*** Update *** Steve Solomon watched this video 😀, and emailed me with some important information that I had not known about. Apparently one of the key benefits of the rape or canola seed meal is that the 6% Nitrogen will be released quite quickly in the soil, enabling rapid growth of the plants. But the lower protein content of the rolled oats means that the 2% nitrogen will be released over a significantly longer period of time. If I added 3x the amount of oats as seed meal, there will theoretically be the same amount of nitrogen released, eventually, but using the rolled oats means the plants will likely not have that rapid growth. Getting feedback like this is one of the massive benefits of broadcasting what I am doing to the world, but it does mean that I am probably going to change my plans that I mentioned in the video. I just ordered a bag of rapeseed meal from Germany (going against my desire for a more local supply), to do a proper COF mix as recommended by Steve, and to compare it to the one with rolled oats that I was planning to use. It will be interesting to see what comes out of this little experiment! Learning something new every day!!
That is so interesting. I'm now wondering about the rape chaff I can buy in bales which isn't expensive. I wouldn't have a clue how to analyse it though. I'll be very interested in what your findings are with the rapeseed meal.
@@apolloallotment5130 ‘Gardening When It Counts, is a good general book about growing, which includes the use of COF. ‘The Intelligent Gardener’ is mainly about soil testing and remineralisation, with the first half detailing reasons why. I recommend both, but the first is an easier introduction.
A suggestion: Check any local beer breweries for spent grain, this would fit all the same criteria as your rolled barley while also being a byproduct. The only issue is that spent grain is wet, so you probably only want to pick it up when you want to use it.
If you go to a smaller brewery rather than a larger brewery then you may have more luck. Brewing take a lot of grain so breweries will have someone who will take all their spent grain continuously as messing about with small bagged amounts of grain isn't worth it. Also the spent grain is depleted of most desirable nutrients, there will be residual protein but nothing like what's in rolled grain. Spent grain is good for the compost pile though.
@@GlobalNomadPete It's also excellent for worm bins as a something to help add bulk and "fluff" the castings a bit so they don't get too compressed and soggy if you're feeding them mostly veggie scraps.
I was very impressed by Steve Solomon's book The Intelligent Gardener and it's methods have worked great for me. I think Red Gardens guy should write a book too. I would buy it, the guy is an amazing gardener and a wealth of knowledge.
Good to know that others have found Steve's approach to work out well for them. Thanks for the encouragement about the book, I am beginning to work on one!
I've been looking into growing duckweed for a similar purpose as a green manure, It's a floating plant that grows really aggressively and is very high in protein, and should break down pretty easily in soil. If you had a pond that captured run off from the farms you are near, duckweed could be used to soak up the nitrogen and then you could use it. This year I'm planning on growing fish outside, and if I'm right, duckweed will hopefully be a good by product. Just need the snow to go away.
Azolla is another good option depending on what's available in your area. Basically does the same thing as duckweed, plus it can fix it's own nitrogen as well. They're both an excellent way of pulling excess fertility out of ponds and small water bodies as long as you can keep it contained so it doesn't escape. Otherwise they can both be quite invasive unfortunately.
Chicken pellets have to be aged one way or another to become fertilizer safe for anything, so the head from being compressed into pellets is the last step. Its actually a highly efficient way to cook-dry them to their final state.
Just warning you that from oats spilling on the ground when feeding horses, a lot of the oats will sprout! You can also get crushed oats that are ground into small bits from some suppliers. Re the waste product, oats do go out of date and sometimes are returned because they have mould. Might be worth checking with local mills/suppliers.
Thanks so much Bruce! Great vid! I have near 100 chickens, half of them roosters which are useful for turning leaves in wooded areas into leaf mold which can be easily harvested. I've got more chicken manure than time to incorporate it. And eggs that are dated make good fertilizer as well.
@@REDGardens I just shovel them in under plantings started in small pots. I also grind shells to sprinkle for slug control. (I think it helps. ) Shells are also useful for peppers and tomatoes to prevent blossom end rot.
Wow Bruce. This video is what i am talking about. Blew my mind, and I have been wondering how to get my magnesium/copper levels up (especially for the fact that I need to grow stuff that the goats and sheep can feed on). Some of those elements are paramount to certain veg developments, and it's stuff we never think about (like moly). Well done and many thanks. Shameless late edit: Something to note when sourcing these products (whether manure or seeds) is to ensure that the growers/breeders/whatever did not use glyphosates or anything of the sort. This could transfer through the feeds, manures etc and slowly affect your crops in ways that take ages to unfurl. Learnt this the hard way by obtaining hay for mulch from an "organic farm" back in the day.
That's interesting. I'm just starting my gardening adventures, here in South Louisiana, USA. I found a horse stable that offers their manure compost, much of which is aged very well, for free. Just come and get it. I've wondered why more people, farmers and small gardeners, don't take advantage of this free compost. What should I be looking for?
@@GratefulWarriorMom there's some good people out there. I get sawdust from a mill for free while many others charge. If you can, do it. Only thing I would be doing is making sure the horses didn't eat hay and stuff that were sprayed with herbicides (especially Roundup). That alone can get you in the short run. But it's hard to ask, hard to look a gifted horse in the mouth.
I am a hide worker. I have long known the benefits of nitrogen from hide scrapings, hair, and stomach's from small butcher shops. Only this year do I get the chance to start using them. Thank you for your full review of the other options. Will just continue on my current path full tilt. I also do sig indigo vats, so you can only image where my used vats will end up. Oh look! An old septic tank!
@@REDGardens hide scrapings decay to become the nitrogen in the soil. You could soak your dead rats in water and allow them to decay. Pour that on the soil and WATCH OUT MOTHER NATURE!
I always enjoy your analytical approach. Have you ever been tempted to create a garden bed that is more directed to growing mushrooms, with the vegetables? In other words, creating a complete living soil. The rolled oats would encourage mushrooms growth which in turn encourages plant growth.
You got me thinking. Next season I will try interplanting beans with broccoli, sprouts and cabbages. My yellow lawn became lush and green after interseeding with clover. After harvesting the beans I can chop and drop them as a mulch. No need to use the compost bin for the above ground part of the beans. We all seem to be obsessed with only one type of veggie in a bed. After the last frost date I sow my winter carrots between the garlic with great success. Only thing is that I use a serrated knife to harvest the garlic in order not to disturb the carrots. Tried beets with broccoli last year, but most beets were eliminated by the birds, so no conclusion here.
