compost whilst I'm making it, it's awesome stuff.👍🤠
I salute you on your trial(s).
I have to ask: Was one of the goals to get cleaner potatoes with less digging?
You might try large raised bed fencing rings lined with cardboard, 1/2 municipal compost on the bottom & 1/2 dirt on top. You could still amend as you see fit. Potatoes like dirt with some clay (good CEC.) Growing in 100% compost is difficult as the CEC may start out high, but rapidly depletes in the organic matter on the way to decomposition. My potato rings do fine. The potatoes come out fairly clean with little damage even with about 12 in of dirt. Harvesting is easy. I leave a place to unhook the fencing on opposite sides.
I can also winter kill covercrop the rings (since they contain dirt) with a mix heavy on beans/peas for in ground available N in the spring.
The goal was to test the compost amendments an a fairly controlled way, and I figured growing potato plants was a good test.
But I did also want to get potatoes out of it, and if they were cleaner, and without scab (which is quite common in our high pH soil) that would be great. Not sure it is less work though.
How about having some bags with just, say, sand? If you're constantly adding liquid fertilizer, this would be a control to see if the compost is helping at all.
You need alot of aeration !!! It will regulate watering too …. Perlite, rice hulls , coco or coco chunks, wood charcoal, mulch straw etc
Very valuable information. Thanks so much for performing and sharing your trials. Id personally like to see an organic liquid fertilizer trialed. Something like fish hydrolysate
Have you tried mixing alfalfa pellets into your compost?
Unfortunately alfalfa pellets dont seem to be available here in Ireland.
I think the wood in the compost robs a lot of nitrogen that the plants would ordinarily use.
This is my suspicion that the municipal compost is still using the nitrogen itself as it isn't done composting yet.
I’m into survival gardening and I grow a lot of potatoes. I have to use 10-10-10 Chemical Fertilizer to get acceptable yields.
A 50lbs Bag of 10-10-10 is about $18-$22 in my area.
I’m prepping bags of fertilizer now. But I remember when it was way more affordable.
A bag of fertiliser like that will grow a lot in a tight situation!
Wow! What a lot of work you’ve done! Seems to me that a lot of us on smaller incomes would use urine as our main feed for potatoes. How often would you feed potatoes in pots and and what dilution? Best wishes.
I thin it is a useful fertiliser in some cases. I tend to dilute it 10:1, or about 1L in a 10L watering can. Not sure of the frequency, but I tended to try once a week.
My problem with using urine is, if you are ingesting any chemicals they are then in the urine. This bothers me greatly, I don’t like using bonemeal or bloodmeal because I know what chems are given to the animals that bonemeal is made from. Sigh..😊
A suggestion for a future experiment. Add another variable - bag where earthworms were added vs not added. Earthworms don't really create nitrogen but they could make it more bioavailable. What I suspect you would find is that the bags with the granular fertilizer added wouldnt differ much between the two cases, but the other bags with other styles of fertilizing plus earthworms would improve to match the outcomes from the granular fertilizer.
Hi Bruce, I'd love to see you test with a mixture of goat manure(higher in nitrogen than other manure) & compost. Have had good results from it.
Pretty much any synthetic fertilizer is key, what ever is cheapest for your needs. Bio char definitly helps keep the bacteria healthy.
I did a similar compost trial in 20x35L plastic pots with spuds, a very similar size to ur bags. 2yr composted manure+woodchip screened to 10mm, 2yo dog poo compost, and home made 8 month rested thermophillic, some with BF&B added, although there was a visible difference in the shade of green, and visible lipids on the leaves early in the season, it soon evened out, tho I'd say generally the BF&B plants looked healthier throughout, I got a greater yeild than ur trial (6-8lbs with an anomolous 9lbs due to one particular potato weighing 2lbs on it's own) the results per compost type were really inconclusive, some of the amended BF&B yielded less than it's unamended counterpart, while others had opposite results. Each chitted seed potato was innoculated with liquid mycorhyzal product and I wonder if the greater yield was due to this factor, tho it could have been a variety thing, I used Sarpo Mira. Facinating trial, thanks for sharing Bruce.
