Healthy soil and sustainable growing

[Harvey Ussery <boxwood@nelsoncable.com>]

> I have 2 huge Dump truck loads of Fall leaves drop shipped each fall to 
> my yard by one of those guys who clean them up for the rich folks. He 
> doesn't pay to truck them to the landfill and I get free Mulch, compost 
> fodder, and parent material for my leaf mould. I make leaf mould to 
> replace the Peat moss and it works great in building soil.  
> I've even grown Wine Cap 
> mushrooms in the Wood chips last year!!  ~Bruce

Bruce, could you elaborate of the production of your leaf mould. It 
sounds as if you are making it as a pure "leaf meal" as opposed to using 
the leaves as the carbon component in composting? Do you do any further 
processing other than heaping it and letting time and the microbes and 
fungi do the rest?

Have you used the leaf mould to make seed starting mixes? I noted that 
you use it in place of peat moss for soil improvement. I abandoned peat 
moss years ago for my seed starting mixes, because of sustainability 
concerns. I now use coir (short fiber coconut husk) instead, but would 
sure like to come up with a local alternative that doesn't require 
shipping from the other side of the planet.

The wine caps--did you inoculate the chips with a purchased spawn kit, 
or did they volunteer? I've tried to get wine cap stropharia going twice 
now with purchased spawn, with no luck. (Ironically, though, several 
volunteered last year, the first I'd ever seen here.)

~Harvey


--
Harvey in northern Va
www.themodernhomestead.us

"How we eat determines, to a considerable extent, how the world is used."  
~Wendell Berry