Depending on your climate, there are some really good leguminous trees that work great as chop and drop mulch or compost fodder. Personally i use Inga tree leaves and woodchips, but I’m sure tamarind and even mesquite would work well.
Interplanting has a lot of possibilities, and I have had some success with it, but also had crops that really struggled. The beans could work quite well between the brassicas. I have heard differing claims about how much of the fixed nitrogen is actually made available to the brassicas while the beans are growing. As Damien replied, once the pods appear apparently most of the nitrogen goes into the pods and seeds, and it is unclear how much remains in the plants as part of the chop and drop. but at the very least you should be able to get beans without taking away nitrogen from the brassicas. Hope you have a good season of exploration.
a few years ago i fertilized an area using only rolled oats and rice. the vegetables grew very well that year, but not the following year with no additions. this year i did a different area with chicken feed pellets, wheat flour, and white sugar and the vegetables quickly grew into an unmanageable jungle. the main idea was to attempt to provide a good energy source and nutrients for the soil bacteria, but i have no analysis of what was really happening, other than the plants growing much better than in other areas.
That is interesting. It makes sense that there would be a burst of growth from that kind of fertility and energy. if there are things for the soil biology to eat, and to pass on to the plants, then there should be a decent growth response.
This was a great video! I primarily use fish emulsion and worm castings for my garden's nitrogen needs, but I recently purchased some neem seed meal that I'm trying out for fertilizing and pest control. It has an NPK of 6-1-2 and I'm top dressing it on my garlic and onions to test it out. I also have a large stash of dried nettle I use for tea, but some of it is a bit old and I may brew that just for my plants for a nitrogen and mineral boost as well. 👍🏾👍🏾
Sheep wool is high in protein and retains moisture. After shearing, the wool is skirted to separate out wool caked in manure. The skirted bits contain high protein wool and high nitrogen manure. A layer of wool on top of the soil retains moisture and slow releases the nitrogen from the manure and also slow releases the wool protein as it breaks down. In America the price offered for wool from meat breed sheep is so low it is not worth the price of the burlap bag required by the purchaser. Put a notice on the bulletin board down at the co-op that you are interested in wool. Cleaner wool is excellent in pathways to prevent erosion.
It would be cool to try sheets wool, which I think would be easier if I lived closer to the coast where most of the sheep are kept. I wonder what they do with all the sheep wool.
@@REDGardens I also wonder if it is worse for slugs if washed and the lanolin removed, or even if it could be dug in as a barrier. I read once that slugs can live 4 feet underground.
Just a very interesting point there about erosion.. I live in a small town in Wales called Tregaron. Years ago when they put the railway in they couldn't figure out how to put it across a bog, now a wildlife area - Cors Caron. So, they used sheep fleece under the rails and it worked for many years!
Thanks for sharing your knowledge. We run a market garden and use seed meal (rape, hemp and others) as our main source of nitrogen. I didn't know about the factor of 6.25 to convert the protein to nitrogen content.
That is interesting that you use seed meal as the main source of fertility. Do you have any issues with it, or do you find one type better than others?
@@REDGardens we noticed that it releases the nitrogen quite slow. The kinds are very comparable, some are harder to mill into powder than others. For that we use a garden shredder. One very important fact: most of them (mainly rape) inhibit germination. That was a late found fact for us so we only use it with transplants where bad germination in the bed is more of an advantage. In the beginning we also used horse fodder (pelleted clover) as a nitrogen source but seed meal is much cheaper for us (per kg N). The factor of 6.25 unfortunately makes other N-Sources (hoof/horn/blood residues) more cost competitive but we don't want to support that industry plus potentially bring in antibiotics. Thanks to your input I'm slowly getting a better picture of the seed meal. We are kean to start the new season with proper/better dosage of soil amendments. As it seems we were only adding 1/6.25 of the necessary nitrogen...
@@petersilie4927 Thanks for those insights. the slow release nitrogen can be useful, if you add enough in the first place. Very interesting to hear that they can inhibit seed germination, I wonder how long that lasts. I also discovered that the animal residue N sources are quite a bit cheaper than the alternatives, bu as you mention that industry has its issues. Hope you have a great growing season this year!
This is very interesting. I'm using neem seed meal a byproduct of neem oil extraction for added fertility and rice hulls for aeration on my beds. Another interesting intersection with animal feed is beneficial bacteria, I was looking at the list included in espoma's vegetable fertilizer and was fascinated that some of them are used as some form of chicken gut/health enhancer. Would be cool to research more and test some day
Very interesting. I'm glad you pin the comment. It's definitely something to consider in our situation. Great video, as always Cheers from Victoria, Canada
That makes sense, as it seems to be balanced, but the question is how much did they use. 4kg of 5-5-5 provides the same fertility as 1kg of 20-20-20, just less concentrated.
@@REDGardens Depends of course on the situation. When for example you use containers, say 10 gallons. Use 2 -4 handfuls. For example, I have one strip of planting soil in my garden of 1ft by 12ft. I'd make sure to just throw some handfuls and make sure most of it is covered. That should do the trick.
Simple suggestion: call the company that produces the oats and ask if they have old stock they want to get rid of. You may be able to barter for a bulk discount if you relieve them from surplus stock that's approaching the sell-by date, and you'll fulfill the criterion of using a by-product.
I once lived behind a beer brewery - they produced many barrels of spent grain a week - I used that stuff all the time in the garden and compost bin -- it gets pretty stinky but (and because) its loaded with nitrogen.
Another vote for spent grain. I was able to source lots from a local maltings but they closed down. I added it to my three compost bins along with fallen leaves, grass cuttings and garden and kitchen waste. I was producing enough compost to satisfy my allotment needs and those of my two neighbours. I added Epson salts into the compost bins as well, mainly following your no fuss methods which have saved me so much time over the years, wish you'd been around with that video 20 years earlier😊. Ireland just cannot be short of spent grain. Micro breweries are the ones to look for, they have difficulty getting rid of their waste. Or Get another patch specifically for growing rapeseed/oats/barley etc. for fertiliser or composting.
