North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[Mike Levine <mlevine@umich.edu>]

I considered using some once, but the particular product we were were
looking at had a tiny bit of radioactive material in it.  It was just a
small amount, but we were advised by a friend who does environmental
testing not to use it for that reason.  Every little but of radiation is a
little bit more you just don't want around.  Radon is common in our area
and is formed by the break down of these heavier radioactive elements so
it's believable that even a small amount of radioactive material in rock
dust could be harmful.
As was said before, not all rock dusts are created equal.  I'd consider
using some if it was clean of heavy metals and radioactive material and if
my soils were deficient and the rock dust's composition contained minerals
I'm lacking.  However, this land is quite productive so if it ain't broke
why fix it?  Soil testing and adding the specific things you are lacking +
a well balanced compost should fix most imbalances.

Mike Levine
Zone 5b
Scio Township, MI



On Tue, May 19, 2015 at 10:01 PM, Lawrence London <lfljvenaura@gmail.com>
wrote:

> On Tue, May 19, 2015 at 9:33 PM, Road's End Farm <
> organic87@frontiernet.net>
> wrote:
>
> > That may be true as long as not many people are using it.  If lots of
> > farms start using it, I expect they'll start digging specifically for
> that
> > purpose.
> >
>
> On the quarry site they have one or more giant rock crushers, to turn big
> chunks of rock into successively smaller chunks. In the grinding process
> dust is generated
> which is washed into the siltation ponds with water pumped from the
> siltation ponds. The objective is to create crushed rock not generate dust
> which is a byproduct of the crushing process only. It costs them money to
> manage it and that is why they usually give it away.
>
> >
> > None of the sales materials I've seen said "test your soil first and
> check
> > whether our quarry is a good fit." I'm relieved to hear that at least
> some
> > of the proponents are doing it that way.
> >
>
> Most quarries are not the least concerned with agricultural uses of this
> material. Only one I know of has farmers coming to haul it off. That is a
> granite quarry. I have a pile of their dust on my land. The benefits of
> land application of the right dust are immeasurable. To see is to believe.
>
>
>
>
> --
> Lawrence F. London
> lfljvenaura@gmail.com
> Ello: @ecoponderosa <https://ello.co/ecoponderosa>
> https://sites.google.com/site/avantgeared/
> https://sites.google.com/site/venaurafarm/
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