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  • From: Keith Johnson <keithdj@mindspring.com>
  • To: permaculture <permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [permaculture] rock dust, need help filtering the hype from the facts
  • Date: Thu, 12 Feb 2009 22:56:53 -0500

Wendy,
Depending on the fineness of the material you are working with, the relative abundance of soil organisms, and the preexisting health of your soil, the material you apply will have varying amounts of availability to plants. I've learned that the best way to use rock powders is to apply them more often, every couple weeks or monthly, in smaller doses rather than one big annual meal. You wouldn't sit your kids down to a table with a year's supply of food and tell them to have at it. You shouldn't do it with the garden either. If you apply it to the surface of a mulch / lasagna garden it will trickle down into the root zone in short order with rain or irrigation. To make a small amount do more work apply the powders directly near the root zone of the plants even dusting the plants themselves. It won't hurt them and will even help protect them. If you do two rows of radishes, one with and one without, in a couple weeks you will notice a distinct difference in the roots of the plants. The ones with dust will have many more fine feeding roots and fewer of the long reaching seeking roots, basically telling you that the former are getting more of what they need without having to travel. This means less stress and less work for the plants. If you are using coarser materials the effect may be delayed a bit until the soil organisms get their "teeth" into it.
Keith

Wendy Smyer Yu wrote:
Keith,

Thank you so much for all this information. I am so glad to have somewhere
to look to do my homework, and to hear your personal experience.

Now I have a more specific question: we're in the thick of our short rainy season (CA)
and I'd like to get a good sheet mulch on in the next few weeks (yes, I'm feeling a
timing pinch, but I've just moved back from overseas). If I don't figure out what
rock/mineral products to use right away, am I losing an opportunity that would come
from "interlayering" it with the sheet mulch? Or is it best anyway to apply
it at the surface and it wouldn't matter if I was several weeks late?

Sorry for the really basic questions, I'm having to re-learn everything - the problem with theoretical learning when not based in practice (darned un-rooted apartment dwelling existence to be blamed!) is that it doesn't stick!
Again, thank you!
Wendy
--

Keith Johnson
"Be fruitful and mulch apply."
Permaculture Activist Magazine
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