The aminopyralid saga featured on this week's Gardeners' Question Time. If you missed it you can listen via their web site click here.
I would appreciate any comments with reference to the advice that it is OK to use up contaminated manure by spreading it as a mulch on ornamental borders or any other comments on the programme.
6 months ago
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We used contaminated manure as a mulch in the ornamental garden and the plants have suffered. Some roses lost all leaves and suffered from die back.They are just recovering.
ReplyDeleteI would like to remove all the mulch,but it will be a huge task....and what do we do with it?
The veg garden is still showing signs of damage.New rasberry stems are distorted.
Thanks for this. I know of others who have lost roses too.
ReplyDeleteI wouldn't have suggested putting manure down as a mulch on an ornamental bed but then I am not the expert and wondered what others thought.
The only official advice is either get manure taken away or spread it on grass but neither is very practical is it?
I suppose another possibiliy is if you have a bit of ground that you can leave without growing anything for a year or so. Spread the manure on it and keep incorporating it into the soil and digging and rotavating until it decomposes. I understand that the manure needs bacteria from the soil to break down the contamination so I am not sure how this happens effectively when the stuff is used as a mulch other than bacteria from the soil being brought up by worms. Guess decomposition of the chemical takes longer though.
If you are OK harvesting food that may contain some residue you could grow sweet corn or squashes/pumpkins/courgettes as we found that they don't really suffer, in fact they thrive due to the manure.