Every beginner gardener wants to know which manure is better. After all, the money will have to pay for any, and the cost depends on the volume of the purchased goods, but not on the quality.
At gardening trucks are on duty, loaded with fertilizer for the earth. What lies in the car, it is difficult to understand: to dig into the cargo will not work, especially if it is wet, caked and heavy. The seller praises the goods, tells about its origin: horse, cow, pig and so on. But still – what kind of manure is better? Let’s see.
Horse manure
It is now afternoon with fire not to find. When plowed on horses, and the main mode of transport was horse-drawn. Now is the time of tractors, and horses are needed in farms-for grazing. Yes and not in all farms his graze. And the owner of the horses, and manure on his land to use can. It is still believed that horse manure is the best. In one kg inadequate to (of fresh, not humus) contains:
- up to 6.9 g of nitrogen;
- up to 2.6 g of phosphorus;
- up to 7.2 g of potassium.
The figures themselves look abstract, but let’s compare with chicken droppings: there the ratio of the elements is: 16-15-8. If you compare with the cow, the horse “nutritious”. The mullein are the ratios of elements: 5,6-2,8-6.
It turns out that horse manure is not a champion. So whether it is worth thinking, what manure, the best on characteristics, to fertilize the kitchen garden?
Is it worth using horse manure?
On my site horse manure happened twice: the first time it bought because it-the best, the second time only because another didn’t bring. That is, there was no choice. The manure feeds the plants for only one season, the second his strength is not enough. He is very heavy, the earth after his kind crushed. Fresh it can not be used. Therefore, it is necessary to store manure: it is necessary to occupy an area, reduce (about three years) the amount of useful land.
Although this is not necessary-it all depends on the quality of the manure. If it is clean, without plant residues, and all five years will lie, but ready to use will not. Especially if you have time to dry, i.e. dry manure to soak or just to make the wet very difficult.
Litter manure contains a large number of plant residues-on the litter for livestock is most often straw. The more manure there is, the faster it will be processed into a plant-friendly form. Introduction of rotted manure into the soil is usually done by eye, although excess nutrients in the form of nitrogen can make home vegetables unsuitable for food, since the content of nitrates will be increased. At the same time, the work is very hard, not for women’s hands.
When rotting from manure released gas-methane, which is useful for plant organisms can not be considered.
Is there any benefit of ash
The gardener always has an excess of the tops of peas, potatoes, tomatoes and other vegetables. It is believed that they are not needed on the site, because they make a fire, and the ash is scattered in the beds. This, incidentally, is also fashion. Somehow, it is believed that the ashes are very useful for increasing the fertility of the soil.
If we proceed from the quantitative analysis of the ash of different plant species, we will have to destroy all birch groves to fertilize the soil with ash. After all, in birch ash phosphorus contains 71 g per kg, and potassium-as much as 138 g. you can still Christmas trees after the new year’s holiday to collect and burn, because their ash contains phosphorus 24 g, and potassium-32 g per kg.
For the same reasons, someone came up to let the fall in the fields to burn the remains of straw. Judge for yourself: in one kg of ash wheat straw phosphorus-64 g, potassium -136 g. and in the straw (not in the ash!) total phosphorus 1.7 g of potassium and of 13.7 g. And no one counted how many quintals of straw must be burned to get the same account of kilos.
Ash for soil deoxidation
For some reason it is believed that wood ash deoxidizes the soil. That’s not so. Before the invention of soap, people degreased their skin with lye, that is, wood ash, which was poured with boiling water and insisted. The result was alkali. Ash in the ground is also in contact with water, too, formed alkali. In the ash, a lot of calcium, which dissolves quickly in the ground water, the soil pH is growing rapidly, sometimes up to a value of 8-10. Phosphorus and other elements enter into chemical reactions, which result in the formation of insoluble substances (that is, inaccessible to assimilation by plants).
And here in plants occurs a very long and hard post. The gardener is perplexed: the soil seems to have made the necessary substances, and for some reason there is no harvest. So why not, that plants are starving! It will take some time, and the soil will become acidic. Itself will become, naturally. But this may require a whole garden season.
Delicate balance
So should we invade the kitchen of a complex nature? Maybe it’s easier to let her live the way she wants. And to people-only to help the beds, with own hand creating the best fertilizer.
How to make fertilizer better than manure with your own hands
My neighbors-farmers suppliers bring to feed the calves green mass. In it what only grass there is no! There are pea tops, and lupines, and all the other herbs. All in powdered form.
The fact that the cattle do not have time to eat, begins to deteriorate. This happens almost instantly: that in the morning did not have time to spread out on the feeders, the day warmed in the thickness of the pile, in the evening it is almost a stove. Because we use green paint for mulching beds.
In autumn, all the green paint that was left, just moved the tractor to my fence. It was done around mid-October, because it immediately snowed, which did not melt until spring. But only it is warm in that pile I found a huge number of earthworms. They worked so well that it is possible to lay out substance even on beds – harm won’t be.
The so-formed herbal humus. In my case, it turned out a lot.
In nature of piles is not the case, but even layer of fallen leaves, flattened grass is always.
Green manure – a worthy alternative to manure
Grow them on the same beds: harvested radishes-sow forage lupines or phacelia. Then cut the plants with plane and leave it on the beds. Or just do not touch them – frost will do everything. By spring, there won’t be a trace of that grass in the beds.
I had white mustard sown in potato ridges last autumn after harvesting. She’s carpet! And in the spring I could not find any old leaf, not even a hint of mustard leaf.
This is the best fertilizer that can exist in nature. It is made with their own hands – sowing of green manure after harvesting the main crop or during its cultivation.
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