Healthy soil and sustainable growing

["TradingPostPaul" <tradingpost@riseup.net>]

Maybe it's like those exercise machines people buy and eventually give up
on. When they don't get the promised results (buns of iron???), well, it's
obvious they didn't do it properly. Or is it? 

After a little reflection I now suspect that the sellers of ACT machines
just don't hear the negative reports from their users. IF I shelled out a
lot money for one and wasted my time spreading it on large fields, without
any results I could see, would I run out and tell everyone? Don't think so.
Who wants to be thought a fool? Would I go on the Internet - specifically
the Compost Tea list (I've been getting that list myself for some time) -
and tell everybody I spent my money on it and it didn't work for me? Don't
think so. 

I'm not singling out compost tea. Take those compost tumblers for example.
Finished compost in two weeks! Right. It looks like finished compost,
doesn't it? But how long does it take for the microbial processes to work?
Much longer I'm afraid. And ... all that tumbling continually aerates the
compost material, guaranteeing it will be totally devoid of nitrogen when
the two weeks is done. And without that nitrogen the carbonaceous material
simply will not decompose into healthy soil. But then some people can't
distinguish between wishes and reality. Dig the stuff into the soil where
it belongs, or use it for a mulch at least. 

Shortcuts? If wishes were horses, beggars would ride.

paul, tradingpost@riseup.net
---------------

The outstanding scientific discovery of the twentieth century is not
television, or radio, but rather the complexity of the land organism. Only
those who know the most about it can appreciate how little we know about
it. 
   - Aldo Leopold in  Round River, 1933

*********** REPLY SEPARATOR  ***********

On 6/15/2006 at 12:34 PM Soilsecrets@aol.com wrote:

>In a message dated 6/15/2006 10:04:19 A.M. Mountain Standard Time,  
>bob@bnbrew.com writes:
>
>" Will  those who say it can't be done please step out of the way of those

>who are  doing it!   
>
>
>
>That's fine Bob, do it on your own land and your own penny, but don't be  
>putting the stuff on someone else's land at their expense!   My suggestion
> to my 
>clients from this point forward when they have been damaged financially  
>because some commercial entity sold them on the use of Compost tea is to
>sue  them 
>to the end of existence.  
> 
>Dr. Michael 
>