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Okay folks, I have a dilemma which I am hoping you can help me with. Any suggestions or experiences eagerly sought !
One of the growing spaces available to me this season is a shaded, very damp patch of clay soil that has hitherto been used in a half hearted way as a tattie bed. It is covered in creeping buttercup and couch grass, plus annual grasses.
I have available to me, as feed, some cow manure, from a pile that has been sitting outside for at least a year. Also leaf mould, as fetched from the forest nearby. Last but not least, we have bree from a compost heap in a wheelie bin with a tap at the bottom - powerful stuff, very like worm wee !
The main problem is, the man whose ground it is didn't realise that it was needing fed well rotted manure at the beginning of the winter. So he wasn't too worried about the manure we fetched, and much of it was not at all well rotted - it looks as fresh as the day it left the byre, in fact.
So if you were in my shoes, how would you feed the ground to ensure a good crop ? How and with what would you dig over the ground to make sure of the nutrients in it ?
All very last minute I'm afraid...(Although there is still snow on the hills here, so despite the soil warming it will be a while before the season really gets going.)
One of the growing spaces available to me this season is a shaded, very damp patch of clay soil that has hitherto been used in a half hearted way as a tattie bed. It is covered in creeping buttercup and couch grass, plus annual grasses.
I have available to me, as feed, some cow manure, from a pile that has been sitting outside for at least a year. Also leaf mould, as fetched from the forest nearby. Last but not least, we have bree from a compost heap in a wheelie bin with a tap at the bottom - powerful stuff, very like worm wee !
The main problem is, the man whose ground it is didn't realise that it was needing fed well rotted manure at the beginning of the winter. So he wasn't too worried about the manure we fetched, and much of it was not at all well rotted - it looks as fresh as the day it left the byre, in fact.
So if you were in my shoes, how would you feed the ground to ensure a good crop ? How and with what would you dig over the ground to make sure of the nutrients in it ?
All very last minute I'm afraid...(Although there is still snow on the hills here, so despite the soil warming it will be a while before the season really gets going.)
I have this sudden image of dreels three feet high with haulms six feet high, trying to compete with a Leylandii hedge...! 
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