Allotment Gardening Advice Help Chat
Growing => Grow Your Own => Topic started by: gypsy on September 28, 2014, 12:59
-
3 weeks ago I put lime on 2 of the veg. beds, each about 22 foot by 4 foot. dug them over then a week later covered them with black membrane as the weather was warm and the weeds would no doubt start growing. I intend to take the membrane off when the weather has gone cold.
I have just been away for a few days, when I came back someone probably thinks that they have done me a favour, the black membrane has been removed and each bed has 5 huge piles of fresh manure, well not really manure, mainly wood chip dumped on the beds. I saw red but have calmed down now. I have dug as much off as I can and put it in a pile for use next yr. but of course there is some residue. What do I do now? Lime again or just cover it over and hope for the best?
-
Just cover it'll be fine ;)
-
I think the theory is that acidity in the manure may counteract some of the lime if it is in direst contact. I would not add more lime but work the top few inches to mix the lime in.
-
The acid in the manure reacts with the lime to liberate available nitrogen as ammonia, which then evaporates from the soil. Bye bye nitrogen!
-
Are wood chips as acid as manure, I would have thought that by Spring, a sprinkle of chicken manure pellets/BF&B would be enough to sort things out ;)
-
Gypsy, sorry, do you mean piles of fresh animal manure, or piles of fresh compost ? a big difference. I ask because of the wood chip. Seems a strange thing to just turn up unannounced... almost weird, unless it's a communal site-wide delivery that happens this time of year.
In the end, I agree with MOS, don't fret. If any of us get the odd lime/manure thing a little wrong, it's not a big deal this time of year and will probably have almost nil effect come the Spring as any nitrogen problem then is an easy cheap fix. If in doubt, readjust with chicken pellets, or the fertiliser of personal choice.
As it is, you've sorted the offending piles and the material will no doubt be useful somewhere on your plot at some stage, I just guess you would have liked a little more communication, let alone wanting to know who actually put it there. I wouldn't be happy at all if some stranger started messing with my plot, unannounced, and would make that quite clear to the person concerned so it doesn't happen again. Someone will know who plonked it there.
-
Mistaken plot identity on the part of whoever delivered it?
Leaving that aside, because you have removed it, but particularly because you dug the lime in anyway, there is nothing to worry about, other than how long your pile/s of woodchip/manure will take to rot down - the bigger the chips and the less the manure content the longer it will take, and it will be quite acidic until it has completely decomposed (nearly all finished compost is around neutral pH whatever it was originally made from.)