That is really interesting. Thanks for sharing your trial. Inoculating the seed potatoes is an interesting option that I hadn't thought of. I am not surprised that you got such a big yield with the Sarpo Mira potato, I have had huge potatoes in the past from that variety.
All the treatments should be noted with the NPK ratio and value of the added materials, not just the type of material. Compost in itself is NOT a growing mix, and will quickly become anaerobic by compressing under its own weight. The typical poting mix is 1/3 compost 1/3 smectite 1/3 perlite. If perlite and smectite prove too costly, what you should do is mix the compost with an equivalent amount of topsoil and alternate a layer of compost with a layer of brushwood or straw to avoid compaction. Use pure compost only at the top layer to avoid weed germinating. Get the topsoil tested and adjust your NPK fertilisation plan accordingly. You can use maybe a fabaceae association with the potato, with correct rhizobium inoculation, to get some nitrogen fixation, but you'll need larger bags.
It would be good to know the NPK ratio and amount of all the materials, but some of them are hard to determine. In this context, I wasn't trying to find the ideal medium to produce potatoes in bags like this, I was using the bags and potatoes to see what different forms of fertility would improve the compost that I want to use in my gardens.
Hi Bruce. I had similar results with growing in a little to carbon rich compost this year (potato grow bags), I think my solution next season will be Urea! I just do not have enough urine for 40+ growbags.
Getting enough urine is a real issue ... which is a strange thing to admit to 🙂
You can just get a 50lb bag of urea for $25. Lasts a long time. Totally safe. You can eat a half teaspoon of it and it improves your gut biome. Farmers feed it to cows when they give them low quality hay so there gut bacteria has something to eat. It's great stuff.
I wonder if the excess of woody material in the compost is consuming the majority of the nitrogen (as it decomposes) before the plants can take it up. I've heard of gardeners having similar issues when they have mixed wood chips into their soil thinking they are adding beneficial biomass. I'd love to see the results of various ratios of compost mixed with plain soil (in grow bags). I've been doing a similar experiment with growing tomatoes in 45 litre grow bags and so far 60% plain soil to 40% compost (with added nitrogen and topped with sugar cane mulch) seems to be performing the best. Keep up the great videos.
Yes, I suspect that most of the nitrogen was absorbed within the carbon or decomposition process, before the plants could get it, but I was hoping that after 2 years the compost material would have matured enough.
I've added field beans to all my containers (including those used for potatoes) which will hopefully put some much needed nitrogen into the soil over the autumn & winter.
I will chop and drop the green growth and cover with fresh homemade compost in the spring ready for planting.
I will also add blood, fish & bone at planting and use comfrey feed during the growing season.
Thanks to your trials will also add urine!
I was thinking of sowing a legume, but I wonder how much nitrogen can be fixed in the cool weather over the winter.
Me too! I have no evidence that it works just figured if it's good to add cover crops to beds why not containers.
I really like your experiments. They are very helpful.
Maybe you should also compare compost to your home soil and to soil amended with this compost and soil with this compost from your garden beds. Should give some interesting results.
I did something similar to that as part of the other large grow bag trial.
As expected your trials show what everybody (science and experience growers) already knew.
The main ingredients to plant grow are:
air - light/temperature/ co2
Water
Nitrogen
P
K
The medium you use (compost, soil, hidroponics,etc) is secondary.
The carbon plants need its the carbon in co2.
I have had poor crops with using this type of compost, which seems to be a very common issue, and I wanted to see how it might be improved. Extra soluble nitrogen seems to help out a lot.
A compost that is mostly from wood or wood chips is way too carbon heavy requiring a lot of nitrogen.
He'd have done better with a 50/50 mixture of that compost mixed with grass clipping which is nitrogen heavy.
That worked wonders in my garden, and all I did was add the weekly grass clippings as a ground cover.
Chicken manure has lots of nitrogen, just use decomposed stuff on the top of the pile.
I love the way it's a compost fertility comparison test but the human gardener (not the nerdy robot analyst) still wants better and bigger spuds to eat😂😂😂
Yep, want both!
I've been using a similar compost the last few years, with the same results. The first year was a mess, but I've been using chicken manure since and having very good results. I suspect I'm using 2-3x more chicken manure than you, I know it's a lot more expensive there than here. As you said, another good option is pelleted urea if you can get it reasonably. I've used it from time to time as an emergency supplement and it's done well for me. After all, it's the white stuff in chicken manure, just a refined form of it.
