Conservation & Ecology “
Compost turning can become a tad pungent during the warmer months, so find an area not too close to private properties or the letters from disgruntled people will flow after you’ve ruined their washing!
Small compost pile with clippings and leaves as the main source of recycled materials
humus, and humus is the consequence of a four stage process which, not too dissimilar to chelation, is an in-depth study in its own right.
The process is mesophyllic; thermophyllic;
Strong creeping red fescue and perennial rye grown in recycled sand and compost
stabilisation and maturation, however, I wrote a dissertation on these and it took months of research to scratch the surface of their actions, so I will try and simplify the process in the following words: the initial stage lasts only a few days where the mesophile microbes start to generate heat. This heat triggers the one to six week thermophyllic phase, thus allowing the multiplication of other microbes to further create more warmth. It is imperative that minimum
temperatures of 58OC should occur, for at
least a day, for sanitation to transpire. At this point, oxygen needs to be made available (by turning the compost) in order for anaerobic decomposition to take a foothold. It is in this stage, however, that temperatures drop, thereby allowing fungal spores to occupy the compost and carrying out enzymic degradation to the subsequent humus - which is exactly what we need! Also in this final stage, and this is the bit which gets really exciting, macro fauna and microorganisms colonise the pile, further stabilising the humus ready for use on your course or sportsground. Yet you need to understand that the humus cannot be too lively when you use it, as this brings about lots of potential problems, such as pathogen encouragement and root scorch - be warned! The trials I carried out with compost and
Fescue grown in humus
recycled sand - on strong creeping red fescue and perennial rye grass grown under controlled conditions - suggested that root weight, grass weight, colour, NDVI readings (Normalised Difference Vegetation Index provides an estimate of the plants growth, vigour, vegetation health, biomass production and a means of monitoring changes in vegetation over a period of time) were far superior to the plants which grew with no compost.
This is glaringly obvious to most of us turf managers, but do you know why this happened? It happened because compost
114 I PC APRIL/MAY 2015
has all the attributes toward healthy vegetation, so the message here is add a little compost to your sand and watch what happens. I’m not, however, suggesting that you build
a green, surround or fairway based on compost. I am suggesting that sand, with a small amount of compost added to it, will give you far better results than sand without compost. The requirements for the amount of compost you require is, of course, site and rootzone specific, therefore you would have to carry out your own tests prior to building anything with sand/soil and compost - be sure that humus is stable too please!
How do you make compost/humus?
Simple, actually. However, timing is everything! When you have chosen the concrete area where you will grow your compost (not near a water course or a fine turf area), begin by tipping your grass clippings into a pile and then mix either the woodchip, paper, cardboard or peelings (or all four) together; the reason for adding paper and cardboard into the mix is to allow air gaps to appear when they break down - without lots of oxygen, the pile will not generate enough heat to decompose to its maximum efficiency. The reason we add brown waste is that grass tends not to break down so easily and becomes congealed without a little help from the aforementioned brownies. If, however, you do not have a suitable
concrete base, then a bed of recycled sand may work, depending on how much compost you wish to develop. The sand will catch a good amount of effluent before it reaches the underlying sub/top soil and can be returned to the pile when it is time to move it.
Compost turning can become a tad
pungent during the warmer months, so I would try and find an area not too close to the clubhouse or any private properties, or the letters from disgruntled people will flow after you’ve ruined their washing! In an ideal world, you would have at least
three compost piles developing at different stages at any given time. I understand space
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96 |
Page 97 |
Page 98 |
Page 99 |
Page 100 |
Page 101 |
Page 102 |
Page 103 |
Page 104 |
Page 105 |
Page 106 |
Page 107 |
Page 108 |
Page 109 |
Page 110 |
Page 111 |
Page 112 |
Page 113 |
Page 114 |
Page 115 |
Page 116 |
Page 117 |
Page 118 |
Page 119 |
Page 120 |
Page 121 |
Page 122 |
Page 123 |
Page 124 |
Page 125 |
Page 126 |
Page 127 |
Page 128 |
Page 129 |
Page 130 |
Page 131 |
Page 132 |
Page 133 |
Page 134 |
Page 135 |
Page 136 |
Page 137 |
Page 138 |
Page 139 |
Page 140 |
Page 141 |
Page 142 |
Page 143 |
Page 144 |
Page 145 |
Page 146 |
Page 147 |
Page 148 |
Page 149 |
Page 150 |
Page 151 |
Page 152 |
Page 153 |
Page 154 |
Page 155 |
Page 156