hydrangea - 3 -compost.

27 Jan '06 12:18 pm

There is a mushroom farm on the outskirts of our town. In Autumn(April-May) the fields of maize in the area are harvested and the stalks and stubble are then gathered in to trucks and transported to the farm where they form the base of the mushroom-growing compost.To the basic ingredient is added chooky poo,and other things to make up the recipe. It is then put into long dark sheds and sprinkled with mushroom spore.It is unbearably smelly, and the townsfolk gripe about it at regular intervals as it wafts in the air.
When it is replaced by new compost,big trucks transport the old compost to a depot, where it is bagged and sold to garden centres all over NZ ,at about $6 a bag. Now I am very lucky, for locals are allowed to buy it by the trailer-load.$15 .
I borrow Smiley`s Nissan ute, and tootle along to buy some and use it as an excellent foundation for the garden beds(or as a mulch)
This is what I put on to the hydrangea bed.
The nice little man in the mushroom transport office will come out and scoop the compost out of the big bin and load it with a small tractor and front-end loader.
As I was tootling home with me, the ute and my compost, I came to a line of traffic at a checkpoint,where registration, licence, etc were being checked. So me,the ute and the compost had to queue up behind the other vehicles. I think the smell really got to the traffic officer, as guess what,me , the ute, and the compost were quickly waved through!
Ah, what perfume will do !!
Dixie.

28 Jan '06 6:14 am

LOL

Mushy compost is quite acidic isn't it? Are the hydrangeas blue?

28 Jan '06 6:46 am

Guess what ! I`m writing about that next !Dixie.

30 Jan '06 9:27 am

Due to overwhelming demand(thanks both of you )I will complete the hydrangea bed.
I had brought about10 successful cuttings from my previous garden of a blue hydrangea. I planted them in the curved garden in the mushroom compost enriched soil,with my cuttings of campanula in front.I have used campanula as a border around a lot of my garden as it suppresses weeds and has a lovely starry flower. When they flowered they turned out Pink !(from blue cuttings) I added some fertiliser and aluminium sulphate, and over a couple of years they became blue .They usually have pink mauve and blue flowers on the same head,which is so pretty.
Dixie NZ

30 Jan '06 9:30 am

The next photo.

hydrangea - 3 -compost.

hydrangea - 3 -compost.

mushroom compost

Hydrangea 4