Yeah, I need to look into getting some spent grain, or even better stat brewing with my friends again! It is good stuff, though because it is wet, and needs to be incorporated with other materials quickly, it doesn't fit the need for a stable and storable dry material. I was thinking of approaches where I grew my own storable fertility, but it is the harvesting at the small scale that takes the time and effort.
@@REDGardens the stuff I got from the Maltings was always bone dry. The hops and spent grain I got from a local micro brewery was wet but it went into the compost bin.
@@Qopzeep nope no more than usual. Red Gardens had a video showing rodent problems in compost bins a couple of years ago. I'm lucky never had that quantity.
Spent coffee grounds are said to be rich in nitrogen due to the remaining caffeine content. Won't be the 5-7% you calculated for oilseed presscake, though, as fresh coffee grounds *start* with 2% caffeine. But if you can motivate a local café to collect spent coffee grounds separately in a fridge (for mold protection), it would be a free resource …
I used to get coffee grounds from the local (very small and not pressing a lot of coffee) bookshop, but then the owner started her own garden. I wonder what the nitrogen content actually was. If I lived in a more populated place, I'd definitely be seeing out that resource.
Coffee grounds are pulverised seeds, so a fair amount of protein there. I just did a Google search and according to Oregon State University, they have about 2% nitrogen.
@@REDGardens I was going to suggest coffee too; I currently get spent grounds delivered once a week by cargo bike! And lots of burlap sacks too, which I can always find a use for.
Nice addition to the conversation around seed meals and grains for building soil and feeding plants. I'm in the Willamette Valley and get most of my seeds from Territorial so of course have heard of Mr. Solomon. I'm learning more about the benefits of adding soaked seed to my chicken run to sprout for them and think there is a lot more going on with this than nitrogen (but you have to keep your video on point). The enzymatic activity generated by sprouting seed and brew grains is also a fascinating subject. Very interested to see where you go with this!
Thanks! good point about sprouting seeds chaining things quite a bit, as there is definitely a substantial change in the molecular makeup of the seeds through this process, which must make a difference. The sprouting of grain in brewing as you mention changes a lot of the stored carbohydrates to more dissolvable sugars, and I wonder what it does to the proteins.
Thanks for this. I’ve been trying to find a readily available, cheap, organic, vegan option for building soil fertility and structure in my veg garden. I definitely want to stay away from pelleted animal manure. I think going straight to the animal feed would be the more ethical option from my point of view. I’ve been trying to work with liquid options from nettles, pondweed and seaweed. But miss having a ready-to-use dry option.
Yeah, the ready-to-use dry and storable option for fertility, can be a tough one to find. So much depends on how each of us priorities different the possible different aspects of vegan, local, inexpensive, non animal product, produced without pesticides or synthetic fertiliser, and a few more. Ideal for one grower is not necessarily ideal for another, but at least there are more and more options out there, and wore people exploring.
This year we're building an Anaerobic biodigester, which produces biogas for cooking/heating, but more valuable to me is the bioslurry effluent byproduct which I'll use as liquid fertilizer high in NPK and trace minerals(obviously completely dependent upon the feedstock), this will get added to aerated compost teas, and soaked into biochar.
I've been using chicken waste pellets for years. I started using cotton seed meal last year, but I was finding critter activity was greater, digging around and disturbing direct seeded veggies.
If you are using compost and seed meal, you could add the seed meal to the compost a few weeks before spreading it in the garden. By then it would have decomposed enough to not be interesting to critters.
@@REDGardens If I remember correctly, Solomon himself actually recommends adding some of the minerals to compost prior to applying to soil. I'm not sure if it was in the book or in the calculation worksheets. I have a calciferous soil, so used those worksheets, and I remember phosphate, specifically, as being called out to be either added to compost, or to be foliar fed, since my soil will tie up any free phosphorous I add directly. I'm going to be following his methods for the first time this year as an experiment, so it will be interesting to see what adding cotton seed meal to my soil does to critter activity. I do plan on adding the mix to the soil a good few weeks before I direct seed anything, though.
@@walrusiam6233 Yes, I think there is definite benefit to adding it to the compost, especially with phosphorous apparently, and I am pretty sure Steve talked about that. Good luck with the experiments!
Great video. I use alfalfa pellets in my garden and orchard, which seem to be used primarily as a horse feed. I gather that they are derived from the alfalfa foliage, not seed in particular, although honestly I am not sure. I believe they have 3-4%N. I like the fresh, green hay scent of the alfalfa, much more pleasant than most other solid fertilizers. The pellets also seem to be much more affordable than alfalfa "meal" (and other seed meals), which are sold specifically as organic fertilizer. The pellets do seem to break down more slowly, likely due to lower surface area compared to a fine meal.
Well animals don't bind nitrogen from the air. They only excrete what they eat so using animal feed makes sense. Fertility is an underrated topic in our western society wich has distanced itself from the primary economic sector. Phosphate for example is an incredibly important resource for mankind and efforts to reduce the consumption and increase recycling will be necessary in the near future. At the same time much soil in the world is eroding and phosphate is going to waste. I enjoy your videos on these topics. If I owned some land I would love to do some experements with green manure perhaps. For now learning about fertility and soil has mostly improved my appreciation for legumes, fungi and worms and changed my perspective on "waste" in the garden. My parents drive me nuts sometimes constantly extracting unappreciated organic matter from their garden while wandering that fertility seems to be bad. Thinking in circles has to become more widespread.
@@REDGardens As for nitrogen cycling, I once read that the additional nitrogen from using human urine as a fertilizer would suffice to grow 80-100% of the food for one person. Forgot the source though … and the urine would need 6 months of storage to be microbiologically safe, and also is not as comfortable to handle as your COF powder.
Oilseeds are pressed and as a result are heated. Similar to compost, this kills weed seeds. I would be concerned with some weed seed content in rolled oats. As someone who grows grain commercially, keep an eye out. On the question of litter pellets: it is pelleted wet, and the resulting heat dries the material. This makes it stable and ok for USDA organic vegetable growers to use within controlled harvest windows for applying manure products.
@@REDGardens Happy to help if you have any questions. I operate a large organic grain farm in the upper midwest of the US. Very familiar with a laundry list of organic amendments, byproducts, etc.
