Chicken pellets in flower bed?

[vikkib]

I'm in the process of putting a border into my garden.

I've taken off the turf and the soil is pretty dry and quite light.

I'm planning on seeing if I can get some half price bags of mpc and grow bags tomorrow to incorperate but I've also got a tub of chicken poo pellets which never made it from the shed to the lottie.

Would these be something worth adding to a bed where I plan to grow shrubs and perennial flowers.

I think it needs more organic matter but I've got quite a few plants sitting in pots ready to go in so aside from expensive horse manure from the gc is there anything else I can add to boost it?

[WendyC]

Yes use your pellets. I use about a handful per square yard. Throw then down and fork into the top few inches.

[Two_Sheds]

Chicken pellets are high in nitrogen, which will give you leafy growth. Potassium (K) is for flowers.

tbh, I've never fed flowers in m'life, they really don't need it, not even roses.

As for extra humus, the quickest, cheapest & easiest way is simply to ~ you've guessed it ~ chop up your weeds and drop them on the soil, as a mulch. This improves your soil no end

[vikkib]

Thanks Wendy and TS.

I think I'm just concerned as the soil is so light and doesn't seem to have much substance to it. I've got some green manure seeds knocking around somewhere and I'll have plenty of gaps in the bed for now so I'll chuck some of those in then chop them up and add them for a bit more organic matter along with the weeds.

I've not really grown anything other than veg before so the needs of shrubs and flowers I've got are a bit unknown. I've got a small acer and a smoke bush and some other shrubs that look like they'll be fairly substantial so I think I'll have a little read up on a couple of them in case they need anything specific.