a little garden near Gawler
Reecently I posted about an experiment in using finished Bokashi compost to boost cheap potting mix. It’s been a couple of weeks longer than I originally planned before checking it but, you know me…
This experiment was the first in a series and this one was mostly to see if the finished Bokashi compost would be broken down in the potting mix. If you remember, I used a very cheap mix to see if I could boost it with Bokashi. It’s too early to tell if the soil is now any richer, it will take a few weeks for the plants to show any benefits. The assumption though is that incorporating more nutrient rich, organic material will boost its effectiveness.
The final result from each of the methods had no smell beyond something ‘organic’. Both had pieces of unbroken – down Bokashi compost in them but the bucket made using the mixed method of had only tiny pieces that took some looking for before I identified them. Some quite large pieces were left in the layered bucket. What these were composed of wasn’t apparent, meaning that there had been quite a bit of decomposition, which is good.
All in all, about 70% of the finished Bokashi that I put into the layered bucket had vanished and around 90% of that in the mixed.
I observed worms in the layered bucket but not in the mixed one. I’m not sure if this is evidence of anything.
All in all, the results were about as expected. I thought there may have been more activity over the extended time period (I planned two weeks but it took me a month to get back to them). However the theory worked and these results provide a baseline from which to check other experiments against.
Now that I know that the Bokashi compost does actually break down, I’ll run a test with some old, used potting mix that I have. I’ll do two buckets and mix them both. I’m even wondering if blending some Bokashi compost then mixing it with the potting mix in one will work faster? Maybe next time.
I also feel that there were not enough holes in the base of the buckets to allow good access to soil critters, so I’ve increased the size of the existing holes and doubled their number.
I’ve chosen to replant 4 kangaroo apple seedlings into the new mix and watch what happens. I’ll keep you posted…
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Ligaya Garden 