Canola and soy meal are easy to get here in western Canada. I have been using Mr. Solomon's fertilizer for many years but over time changing it to include a variety of seed, leaf and animal ingredients. Choosing by size of grind, from fastest to slowest, alfalfa, canola, soy and then feather meal to really boost the end of season cover crops and remain till the new year. All applied at the same time, blood meal for super early cold weather nitrogen boost before the soil organisms are awake on things like garlic.
I had forgotten the reason for my comment....duh......the finer the grind the quicker the decomposition, I feel, so mill your oats and they ought to break down and release their goodness faster.
Two points from economics: 1) The price of an input will be roughly proportional to the amount of resources (including labor) necessary to produce it. (This is more true to the extent we properly address spillovers, e.g. with a carbon tax.) Silly example: rolled oats will be cheaper and use less energy than using an equivalent amount of oatmeal cookies. 2) Buying local is better all else equal. But all else is not equal. The extra energy necessary to move something might be dwarfed by the extra energy (or opportunity cost) necessary to produce it locally. Easy example: Norway should not grow its own bananas.
This seems like a lot of work. I’m a big fan of using cover crops. Much easier & cheaper once you buy once you can save the seed yourself & have them forever. Overwintering rye, oats & barley make excellent cover crops & you get a bonus of having an extra crop & the straw at the end. Include clover for nitrogen if you think it’s an issue. Advancing Eco Agriculture have loads of podcasts on cover crops & all the different mixes & their benefits.
Those are good options, and worth doing, especially for building soil. One of the key issues with cover crops is that you can't get a something to eat while the cover corp is there. Which is fine if you have loads of space, but not so much if you are trying to maximise yield our of a smaller space. I have been trying to find a study into the amount of nitrogen fixed by various clovers and legumes, especially for overwintering crops, but I haven't found one yet. Would love to know if you or anyone else has come across something like this. I have heard that the cooler soil over winter means that there is very limited nitrogen fixed, and most of the benefit is done in the summer when I would want to grow food. So for some contexts it is a lot easier to just buy in fertility from elsewhere. Thanks for the pointer to Advancing Eco Agriculture.
@@REDGardens from my experience (mulching with green waste) you need a lot of cover crop to produce enough fertility for a vegetable garden. Like at least double the space with multiple "harvests" per year. I use cover crops if my main crop is done early and I don't want to plant anything else. Its a good way to keep the soil from eroding, reduce the nutrients washing out over the winter and give the microbes some food but not a suitable alternative to fertilizing.
From my understanding of it, leaving soil bare in winter depletes the soil of carbon as the microbes break down the organic matter to survive. If you keep a cover crop in the space it keeps them alive as 75% of the sugars a plant produce get stored in the soil. And if the soil carbon gets broken down it releases the nitrogen & other nutrients stored in the soil, which then either leach out or evaporates off. Nearly all plants keep microbes that fix nitrogen too. Soil carbon is key to keeping your microbes & your nutrients in your soil. Most issues are not because soil don’t have the nutrients, it’s because they’re either bound up too strongly to clay & lack the microbes to release them or they’re leaching off in winter.
And using overwintering grains as cover crops gives you another yield from the space in winter when not much else is growing & will be out by the time your summer crops will go in.
One word, Roadkill. Extremely efficient and utilizes what otherwise would be wasted. And it doesn't require other process or farming that would use pesticide or non-organic fertilizer to obtain. Growing "Nitrogen fixers" is another great way
Come to Texas....... we're overrun with feral hogs. Some farmers even hire out 2-3 man helicopters w/ semi auto rifles for large scale eliminations in the 1000 acre sorghum fields post harvest. Then followup teams on dirt bikes/ATVs finish off the wounded. Thousands of pounds to dispose of....
I am certain you have access to spent brewery grains. It’s usually already beginning to ferment and heats up a compost bin quickly with a good amount of nitrogen.
I wonder if the decomposition will take a while and it will end up stealing Nitrogen from the soil. In areas with lots of dairy production, I found fully or partially decomposed organic Cow manure as good source of Nitrogen. Based on what you mentioned this would be readily available source in that area, which is also a byproduct. I am sure you have already considered this.
With the crushed seeds apparently the initial start to decomposition is fairly quick, and the release of nitrogen is reasonably gradual. I think most seeds contain a lot of nitrogen, more than is needed in the usual carbon:nitrogen ratio, so additional nitrogen will not be pulled from the soil. Unfortunately all of the most of the farmers int he area use slurry tanks, and don't have any compost/manure piles. And there has been some cases of herbicide contamination that really damages vegetable gardens, so I would rather stay away from that supply.
@@REDGardens Thank you! this might be nothing, but I wonder if overtime the addition of seeds with higher concentration of oil will change the composition of the soil microorganisms. Overall, I can wait to see the result video next year.
@@rostamkocholo Interesting question. I think the addition of a lot of any type of material is agent to change the composition the soil microorganisms, but not sure what impact that would have. Something I don't know enough about.
I read an article in Mother Earth News many years ago about this organic fertilizer. The only problem I encountered was that the seed meal attracted voles to the growing area. I have chickens now and I use their compost as an alternative but I think I am still dealing with the vole problem I started with this fertilizer. Here in Fairbanks, AK the voles can kill a lot of veg!
Have you considered seaweed? Local, available as a waste byproduct (when washed up out of the intertidal zone), feeds not only the plants but the soil, free and reasonably high protein percentage. It does have the disadvantage of requiring to compost further and the associated issues with decomposition in place (loss of nitrogen until decomposed), but then so do oats presumably. We use seaweed and hot animal manures as compost additions rather than application direct to each bed. We use cool animal manure within beds (specifically rabbit manure as it's already been processed to cool by the rabbit's digestive system, having passed through twice). All of which meet the criteria of local byproducts that are free to us and as close to natural as possible. Awesome uploads as always, thank you for sharing your thoughts and work. It has become an exceptional resource, you should be very proud. Thank you from the Highlands of Scotland. 👍 🏴 😁
I use some seaweed dust as an amendment, but given that we are quite far from the sea (and I don't drive) I am trying to focus on exploring land based options. I used to help collect seaweed when visiting an old friend on the coast, which he used as a mulch directly on his gardens, and would love to explore that resource if I lived closer. Thanks for your kind comments!
