ShooTa
Member
- Location
- Denbighshire - In the vale of Clwyd!
i wonder if sheep would eat biochar......or want for that matter...
Compost teas
- Thread starter ShooTa
- Start date
Old McDonald
Member
- Location
- Harray, Orkney
I have yet to personally meet a farmer who is not holistic. All of them have considered the whole farm when making decisions. they might not have made the correct decision, or been able to afford to do the correct one, but they always considered the whol farm. The idea that holistic is good is no different to assuming organic is good.
I am not so sure about what they will eat necessarily being good for them. Ruminants, and particularly cattle, will eat the bones of their deceased former herd mates. I doubt that is good for them in the long run.
Funny you should say that. Ive just seen a video on FB of a cow choking to death on what turned out to be a large bone. The person in the video pulled it out and saved the cow
awkward
Member
- Location
- kerry ireland
that's a new one to me . would never have thought that. but live and learn. we all try and do different within our own gates . but its by sharing our successes and failures that progress is made.
New Puritan
Member
- Location
- East Sussex
- Location
- Owaka, New Zealand
They seem to.
It is fairly high in potash, of course - it is not really any different to eating burnt toast when you have an stomach upset, sometimes you need it, and sometimes you don't.
I have found my sheep eat more seaweed in certain paddocks and none in others, and cattle have a different pattern according to my notebook... so I feel it does depend to a degree what minerals they feel they need to forage for.
Certain paddocks I don't even bother supplementing them, but the younger grass they like a bit, and will nibble bits of char in there too.
Mature grass, not so much, as a generalisation - so I conclude their requirements are better met.
I don't believe that they simply don't understand what they are eating - it is reasonably apparent that animals are the true forage experts, they co evolved and did alright.
Deer wouldn't walk 5 miles through thick bush to nibble seaweed on an open beach just because they like the view? They do it because their diet is not complete, much as we crave fruit but may simply overeat desserts and other sweet things because we are misinterpreting the signals from our gut flora etc - probably the real crux of human nutrition disorders lies in misreading these clues, stemming from a mineral-poor diet; we continue to eat the wrong things, to satisfy "cravings"
ShooTa
Member
- Location
- Denbighshire - In the vale of Clwyd!
well - Just to start things off im going to start small and actually complete 1 full cycle of the berkel;y method 18 day compost - once ive got that down im going to relook into teas (mainly as no funds to buy the kit which are spare./ fml.
New Puritan
Member
- Location
- East Sussex
The not in the vale of clwyd thing for me is a real bugbear of mine its a long ish story but ill explain it. Our farm is in a village called gwyddelwern which was in the county of clwyd for a while but is not in the vale of clwyd its in the dee valley amd was in the old meirionethshire as well when the county border lines were changed.
The vale of clwyd is very good farming ground. There is grade one arable land down there and grass grows at least a month before were i am near and over 1000ft above sea level. Any time i get any farming success all i get off some friends lower down by the dee river (on some almost as good land as the vale of clwyd definetly better than my stoney patch) is 'life must be easy in the vale of clwyd'
FFS!
I think @ShooTa is in ruthin? Which is most definetly in the vale of clwyd. Theres some good ground over there but some not so good as well just like anywere else. But the people who arent in "clwyd" dont care about that its all good because of a line on a map
ShooTa
Member
- Location
- Denbighshire - In the vale of Clwyd!
New Puritan
Member
- Location
- East Sussex
ShooTa
Member
- Location
- Denbighshire - In the vale of Clwyd!
Berkley method - afaik takes 18 days to make. using an approx 1m high by 1m radius pile - layers of greens and browns well watered - left for 4 days to get up to temp (67 odd degrees or so) then turned every day/second day in a special way that puts the warm bits on the outside and the cold bits in the middle so everything cooks nicely. Richard perkins has a good video of it on his youtube, as does dr elaine ingham. plus a few others.
Theres a decent chance i might know you or at least know roughly were your farm. Might see you at groundswell on wednesday
ShooTa
Member
- Location
- Denbighshire - In the vale of Clwyd!
Yeah, that'd be nice - mainly going for hearing greg judys talk - but some really great other discussions, shame its the wrong side of blighty.
Greg judy is why im going too. Still havent booked my ticket though ill have to get o it
awkward
Member
- Location
- kerry ireland
how is this working out . did it go well
I searched "biochar" as I have a lot of woody waste to deal with and I found this very helpful thread; but I am not sure I understand what goes on when it is used.
It is supposed to persist without decomposing for hundreds of years; if it is so chemically stable, is it actually doing anything? Does it just retain moisture or will it release minerals (potash?) or whatever? Why is it used?
Some interesting links here but those I've watched so far still don't quite solve this for me; I would have though either the un-charred raw material or the fully burnt bonfire remains would have been more available to the crop.
It is supposed to persist without decomposing for hundreds of years; if it is so chemically stable, is it actually doing anything? Does it just retain moisture or will it release minerals (potash?) or whatever? Why is it used?
Some interesting links here but those I've watched so far still don't quite solve this for me; I would have though either the un-charred raw material or the fully burnt bonfire remains would have been more available to the crop.
Yeah interested to hear also.
Did my own composting with more carbon for increased fungi activity. after 25-30 days after all the turning it decreased in heat and I think now its down at 16c. Mycelium is taking hold from what I can see on top. I should really have it tested fr curiosity but it's a lovely earth smell. The next step would be to use it in a compost tea.
Old McDonald
Member
- Location
- Harray, Orkney
What you have posted is why I am not convinced that biochar is useful. I said so back in post #18 and nothing I have seen since convinces me otherwise. I do keep reading about many subjects because we are never too old to learn.
I have posted elsewhere about the South American terra preta and written a little about it in a book, and again I am not convinced it does anything that normal composting/degradation by fungi and soil organisms would not do. In fact I prefer the normal system without charring.