New Lottie compost and no dig query

[SimpleSimon]

Can I ask about strimmed weed and grass material. If the idea is that you put cardboard down on top of weeds that eventually rot and die, is there any reason why you shouldn't put strimmed grass and weeds (no roots that might re-root) under the cardboard? If it's OK, should it be left to dry a bit first or it makes no odds.

I've got rather a lot of such material, plus nowhere near enough browns to make compost.

Should be fine but you could also make weed tea with it all and use it as a nitrogen rich fertiliser.

[Snoop Puss]

Should be fine but you could also make weed tea with it all and use it as a nitrogen rich fertiliser.

That's a good idea. I'll try a bit, but I don't think I'll tell Mr Snoop. I've started emptying my bokashi bins into the compost (rather than dig a big hole in the ground for it) and he finds that really niffy.

[ameno]

That's a good idea. I'll try a bit, but I don't think I'll tell Mr Snoop. I've started emptying my bokashi bins into the compost (rather than dig a big hole in the ground for it) and he finds that really niffy.

If you do make weed tea, for god's sake be sure to make it in a container with a sealing lid. The smell is very potent.

[Snoop Puss]

If you do make weed tea, for god's sake be sure to make it in a container with a sealing lid. The smell is very potent.

I imagine it's knock-out stuff!

[ameno]

I imagine it's knock-out stuff!

Very much so.
What it smells of depends on what you put in there, but all smell very pungent.
I have weed barrels for killing perennial weed roots, and it's mostly couch grass, bind weed, horsetail and dandelions, and I find the smell is very much like cow manure.
Comfrey tea smells rather like some sort of fermented food product (the smell reminds me of the smell of certain fermented foods I encountered in Japan, and I actually rather like it).
Nettle tea smells utterly rank, like something died in the tub.

[Mr Bones]

Can I ask about strimmed weed and grass material. If the idea is that you put cardboard down on top of weeds that eventually rot and die, is there any reason why you shouldn't put strimmed grass and weeds (no roots that might re-root) under the cardboard? If it's OK, should it be left to dry a bit first or it makes no odds.

I've got rather a lot of such material, plus nowhere near enough browns to make compost.

Difficult one Snoop, can't say I've ever been fortunate enough to have so much green material to dispose of at one time. The most weed tea I've made in one go (before we turned over to no dig) was a 220ltr blue barrel rammed with a mixture of bind weed roots and couch.

I guess you have to weigh up your options..
Make it into weed tea (taking it you have enough barrels), which will release the nutrients but will also create a soup, densely populated with anaerobic bacteria.

Stack it up and use it a bit at a time, in which case the pile will turn into anaerobic slime.

Spread it about Ruth Stout style to create a dust mulch. With your weather at the moment the grass beneath will probably grow and need cutting again before the chopped stuff has dried.

Spread it about, cover with card and make your beds. This might temporarily rob nitrogen from the immediate area and will produce some anaerobic bacteria but it'll promote other soil microbes too. Critters of the soil food web will spring into action and help with decomposition plus the rain you're having will help when laying the cardboard.

Ultimately your no dig beds will become balanced with a bias towards fungus and aerobic microbes. Once the beds are made you could accelerate the process and help tip the scales in favour of aerobic (over anaerobic) microbes by applying a simple, low-tech actively aerated compost tea.
Hope this helps

[Snoop Puss]

Brilliant info, guys.

ameno, I'd be brewing your first mixture, so the niff would be cow manure. I personally don't object to the bokashi bin smell. Sounds like it must smell a bit like comfrey tea: a bit like a sweet pickle, fermented kind of smell. But it is strong.

Great info, Mr Bones. I might put a bit down, rather than the whole lot, and cover. Where I scythed some down earlier and just left it on the surface about ten days ago, it has dried up rather nicely. Surprising given the rain. It has also already started to break down a bit, and the roots and grass below is looking very pale. Shame I didn't have time to do the whole lot at the same time. Then I could have just raked off any surplus, covered with card and then Bob's my uncle. But no point thinking about that now. Got some free time this coming week, so will just settle down to it.

Any other advice you think I might need would be gratefully received.

[Muddy_Boots]

Been speaking to someone recently who used to work for a cardboard manufacturer until retiring recently and he has an allotment where I have three. He told me you have to be extremely careful about using cardboard as we looked at the plot of someone new whose plot had been covered partly with cardboard from broken down boxes. He said that the glue that is used to make corrugated cardboard and most glue used on cardboard boxes has a fungicide added to it for obvious reasons and fungicide is also added to the liquid in the mashed up paper just before they make the cardboard sheets out of the mush, so the majority of it has a fungicide of some sort added and is impregnated in the paper. Thus he said the paper when soaked will be leeching fungicide into the soil below, plus any cardboard of foreign origin could contain possible carcinogens in the glue as there are less strict standards in say china and the far east as to what is in the glue used.

Just my ten penny worth of advice I'm sharing from someone who probably knows more than us Joe Public types and if you are trying to be as 'organic' as possible may be unwittingly be not as much as you think by accident.

[Snoop Puss]

Thanks for that, Muddy Boots. Very useful.

[mrsbusy]

My experience of raised bed and no dig are mixed We were fervent Charles Dowding believers and set to when we got our allotment. We put the wooden frames on top of the ground and filled them up
The perennial weeds were delighted and 4 years on it is constant war! The weeds creep on under the wooden sides.
We also have made beds without wooden frames which are easier to deal with but there is a fair bit of digging up weeds although no digging in the true sense.
With cow manure - I found it set into a strong crust on top of the soil and needed much chopping with the side of the spade.
So no dig works best
on top of nice weed free or annual weeds only turf.