Have you had a look into low grade/course/short fibre sheeps wool? This low cost commodity is usually discarded/unused. There is a small company here in Australia called Verigrow that have managed to break down the protein (Keratin) into its Amino acids and created a liquid fertiliser, assumingly faster release/ more convenient. However I'm sure the wool can be used directly in the soil as a slower release nitrogen source with of course the help of microbes. Worst case, perhaps pre-composting or shedding may be required. I assume other animal fur by-products could be used similarly.
I haven't looked into sheets wool. I do know of people who have sued it, and with all of the sheep in Ireland, and the low price of wool, I am surprised it is not more available. I think if I was closer to the sheep dominated regions this would be an option worth trying, but I am in cow country!
Maybe grass clippings could provide the nitrogen? About 4% N according to a quick Google. Probably more if from somewhere with a lot of clover. Bit bulky though and might bring weed seeds.
I regularly use grass clippings in my compost and in some of the other gardens. There is a big patch of clover in the section I mow, so that is definitely a source of nitrogen!
Brilliant! In Italy they use soy meal as animal feed, but I was able to find rapeseed meal and flax seed meal in Austria at 30€ for a 25kg bag. I might give that a try! Thank you for sharing this interesting piece of information! I never considered animal feed to be used in the garden!
I haven't been able to find any seed meal that is available in a useable size for our scale, or not mixed in with a lot of other stuff already. I have given up on seed meals here in Ireland.
If you’ve got dairy farms around you could maybe source in a truckload of silage from them. “ Corn silage is not typically high in protein, averaging 7.6% in samples run in 2020 at Cumberland Valley Analytical Services.”
Great information Bruce as I am uncomfortable with using Chicken Manure a it originates from intensive caged Hens and I choose to only eat Free Range foods. This is something I will now look to switching to for my Nitrogen fixes.
Apparently the stuff I get is from 'free range hens' but I am not sure how that could be if they are collecting the manure. I suppose it is all from the roosting spots, and I hope the hens have a access to enough outside space.
If you think of the Rolled-Oats as a Nitrogen fixing Crop, that you cut and drop, it provides almost the same function. Combined with COF it becomes on the whole, magical Pixie Dust.
Have you looked into alfalfa meal? Quite easy to get. Law's produce certified organic pellets derived from waste from the sugarbeet industry. We use it sometimes but prefer bulky organic ammendments which are alive so to speak. We try to get away from the chemistry of soil and focus more on the biology. Great video again.
alfalfa pellets for rabbits works for me. can be made into a tea too. waste hulls/seeds can be bought in ton bags from local seed processing companies .
Most grains and oilseeds are not nitrogen fixing, so it makes me curious where their nitrogen comes from. Inevitably it will be from mineral fertiliser, right? Either naturally in the soil where they are grown or added by a farmer. The same is likely true for chicken feed, although I imagine the sources are more variable. What is your opinion on using these secondary sources of nitrogen rather than mineral fertilizer?
That is a fascinating question. I have been thinking about things like that, while doing this video, which I am thinking of turning into a second related video. You are right that the nitrogen has to come from somewhere, and the vast majority of it in most of the fertilisers that you can use, if you trace it back, comes from mineral fertiliser. Even the local horse or cow manure. I imagine that the likely scenario for the oats I am using is that the field they were grown on was sprayed with slurry from a dairy operation, from cows that were fed a combination of grass/hay grown locally with mineral fertiliser and grains grown both locally and imported, most of which would have used mineral fertiliser. So it is several cycles away form the initial mineral supply, and part of the process of trying to manage that cascading wave of nutrition. Using it directly can be a hell of a lot cheaper it seems, but it can really damage the soil, and if we live in a society that uses tons of mineral fertiliser, I'd rather take advantage of someone else messing with their land. Not an ideal, sustainable solution of course, but benefiting from the existing context.
@Nooneinparticular987 Very interesting stuff. Thanks for sharing. I would be really interested in finding out more how much nitrogen can be fixed in a vegetable garden soil (without giving over lots of space to nitrogen fixing cover crops) and what conditions will benefit this. And, perhaps more importantly how much this annual fixation compares to the amount of nitrogen needed for the intensive cropping of vegetable gardens.
@@REDGardens The nitrogen can initially enter the food cycle only from two sources: Legumes or Harber-Bosch method. Don’t you think that it is a waste of energy, land and resources to turn this nitrogen into grains, only to use these as fertilizer in the garden? It would be more ecological to use the mineral fertilizer directly in the vegetable garden. So I would argue it is the most ecological and resource efficient way to use mineral fertilizer directly when legumes are not enough. Of course all waste material like manure, compost etc. should be used, but not animal feeds. You argue that mineral fertilizer damages the soil. But it has exactly the same substances that are taken in by the plants as if we would use organic fertilizer. It has to be more carefully dosed though because it is directly available to the plants and water soluble, so excess could be washed off site. But there are also mineral fertilizers available which are bound into more complex molecules, so they need to be broken up in the soil first, same like organic fertilizers which are more forgiving in dosage.
@@Zufriedenheit Hi Josh, you make very good points. I do think it is a waste, and I agree with you that it would be more ecological to find a more direct way to use the mineral fertiliser in the garden, though perhaps adding it to compost rather than adding it to the soil directly. As an aside, some of the oats would be fertilised with slurry, the waste stream from the abundant diary and beef farms, so not direct mineral fertiliser application which I think makes a difference in this regard, but the origin of the nitrogen is still the same and your points are still valid. I am not claiming that this is the best way grow food, I am exploring a method that is promoted and used by quite a few people. And trying to keep an open mind about the benefits and problems of this method, and how to tweak them to better adapt to the conditions I am trying to grow in. So, I agree with you, and I think it is important to try things out even if I have my hesitations. I also believe that it is far more important for more people to grow more of their own food, and that the enormous ecological benefit of growing your own can more than offset less than ideal methods. I know so many people that tangle themselves up in trying to do the right thing, or are confused about what is the right way to do something, and end up struggling and not growing anywhere near as much food as they could. We should of course be working towards much more ideal methods, but that can set barriers that reduce the number of people who grow their own food. I am concerned about the great being the enemy of the good. So in this case I am trying to work with resources that are easy to get and use, even though they may be problematic in ways, to see how they work. And besides, it is only a tiny fraction of a huge industry, which uses significant resources and land to grow grain to feed hobby horses, so me using a small amount, or not, isn't going to change anything about that.
