[Market-farming] mint compost, potting up tomatoes

Rachel Evans rachel at sunshinefarmmarket.com
Tue May 5 10:57:44 EDT 2009


Just an update on the mint compost saga...

Turns out it's an excess of potassium salts.  According to the  
manufacturer of the compost anyway.  I need to brush up on my soil  
science, but what I was told by Royal Organic Products is that the  
potassium salts lead to an extremely high electrical conductivity (4.  
3 as received, 6.9 dry weight.  I have no idea what the effect of this  
is, but it's not good.

Also turns out the pH is off the map--9.4.

My understanding is that these factors derive from the mint plant  
itself somehow, or maybe the soil it's grown in in this area (Eastern  
Washington).

For a while I thought the mint compost might be contaminated wtih the  
herbicide clopyralid, but ROP tests for that--and they say that de  
facto their compost can't be contaminated with it.  Because the mint  
farmers rotate mint with potatoes and the clopyralid would wreak havoc  
on the potatoes.

So, I spent a long day getting all our transplants out of the bad mix  
and into somethign more straightforward.  More than half survived and  
we'll see what the set back will be.

That at ROP said that if he knew I was going to be using this stuff in  
a greenhouse operation he would have stopped me upfront.  Also says it  
can't be used in landscape operations, because people put it on too  
heavy.  (It's been messing with the plants in whiskey barrels around  
our house for sure).  ROP makes another product--a compost made from a  
combination of mint and yard wastes (tested for clopyarlid) that they  
sell for these more intense applications.  (That compost is only half  
the nitrogen though).  Most all of his customers are orchardists and  
at the rate they spread the mint it causes no problem whatsoever.  We  
didn't see any problems with it in our fields last year either.   
Though at this point we're going to be switching to something else for  
any side-dressing.  Most likely the cooked pelleted chicken manure  
stuff you can get.

Crazy.

If anyone wants to check out the analyses for these two compost  
products I can forward them on.  ROPs website is www.roporganic.com.   
If anyone wants to educate me about electrical conductivity and  
potassium salts, I'd love to hear it.

Rachel


--
Rachel Evans
The Sunshine Farm
37 Highway 97A
Chelan, WA 98816

509-670-8958
rachel at sunshinefarmmarket.com




On Apr 26, 2009, at 10:20 PM, toni eddleman wrote:

> Sorry, i do not.....but i will google to see if i can find  
> anything.  I
> just happened to read about the mint waste being used, and came upon  
> this
> in a search. about it.
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