Seaweed

[dominic10]

I definitely soak my seaweed to get rid of the sand/salt - if I was sure it was just sand I wouldn't mind but don't want to take the risk. We have a very windy beach and the seaweed is covered with sand by the time I harvest it. I then compost it. I like the idea of filling a plastic bottle with seaweed for a feed Two Sheds. Can you do the same with nettles and comfrey?

[snohare]

Common salt - sodium chloride - is a fertiliser at low levels, and a biocide at higher doses. Hence it killing vegetation (trees next to roads depots tend to suffer badly from salt getting leached to their roots).
In days gone by, a farmer who was leaving the tenancy of a poor quality farm would sometimes strew the soil with salt; this had the effect of liberating whatever nutrients were left in the soil, by turning them into a more soluble salt version. He would thus get a bumper harvest, as a one off. However, the following year all the nutrients were gone, and if he found the ground at a new farm was poor, knowing that the trick would not work a second time, the new farmer might say in disgust of the ground, "It isn't worth it's salt".
Supposedly !
Once it has been rained on a few times I doubt if high tide seaweed is very full of sodium chloride, after all seawater is very diluted, but it will be full of wonderful trace elements that soil is normally short of. Only thing is, it's an offence under the Wildlife and Countryside Act to take it from most beaches, as so many shoreside habitats are severely polluted/damaged nowadays, so best to take only old, withered stuff - stay away from anything fresh(ish) which might harbour beastie eggs waiting for the next high tide, etc.

[Two_Sheds]

I definitely soak my seaweed to get rid of the sand/salt

Well, I've been experimenting. I've been rinsing my seaweed and pouring the salty sandy water onto the same patch of ground (primulas & foxgloves). Result = no ill effects whatsoever

I like the idea of filling a plastic bottle with seaweed ... Can you do the same with nettles and comfrey?

Yes you can.

comfrey+bottles | Flickr - Photo Sharing!

I don't measure or wait very long to use my "teas". I'm just sloshing the seaweed tea into gravel trays for watering (not diluted), and then topping up with more water. No ill effects so far.

(it doesn't stink either, it's lovely)

Seaweed/Kelp has a low NPK = 0-0-1, so is more of a tonic than a feed.

"The real benefit of seaweed is not in its NPK amounts. Seaweed/kelp can contain 60 trace elements, many growth hormones, and disease control properties in it" source

Commercial seaweed products here

[chris]

Interesting links, TS thanks for posting them

I've got a carrier bag full of seaweed, it's currently in my porch - so will be making up a tea batch with it tonight. Bit late in the season, but it may give a boost later on.

Interesting about the fish parts too, I may even try that!

[JustPotteringAbout]

I think it's legal to forage seaweed. I tried to contact the local council to find out today as I'd to go past the beach and had an odd compulsion to go and pick some seaweed. I couldn't get through to aynone who could give me an answer
I harvested some tonight while it was still frozen.
There's a shocking amount of plastic and other debris washed up on the shore Most of the bigger bits of seaweed was ravelled up with strands of rope and bits of old plastic bags, so i had to go for the smaller bits. Got a couple of carrier bags of it home before it thawed.

[alldigging]

There's a shocking amount of plastic and other debris washed up on the shore

It is shocking the amount of litter dumped everywhere.

Next time we go for a walk across the brook here we will have to take a bag for the rubbish we see. I reported some to the council and then had a nice man yesterday ring me and ask if I could meet him there to show him where it was. It is 15 minutes walk from my house, I had to be somewhere else and it was a blizzard so I described to him where he could find it.

[adamjohn]

I read on another forum a little while ago not to bother washing the seaweed as the amount of salt on it would be extremely minimal it would have no negative effects. I really need to get down to the beach and gather some more. Such a great resource.

At the moment I have only covered a bed as a mulch and have dug some in. I intent to keep getting more over the year and add it ass a mulch. Hopefully adding some much needed organic matter into my fairly thin and stony allotment.

[Mr Bones]

If the sun ever comes back out you can dry seaweed to use throughout the coming season. A few handfuls of the dried stuff into a bucket of water and stirred daily can be used on the plants as soon as the water turns silky (about three days).

[Two_Sheds]

There's a shocking amount of plastic and other debris washed up on the shore

Yes, I pick up more human litter than I do doggie dumps, drives me mad.

Yesterday the dog got covered in oil, which was all over the seaweed we were foraging. OH identified it as "dirty diesel" and said that ships will often dump fuel in the sea when the wind is high, because the choppy sea breaks up the spill so the dumper can't be easily ID'd. They dump it rather than pay to have it cleaned out responsibly.
That made me REALLY mad.

I reported some to the council

This is a useful website for that: FixMyStreet
I use it, it's really good. Pot holes get filled, street lights get fixed.

you can dry seaweed ... stuff into a bucket of water

Or just stuff the damp stuff straight into a bottle

[iam]

I made a new raised bed last year and added four bags of unwashed sea weed to the top of it and left it for 5 or 6 weeks then hoed it in and I had very good results with my veg. beetroot, chard, parsnips carrots and some lettuce

[Peppermint]

Up here all the 'old boys' put seaweed on the potato patches and then rotavate in. Some put it under the potatoes (in the same way as the farmers who produce jersey royales).

Some of houses here have seaweed gathering rights in the deeds (we have peat cutting rights in ours).

When we first moved up here we went on a gardening night class and were told to just put the seaweed straight on top of the soil and that it would rot down in weeks to nothing. We've done that this year and yes, that is what is happening. We've also put some on a barrel to make seaweed feed. We've also found shells in the garden when we've dug new beds - so obviously this has been done in the past.

They also use seaweed in Shetland Super Seaweed Shetland Style | wellywoman

[JustPotteringAbout]

Yes, I pick up more human litter than I do doggie dumps, drives me mad.

The local beach is in an appalling mess. There are tons of plastic and other waste on the beach, yet on my 3km walk along the beachfront there was not one general waste bin but there were a dozen or so dog waste bins. OK, dog dirt isn't pleasant for bathers and other beach / sea users but the council could at least make it viable for beach users to dispose of general waste which is arguably a bigger problem.
I collected one bag of waste for one bag of seaweed, seemed a reasonable trade to me. Dropped the bags up past the water break to dispose of on my way back only to find there was nowhere. I figured there would have been EN840 1100 litre bins dotted along the esplanade.

I'm sure the council will whine about flytipping or lecture me to take my rubbish home.

Yesterday the dog got covered in oil, which was all over the seaweed we were foraging. OH identified it as "dirty diesel" and said that ships will often dump fuel in the sea when the wind is high, because the choppy sea breaks up the spill so the dumper can't be easily ID'd. They dump it rather than pay to have it cleaned out responsibly.
That made me REALLY mad.

I noticed on a few sections of my local beach every pebble has black oil spots.

[Two_Sheds]

I'm sure the council will whine about flytipping or lecture me to take my rubbish home.

They may be unaware of the problem. Take photos if you can, and send a report