Yeah, chicken manure seems to be extra expensive here in Ireland, so not an inexpensive form of nitrogen. But I have to remind myself that I am also getting other nutrients in with it.
Have you tried Lactic Acid Bacteria, it's a byproduct of making farmhouse cheese, it does wonders for breaking down compost to make the nutrients more available to the plants.
I haven't, but sounds interesting.
I bought compost to fill my raised beds and same situation. I had to add a lot of nitrogen.
Great information, Bruce. Based on this, I think during the growing season I'll switch from adding urine to the compost to adding it directly to the garden water. I'm not in a hurry for my compost, so speeding up decomposition with urine that doesn't actually contribute to the plants isn't a good use of available resources.
That is an interesting choice, to add urine to the compost or direct to the gardens.
Adding urine to the compost will help it break down faster. I tried adding urine to the bottle of a hose end sprayer to wet down my compost pile but minerals in the urine clogged up the sprayer.
Maybe i should filter the urine before i put it in the sprayer tank.
@@johnndavis7647 Yes, it definitely helps speed up the compost decomposition. I imagine without it, the nitrogen just has to come out of the air, which takes significant energy diverted from the actual decomposition process. I just pour the urine right on the compost with a watering can diffuser. If it needs more moisture, I water after the urine. After a turning or two, I figure it all gets reasonably distributed throughout the pile. I won't stop adding urine to the compost, but during the growing season, I think I might add a small intermediate tank for adding urine to the irrigation system.
Fermented plant juice and fermented fruit juice might work well in providing soluble nitrogen.
You seem to be overlooking the most important thing, which of them has the best flavour 😋
the trial is to test like for like harvest data
I would argue that if you didn't use JADAM for liquid fertiliser, that you give it a try. Plenty of different, easy to create, liquid fertilizers solutions, with multiple focused on nitrogen.
Edit, it goes without saying, but thanks a lot for your hard work, clear and easy to digest results of your trials. Your channel is def one of the best out there.
Yeah, I really should explore JADAM.
need one or two shovel scoops of top soil real dirt in each bag
You mentioned that growing in bags of compost( with different amendments, or without) is not like growing in compost on soil of garden beds, because there is no addional minerals, and the nitrogen released from the compost may leak outside of the bages( soil can retain some of that nitrogen). So I suggest you add another veriation in your trial next year, which is mix compost with garden soil 50/50 in bags😜
I definitely need more variations and trials 😜
I think your compost lacks poo 🙂 Manure from grass eating animals mixed with woodchip (which is what you've just bought) is the ideal recipe IMO.
So what would happen if you did a 50/50 mix of imported compost with native soil (not compost). Or some other ratio. I'm wondering if you'll get more nutrients from native soil which can help balance out the imported compost. Anyway, this is my favourite gardening channel. Keep up the fantastic work!
I have been doing things similar to that with the other large grow bag trial that I have been doing, and the plants have real issues when I add this municipal compost to the soil.
❤❤❤❤❤
Bruce, based on your trials, do you think adding used coffee grounds a little before the beginning of the season and then a little Milorganite throughout the season help boost the nitrogen enough and balance the fertility of the compost? Starting late in the season, I began adding coffee grounds, kitchen scraps, and brown paper shreds to help improve our aged manure compost, which didn't hold moisture AT ALL ... the poor plants struggled to grow in it.
I have used coffee grounds in the past, but not enough to really know how well the plants responded, and haven't used Milorganite. So can't really say for sure, but they both should have a fair amount of nitrogen, and will help, but it really depends on the context and the nature of the compost.
Very interesting...
Something you told me before is
Soil must have 30 ish worms per square meter ?
Did I remember that correctly?
Now I don't like that soil ..
Municipal) for me it's void of life .
I've mentioned this before!
There is no (bi diversity) or food for
Microbes to grow ..it's not going to support life ..your worms )were essentially feeding off your old potatoes root systems..
Now I'm not sold on potatoes in grow bags. Something you should check is the ambiance (temperature) of the bags vrs the ground or in other beds (ground) near or underneath I'm skeptical of the black bag (overheating)
I realize this seems odd ..but ??