Isn't that the problem, someone plants something only for someone else to use that as fertilizer. So the veg, in the end, requires more ground than it actually seems.
Some “natural gardening” practices, very popular in Italy, preach that a vegetable gardener needs to cover the soil of his garden with freshly cut hay, which leads to needing ten times the area of the garden just to grow hay… aside from the fact that most people who have a small vegetable garden won’t have access to land to grow hay, I always found that this approach suffered from the same problem you mentioned
You are correct. When I think about it, all of the different vegetable growing methods I am trialing require the productivity of more land, sometimes a lot more land, depending on the method. Even with the waste products, that fertility once came from some land somewhere, and by putting it on my garden, more is required to be added to that other land. But I think this has always been the case with vegetable gardens. In traditional farms with livestock wandering the pastures, the manure was collected and concentrated on the vegetable patch, creation a steady flow of fertility form the surrounding landscape. Not sure if we can get away from that, but we can definitely be more considerate of where that fertility comes from.
Thanks for another great video Bruce. Super interesting stuff. I've been experimenting with a COF mix, following discovering intelligent gardener through you. Using waste coffee grounds instead not seed meal as it's readily available in the city for free (approx 14% protein apparently according to a quick Google search) I hadn't considered the extra for lower protien than seed meal, just been doing approx 2L plus other stuff per 10m2. definitely noticed some good growth where I put it on last year. Do you know Growing green by tolhurst and hall? It's the one for all the green manure knowledge and doing energy input output analysis. Just discovered Growing Sustainability by Dave of darlington at the end of last year too,a really interesting collection of essays. Also there is of course the classic nitrogen source... household compost activator no.1... urine. I've seen it written before that 1 human wees out enough nitrogen to fertilize their own food production but can't remember where. Just how to capture it. Think Center for alternative tech were experimenting with pouring it on comfrey and then composting the comfrey. Do need to be careful causing nitrogen runoff, how much is too much?
Thanks Ben. I used to have a small but regular supply of coffee grounds from the local bookshop in our small town, but I inspired the owner to start growing, so she uses it all now! Thanks of for the pointers to possible resources. Urine is definitely an under-used and potentially valuable fertiliser. I use it occasionally, but am hesitant because I distribute the food I grow to a lot of people. But we need to work at breaking down those social stigmas.
If you dont want to use this resources from latinamerica, perhaps you have a look to KNF, the korean natural farming or JADAM, you feed your microbes with very low costs and local materials, and so you can feed your plants! Best wishes from Silke from Bavaria
@@REDGardens perhaps can that link help you, it is a study of the university of Hawaii, this methode is the ferrari of KNF ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-eYtxexNNPyY.html and JADAM is the VW look here ru-vid.com Best wishes from Gunter and Silke from Bavaria
Thank you, this is a great content. I believe you might find JADAM ultra low cost natural farming techniques useful. Ireland has an abundance of grass, you can produce all the fertiliser you might ever want with your own green grass using JADAM methods. You have everything you need in your local area with JADAM.
@@REDGardens I've watched a lot of content, it seems to get the thumbs up from people. I'm at the front end of converting a tropical lawn to a productive edible garden, feeling very confident that I can produce and abundance of food armed with this info. I'm heartened that you have heard of it elsewhere - great ideas are worth spreading !
@@apteryx7080 It does seem to have a lot of supporters, especially in warmer areas, which leats me to wonder to what extent it would be appropriate in a much cooler climate that I am working with. Only way yo know is to try. 🙂
Historically in many places with dense populations human waste was coveted as a fertilizer. After being composted and aged, it is at least safe enough for staple crops. And diluted urine is safe as is. There are many publications on this topic. We need to set aside our taboos and look at the waste streams (literally?) that we generate each day.
This is the comment i was looking for, totally agree and with a dwindling phosphorous supply it's becoming a 'Criminal waste'. Humanure can go to hedgerows and windbreaks and the like, then the trimmings from those to the compost pile... Then you start considering how much land you'd need to grow your own fertility :-p
I didn't know adding protein was so important for plant growth and I'd like to try something unusual. Past 2 summers in Ohio, USA have provided an annoyingly great qty. of Stink bugs. I can probably find as much as a pound to add to my compost. I doubt this'll work on such a large scale as you have, but I've got a fairly small garden. Do you think it wiill make that much of a difference?
Interesting option! Anything living will contain protein, and with bugs apparently quite a bit. So I imagine there would be a benefit to the nutrition, though I don't know what unexpected issues could arise.
Using food to grow food is not the way. Feed animals, then use their manure. The manure will have much more microorganism, like compost, which is pretty good for plants, and still contain all those necesary nutrients.
But, what if you don't have any animals, and don't want one? I would have thought that the 'animals' in the soil would produce their own robust microcosm directly around the plant roots, which should be of benefit.
A huge step forward in providing plants with nitrogen will be made when we, as gardeners, find a way to 'unlock' already present but unavailable nitrogen. This coming miracle/mystery will be unlocked when we understand the role of Fungi in our living soil.
I wonder whether vermicompost would be a reasonable addition. You'd need to produce it on site, though, and find something to feed to the worms... hmm.
In Ireland most of the seed you mentioned used for animal feed unless labeled organic are very often sprayed with drying agents and sometimes fungicides to prevent spoilage when stored. Id check with the suppliers to see what they use as its not considered an 'ingredient' its not listed on packaging. Also any concerns about attracting rodents etc?
That is one of the reasons I went with the rolled oats, as apparently they are fairly 'clean'. The horse owners around here seem to be picky about what they feed to their horses. But there is still a risk of 'contamination', and of attracting rodents. I generally keep the rodent population under control around the gardens, but the birds have been very interested in the COF I just added to the soil!
Yes! BSG (brewers spent grains) have about 25% protein content. It is available most places at $50-75 a ton or free from small brewers if you haul it away.
