Lots o stems?

[Pondwater]

somany stems and stalks and i am remixing my soil, can i break them down and mix in for airation and nutrients? i do my leaves in the mix but stems? and at howmuch ? would stop compactation and add airation weed stems are very hollow lol

 

[bluter]

so many stems and stalks and i am remixing my soil, can i break them down and mix in for airation and nutrients? i do my leaves in the mix but stems? and at howmuch ? would stop compactation and add airation weed stems are very hollow lol

you can compost them but they'll take forever to break down. if you chop them up they will add aeration much like the chunkier wood bits you get in peat based media and cheaper garden / potting mixes.

a lot depends on what you use as a base for your mix.

 

[seaofgreen18]

somany stems and stalks and i am remixing my soil, can i break them down and mix in for airation and nutrients? i do my leaves in the mix but stems? and at howmuch ? would stop compactation and add airation weed stems are very hollow lol

Howdy,I would compost that

 

[seaofgreen18]

O

Howdy,I would compost that

OR feed it to your worms if you have them otherwise I personally wouldn't waste your time putting it in your soil it might cause problems that you might not want

 

[Pondwater]

O

OR feed it to your worms if you have them otherwise I personally wouldn't waste your time putting it in your soil it might cause problems that you might not want

most these peat free soils are bark n twig based, even my peat comes with stalks rotting away, so i cant seee any problems besides nitrogen locking which a presoak in fish hydroly would fix

 

[SmokingWings]

Break all the stems up into small pieces, probably no larger than an inch long. Mix with a quality compost at a 50/50 ratio. Put in a large flower pot or similar container and keep moist but not soaking wet. About half of the pieces of sticks and stems should be decomposed within a year. Add some liquid fish or some Blood Meal and shorten that to 5 or 6 months.

I do the same sort of thing mentioned but use wood chips after a tree company has sent branches, etc through the chipper. In the end it is the closest to "aged forest products" or similar names for ingredients on the back of bags of potting soil.