My potatoes grow best in deep mulch semi broken down materials
Basically in a compost system..
I discovered this by finding massive potatoe harvest in my compost..with little to no light and very light moisture.
Potatoes definitely love the cool weather .they don't like hot !
And they don't like sunshine for 2 long ..what's the amount of recommendations of daylight for that variation of potatoes?
Is it possible to put shade cloth on 12 bags ?
Now we still never finished the (indeterminate)determinant)
Variety...you said you don't have that there ?.
Basically I'm saying !
Make shure it's a determinant!
Your planting !.
Otherwise you should be doing them like a potatoe tower
Starting low and deep and then adding?
Again I am just making conversation, freaking love your work ..
FYI for compost tea ) add septic back tablets..they add a million Microbes to the system 😉
Give it a try ! Cheers from van Island.
I don't think I have mentioned number of worms per square meter.
I have yet to see someone produce a really good crop in a potato tower, but something I want to try for myself.
Have you considered to inoculate the compost with mycelium, for example Stropharia Rugosoannulata (loves woody compost, kills nematods, is edible and tasty) or other mycelium in order to decompose the woody material faster?
The 'compost tea/slurry' I used at the beginning of the year contained a fair amount of well decomposed woodchip, from an old pile which had a lot of fungal decomposition, in order to inoculate in that way.
Have you considered doing chop and drop with with the bags of compost and seeing if that charges it over winter? Why not put a couple of inches of manure on the tops of the bags and let nature take the nutrients into the mix.
Sure, a layer of manure on top of the bags would definitely help, but if I had access to good quality manure, I would not be buying in the municipal compost like this. This trial was about trying to figure out how to improve the mediocre compost I can get, and the main thing that it seems many people need to rely on.
Time for value, the granular fertilizer or urine seems to be the best bet. Granular has the advantage of making sure that you have enough potassium and such as well, which may be missing in some people's grow medium. I dunno. Sometimes the lazy option is the best unfortunately (granular).
Yeah, the urine and granular seem to be good options in this situation, and both are cheaper and more effective than a lot of other possibilities. Though there are issue with both, as there are with any form of fertility we can source.
can you make 1 experiment, in one of the bags, with mycelium in the compost and gold clove or any sorts of beans for soil building
👏👏👏👏👏
I wonder if doing a scientific soil test on the compost you get and/or the soil you are using for a growth medium would provide you with helpful data.
As I understand it, such soil testing is pretty readily available at modest cost.
The results might make for an interesting video.
I do soil tests regularly in the gardens, but forgot to include the compost last year. It would be interesting to compare.
So potassium nitrate added at the flowering stage maybe a good amendment.
Interesting results Bruce, thanks for sharing. I look forward to next seasons results as well!
Would you be willing to make a video about this "biologically active" inoculent? I'm curious what it's made of and what the research behind it is. I'd also like to know - have you ever used Epsom salts in the garden and why are you thinking urea ammendments over ammonia?
I made the 'tea' with a mix of compost from several piles that seemed in really good shape, and mixed in some well decomposed woodchip. The basic idea is that this would add a diverse blend of organisms that might not be in the compost. And ones that work well in that material/context would multiply. it was something that was suggested by a few people after last years' trial, that this type of municipal compost is generally quite sterile, or not biologically diverse, so I wanted to reduce the chance of that being an issue.
👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾
Have you experimented with biochar? Maybe adding charcoal in the bags would help locking in the nutrients to avoid rain disolving.
Also i am curius about the color of the compost you are using! I am making my own compost by just piling up biomatter but the color is closer to brown than black is that a good thing or bad? Thanks for sharing your work btw!
Yes, I have experimented with biochar, though want to do some proper trials with it.
Nitrogen cycle eh? From what I know, ammonia is one form of nitrogen. However, there are many nitrifying bacteria that convert things to nitrate instead. The two forms of nitrogen are quite different.IMHO. nitrates take less for the plant to use and is a little more suitable in alkaline conditions. To convert ammonium to nitrate in compost requires aerobic conditions also. Love your content and all your experimentation, good luck to you sir.
Thanks for the info. Nitrogen cycles are the best!
Good to know that urine is so effective