[swaine]

Ive been growing veg for a few years now. My crop rotation was quite simple...dont plant a crop in the same place  for two years running.

I've noticed that a couple of sorts of veg seem more susceptible to bugs of late so I'm going use a stricter three year rotation in future.

I put all the garden waste in the one compost bin. Spuds, peas, parsnips, onions and the like. All the various crop groups (and bugs and diseases?) go in the one bin. I then use this compost around the plot.

The compost bin works well, but never reaches the sorts of temperatures needed to kill anything.

Is this sort of compost a potential way of spreading bugs and soil diseases round the plot? or am I worrying about nothing?

[DD.]

What sort of bugs and diseases are we talking of?

I never put brassica roots in compost, for instance, for fear of spreading my club root even further, nor would I put manky spud tubers in there as they could harbour blight.

[swaine]

The two I had in mind are mildew (on peas and courgettes) and some little fly that has taken to eating my radishes.

Where I get a desease problem like that I put the waste in the council bin.

I guess my query was a bit more general. People say to use crop rotation to prevent a year on year build up of deseases in each part of the plot.

I'm putting all my garden waste in the compost bin, and then spreading it everywhere the next Spring. I just wondered if this was having the opposite effect to my proposed crop rotation?

I suspect the answer is that home made compost doesn't cause that sort of contamination. What do you think?

[ilan]

Whilst stopping the build up of" bug" in the ground crop rotation has more to do with soil management each type of crop has specific demands on the soil so for instance suds require a large amount of compost but hate lime so you would keep these far apart in the rotation cycle John Seymour explaines it well in his book amonst others > I think the bigger problem is as the climate alters mildews rusts and bugs will cause problems as summers become hotter and more humid with warmers winters failing to kill the bugs

[Kajazy]

My understanding is that a lot of the nasty wee beasties that cause a problem tend to overwinter in the soil where the crop was last grown - they're unlikely to find enough sustenance to survive in the compost heap.

With regards to diseases - I think it depends what it is. I burn all my allium waste due to white rot, but haven't worried about a bit of mildew.