Interesting, would this mean by adding meats, dairy and other high protein foods to no rules compost correlate with a more protein dense soil amendment?
i just use fertilizer. sourcing ingredients and mucking about wastes time. alfalfa comes in pellets, and whilst not too high in nitrogen, it breaks down rapidly in soil.
Thanks Bruce for a very informative video. I wonder if you are familiar with the work of Nigel Palmer ? He has run several very interesting videos on using vital nutrients and chemicals such as nitrogen through distilled and later diluted liquid teas . These includes teas made from nettles and comfrey. I’m trying this again on my allotment this year and hope to have some success in improving the soil and plants. What are your views on that? Kind regards Michael North - east Scotland
Bugs me to pay so much for chicken manure and don't know what the chickens ate. Hope to get into meat birds and eggs soon. Molasses can help build soil but is a serious attractant to deer. Same for alfalfa.
This may not be practical on your scale. And more something for the compost bays only. Does anybody near you brew beer with grains? Or if there is a brewing club/craft brewery, even better. Ask them for their spent grains and hops. It breaks down quickly and is great for getting compost going. You can also spread it over a bed and fork it in. I will need to brew some beer round the same time I'm planning to turn my compost. I have three bays to turn, so one with spent grains and green waste from the plot/kitchen every week. The spent grains will heat up very quickly as they break down. Hopefully that combined with the added air and green waste should get them well on their way.
Yes, spent brewers grain is great stuff. I used to brew a fair amount with some friends, and added the spent grains and hops to the compost. Because it is so wet, and needs to be incorporated into something quickly, it doesn't really fit with the approach that this garden follows, relying on a convenient and dry blend of fertiliser that can be stored and used when needed.
Purr alfalfa pellets are very high in nitrogen and cheap. They're usually easily procured and very easy-to-use. Just look for timothy alfalfa pellets for horse or other animal feed. It's around 20 dollars US for a 50 pound bag. It also contains a growth hormone naturally that boosts plants growth. I forgot the name of the hormone alpha contains but it's very effective as a nitrogen source for growing and especially as a compost activator.
Alfalfa only seems to be available at specialty horse shops here in Ireland. It used to be quite expensive the last time I checked, but the price seems to have come down a lot when I checked just now, equivalent to about 60¢ a pound. I would like to try it.
Very interesting. Have you considered "hoof & horn"? I used this on our nitrogen depleted garden last year and have been very happy with results. NPK 13-0-0, slow release over ~3 months. I think would meet your criterias of being a waste product, low processing, etc. Also dry powder that stores easily. I'm in UK though, so not sure what availability would be like for you.
Yes I was thinking of trying the hoof chips from my usual supplier has. They are apparently very slow release, as they are larger size, and that was one of the reasons I didn't go with them, as the COF is designed to be a quicker release. I was also looking for something that wasn't from animal based industry, as quite a few people are looking in that direction these days.
Definite option, though limited in our small community, and the owner of the local coffee shop has started her own garden, so is keeping it all for herself!
Bruce what is your take on using Rabbit food pellets. I have thought about this for several months. Do you have any reservations or recommendations on this matter. Thank you for your time and considerations.
Both good options, though not really suitable for the dry storable mix of COF. It would be interesting to explore other ways of integrating them into the vegetable patch.
I'd be really worried that the plants used to grow the feed were sprayed excessively with herbicides thus making it useless for gardening. I know that's a common issue to look out for when trying to get straw mulch.
Yes, I found it difficult to find solid answers, and just went with a baseline for the calculations. There was also a really wide variation in the protein content of oats, from 9% to 16%. I went with what was printed on the bag, but doubt they are testing each batch, and are simply listing the minimum standard protein content. So I suspect there could be a significantly more protein in them, but then the whole approach recommended by Steve Solomon is based on easy to manage approximates.
Why not use synthetic fertilizer directly. Now there is a farmer growing oats with synthetic fertilizer. And then you use the oats to fertilize your crop...
Very good question, and one that I want to tease out in a follow up video. One short answer is I am just following the advice from a very experienced grower to see how it works, and compares to the other methods and different approaches I am also trying. A more more developed answer is that I have read a fair amount about the problems caused by the use of synthetic fertiliser, and would prefer to explore the possibilities of avoiding using it on my soil. Of course this can be seen as hypocritical, as I am relying on materials grown with their abundant use. And I don't really have an answer to that, apart from knowing that it is really difficult to be purist in this regard. And, with this garden at least, I am exploring a method that accepts that these problematic processes are widely used out there, and to use them in ways that are appropriate and convenient, while minimising the potential damage to the soil I am relying on. But as I said at first, this is a very good question, and I am interested in finding better ways to answer that.
I'm not an expert in vegetable production, but I study agriculture and the numbers I have been given were in a range of 100-400kg of nitrogen per hectare and year in conventional and organic agriculture. This COF-mixture appears to be using more like 10kg of N/Ha/y which seems to be so low that its probably not worth including at all to be honest. Especially a small scale production could probably just try to better make use of atmospheric N. If I have the right numbers in mind one year of clover binds like 160kg of N/ha in the soil and the plant material. That would be the same as mixing like 112kg of oats in one batch of COF. Maybe I am very wrong about this and my numbers don't quite add up, but these have been my first thoughts after watching the video.
My calculations indicate that this would be 10g/m2 or 100kg/ha which is at the low end of the scale. But there is also compost, which will add a fair amount, and additional side dressing, or more COF before a second crop. But I don't know if that is enough. With the 100-400kg N of conventional mineral fertiliser, a lot of it apparently washes away, or returns to the atmosphere. The use of clover is a good one, except that you need to have double the amount of land, with half fixing the nitrogen with clover for a year, for use to grow the crops the next year. For larger scale systems, I think this is useful, or if you have a lot of land. For smaller scale systems, I think it makes more sense to buy in the fertility from the abundance that is typically around.
@@REDGardens Maybe my calculations are wrong by a factor of 10 and you are perfectly right. But didnt you say that one batch of COF contains 100g of N and one batch goes on a 10x10m plot? beacuase that would be 1g of N/m².
@@REDGardens I don't drive either. Used to. My Dad didn't get a driver's licence and vehicle until he was 37! Anyway e bikes are the way to go. And I've been living off grid for 24 years.
