Mixing Wood Chips and Compost

Discussion in 'Soils, Fertilizers and Composting' started by Durgan, Apr 2, 2007.

  1. Durgan

    Durgan Contributor 10 Years

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    http://Compost2.notlong.com

    2 April 2007. The city supplied wood chips, mostly deciduous, were picked up in October 2006 and the compost is garden waste brewing since October 2006. The two were mixed together in the shredder/chipper and will be left for further brewing for about a month then spread on the garden beds.

    The deciduous wood chips are used to create a more friable soil to insure water gets to the plant roots. Basically the process is the addition of fibre and some nutrients, plus it is a convenient method of disposing of the garden waste. The amount of compost generated from the garden waste is very minimal about 4 cubic yards for the year.

    http://www.durgan.org/Blog/Durgan.html 2007 Garden Journal.
     
    Last edited: Apr 3, 2007
  2. Ron B

    Ron B Paragon of Plants 10 Years

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    Spread them on the ground when they arrive, as mulch, and you are done.
     
  3. hortfreak

    hortfreak Active Member Maple Society

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    I assume the compost was fully composted when it was received (which presumably was October 2006, not 2007). Therefore, I am not sure what the purpose of mixing the two was. Bark chips used as mulch will break down and add more to the soil. I'm with Ron B.---spread them and be done with it. Why make extra work for yourself? Also, I think the water (in a garden bed) will find a way to the roots of the plants without getting obsessive about it.
     
  4. levilyla

    levilyla Active Member

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    Hopefully no black walnut mixed in there. Otherwise just spread them around.
     
  5. Durgan

    Durgan Contributor 10 Years

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    The chips were not composted enough and some chunks were too large. The compost has stringy vegetation that is miserable to work with in the garden. Mixing solves both probems with only a few hours of labour.

    Indeed, with a very large area I would take the easier route, but I feel more comfortable with this well mixed combination. The mixture is probably good growing soil by itself, but I have never used it as such.

    Aeration and mositure to the roots is always as problem with a base of clay. It takes a lot of fibre to break the clay structure, and to keep it from compacting.

    Durgan.
     
  6. Ron B

    Ron B Paragon of Plants 10 Years

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    If you are growing annual plants like annual flowers and vegetables you can re-amend the beds when they are unoccupied. For all other plantings, which are not regularly replaced amendments incorporated initially will decompose and disappear in time*, making the initial amending of suspect value.

    In nature the prevailing pattern is that organic litter falls ON the ground and is integrated into the soil system there, at the surface, where the air is. Providing organic matter in a more cosmetic fashion than in the woods, as in a private garden or commercial landscape we call "mulching". Like other gardening operations it is our version of a natural occurrence.

    Annual plants like flowering annuals and vegetables are derived from wild progenitors characteristic of recently disturbed sites where organic material may have become buried or burnt, soils exposed or disturbed. There is an ecological basis for these types of plants responding to cultivation (forking, tilling) and amending.

    *During one study, peat dug into a soil in the hot climate of Oklahoma had vanished a year later
     
  7. hortfreak

    hortfreak Active Member Maple Society

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    Sounds like your municipality needs some lessons in composting. I have never come across compost that was anything other than really good. Ugh. However, unless you are digging a bed for an initial use, I would still recommend putting the mixture on top of the soil. I can understand why you did what you did, but my goodness, that must have been a lot of work.

    No one has any heavier clay soil than I did in my former garden. It truly was "cement". I tried the peat routine (mixing it in, of course), and as Ron B. mentions, it vanished very quickly and basically did nothing. I then started getting large quantities of compost. It is amazing at how quickly a top dressing will start to improve your soil. All those worms got busy and did their job. I could kick myself for all the money that went into the purchase of peat and the years of wasted effort. I was just about ready to give up, but very quickly changed my mind. I then began to enjoy gardening.
     
  8. Ron B

    Ron B Paragon of Plants 10 Years

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    You can also buy topsoil, dump that on top of soil you don't like and plant the same day. It does not have to be very deep, unless there is a problem of a perched water table flooding it. (Installation of drainage lines is the solution for that).

    When one of our towering native trees (low, moist areas produce the largest ones) blows over in this region it can often be seen that the root system was very shallow, the strikingly flat bottom of the tree looking as though it exploded against the subsoil layer that diverted it.
     

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