Topic: Compost

[johhnyco15]

Though bind weed is easy to spot in the compost if it's still growing which it has a tendency to do. You could always drown the weeds then add to your bins but that is smelly.

Yes, I've never understood why people are prepared to recommend this unreliable and smelly wet method when simple drying is actually much more effective - especially for bindweed and couch grass.

If you have a little of either then just keep them separate off the ground in the open air and they will dry out quite quickly (especially bindweed as the roots have a very thin skin) - even rain helps to dry them as it washes away the bits of soil that are keeping them moist.

If you have a lot you need a bit of mesh held above the ground - if you have a plague to clear then you need a chicken wire hammock - which will dry a whole allotments worth faster than you can fill it.

Once it's gone brown and crunchy it's 100% dead and can be composted - I have years of experience of this and none of it has ever re-appeared in the heap.

NB. This also means there's really no need to burn anything that isn't actually diseased - and since blight won't survive on anything dead there's very little left in that category.

Cheers.

i agree with you vinlander i burn very little and what i do burn is bits of old pallet etc which as every year seems to appear around my plots in nocks and crannies i think they must sprout from a small piece of pallet left in the ground lol however not much organci matter is burnt the odd summer raspberry cane that i cant be bothered with otherwise it all composted

[caroline7758]

I agree that drying out weeds is more effective than burning. I had an old water butt which I filled with weeds and put water in but every time I took the lid off there were very healthy-looking weeds poking out of the water and then it sprung a leak! Recently I've been laying cardboard down and covering it with the weeds I'm digging up- this holds the cardboard down and the weeds dry out.  Re how I get the compost out, plotstoeat, my daleks have a door at the bottom on the front.

[plotstoeat]

"Re how I get the compost out, plotstoeat, my daleks have a door at the bottom on the front."
Thanks Caroline. Mine has the same but I have great difficulty getting stuff out. Being tall has it's disadvantages. I also have two cubic bins a bit like Lez's. I transfer from one to the other and plant directly into it, usually courgettes but this year I have also had a good crop of climbing beans that I grew up canes in the corners.