Fascinating video - thank you once again. Personally, I stay away from the chicken pellets because I very much dislike the industry they come from and everything to do with it, thank you so much for mentioning that. Rolled oats sound a lot better to use as an item that is pre-animal-farming industry, as in it isn't a waste product that I have no control over its content, such as with what the hens are fed or given like antibiotics. I have my own hens so do have a small quantity of manure to go in the compost. Would the rolled oats encourage rodents and some birds that can be a problem do you think? Even so, I would still rather use the rolled oats. One thing I can get is rapeseed chaff, and I now wonder about its value for soil, and it is a bi-product, it is also not expensive. I have given it to my hens to kick about in in the winter which was very agreeable, primarily because we are so rural I can't get small bales of straw. It has really made me think how, as gardeners, it is so hard to stay away from the large animal-agriculture industry.
Thanks for that. Interesting points about the lack of control of what goes in the pellets. I think rats and birds are definitely going to be attracted to the oats until they decompose, and I am thinking of ways to manage that. Another comment suggested mixing it in with the compost for a few weeks before, so that it has a chance to become less attractive - so supercharging the compost just before adding it to the soil. It is so hard to stay away form the large animal-agriculture industry. For some gardens I definitely try to find a way to avoid all that stuff, but for other gardens I am more content to use the resources available.
@@REDGardens I know exactly what you mean, it's just finding a happy medium, isn't it? It's like seaweed really. I use it from local beaches but then at the back of my mind I do wonder about glyphosate. Mind you, if I worried about everything I wouldn't grow at all lol. I have used the chicken pellets and then suddenly thought about where they probably come from. However, I still used them up, the idea of waste overriding anything else. Yes, that's a good idea, especially with the larger bins. I may get some to layer in mine. I'm always up for trying new things. I am wondering now about flaked maize? It went soggy quite quickly when we fed it in horse feed.
@@Pixieworksstudio "Mind you, if I worried about everything I wouldn't grow at all lol." That is one of the key issues we face in trying to get many more people to grow a lot more of their own food (which is my primary objective with this whole project and RU-vid channel). So many of us place these self imposed barriers in the way of growing food, which I think is a really serious issue because if they don't grow their own then they will be relying on food they buy in, which in the vast majority of cases will be far more contaminated and with a greater ecological footprint than anything we could ever produce for ourselves.
@@REDGardens Yes most certainly, I have taught myself to be vigilant, but not fussy to the point that I'm too worried to grow anything, with both of my gardens as food-producing, and the piece of land I have just bought for fruit. I'd rather do what I do than rely on bought-in whereas I know nothing about it. It is exceptionally important for people to grow their own, now I believe, more so than at almost any point in history. I so wish more allotments were available, and that there were schemes in the Uk and Ireland to make that happen. I have chatted with an MP about this, and I still wonder if farmers could be persuaded to allow this to happen on an easy access field for instance, giving them some kind of financial incentive to do so. But of course, it isn't wanted by governments because it dents the economy, and farmers aren't keen either, even if they only 'grow' meat and dairy. It is fabulous for mental health, socialising, physical health and exercise, with the benefits far outweighing any possible problems that I just can't think of. I would happily get involved with some kind of governmental push because I feel it is so important.
I'm not a great fan of Steve's method because it strikes me as neither accessible nor scalable (or unsustainable if done at scale), and although it may produce good results I don't think it's worth effort , despite the praise you've given it...
Fair enough. I can understand how his approach to soil testing and remineralisation can be inaccessible to people. It took me a while to understand. I am trying it out, or at least trying to use this approach as best I can, but with the COF, I find it a lot easier to adapt, if you have the ingredients. Still don't know if it actually works that much better than more basic approaches, but that it why I am testing.
Fortunately, I have enough compost for my garden, but would have never used animal feed in my garden. Those oats were probably too fertilized with mineral fertiliser, sprayed with pesticide and took much land to grow where otherwise a forest could be. With around average yield of oats around 4 tons per hectare, it translates to that on 1 square meter you can grow around 400 grams of oats. All this means using oats as fertiliser is WASTEFUL. And with seed cake it's the same, because the higher mineral and protein content means it's even more valuable feed than oats. That's why I think using NPK mineral fertiliser along with compost and nitrogen fixing cover crops is fine.
Very good points, and I don't necessarily disagree with any of them. With my other gardens I stay away from all the things like that, but for this garden I wanted to try something it see how it worked. I justify it in ways because I am using such a tiny portion of what is produced and consumed, so won't have any impact on the decisions of the farmers in the surrounding landscape. They are not going to suddenly start growing trees, and it seems more and more of the people around are keeping hobby horses, taking up loads of land and masses of feed, all to have a big pet. It is interesting what you say about the use of NPK directly, instead of through the wastes of the industry. I will have to think about that some more.
What about waste streams from brewing the spent grain from the mash should still have protein. I would imagine that the issue is how does a single person ta[p into industrial waste streams. The waste stream from malting companies could be useful as well again if you can get it.
Yes, those are good options, which I have used in the past when I was home brewing. I agree that getting access to the quantities one would need is an issue, as well as being able to incorporate them into something before they start to smell and go anaerobic.
I drink waaaayyyyy too much coffee these days and was wondering if my coffee grounds were good for fertilizer. With all the coffee shops out there, could the waste be used from those? Could be free too.
Spent grain seems to be a good source of protein/nitrogen, and a lot of people use it. I use to rely on some when I was home brewing, but never really tested it. The issue I found was how to incorporate it or manage it before it started to decompose/smell.
Have you tried directly contacting vegetable oil facilities? Ireland must produce some soybean oil, sunflower oil, rapeseed oil, or something similar. Where does the defatted seed cake go after the oil is pressed?
Yes I have. There are a few small rape seed oil producers around. One small facility already uses all of their seed meal as feed for the cattle on their own farm, and don't want to part with any of it. Another just didn't answer (and they are quite a bit farther away). The farmer I did get some from a few years ago had a few failed crops, so had nothing to supply, and I think he abandoned growing the crop. To be honest, it was too much of a hassle, and wanted to try something that anyone in the region could get very easily, and not be promoting something that just wasn't available. Hopefully that will change at some time in the future.
Thanks. Each garden is different, with most of them being more compost based with perhaps a bit of extra fertility thrown in. So not so specific or calculated.
