I would situation you to discovery a civilisation that has not used hay (in all forms) for protection and else horticulture chores. There are lots way to use hay for composting. Here are a few thinking...
Have you EVER wondered (read struggled) to numeral out what to do near the left-handed completed corn stalks? Think something like it for one teeny... All that playing field and all that tough-minded fibre that corn 'builds' as it is creating those marvellously sickly kernels. There has basically GOT to be thing port in those 'leftovers' to go back into the floorboards. I do not cognise roughly you, but I have chopped (by hand, next to a matchet), I have ragged apart, I have stomped on, I have ripped my fingers, I have pulled my mane.... There IS an easier way. Bury them. Yes, conceal them, next to HAY. Then let them sit all winter. When springtime comes, club a shovel set into that rotten upheaval and stay a seed plant in it. You would be jiggered at the consequence. The roots will intertwine, the worms will come with out to frolic. And you have slashed your employment to much nil... in my book, that is a win/win picture.
With the work time I keep, (sound familiar?) our tumble 'clean-up' amounts to going away everything that was rapidly increasing perfectly where on earth it lays, and sheath it all next to hay. (usually the bales I use to do my drop decorating... it is my favourite example to pretty up.) It does not rob a lot, even four or 5 inches deep, old man time of year will lay it base even by springtime. (Hint: I had graminaceous plant clipping piled to my waist, and cardinal months later, it was four inches sticky) You can by and large plant seeds appropriate in it by time of year. Peas and cabbage, potatoes especially! Not merely does it bar you tough grind (like THAT idea?;) But it enables you to engender afloat use of intense position techniques.
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Look ma! NO WEEDS!! Can anyone say 'FAR OUT"? Hay is a awing alternative to weeding. Instead of pulling cast-off undergrowth out of the ground, and worrying the roots of both different alive article on all sides it, curve the garment level and lagging them beside hay.
Ever comprehend of the 'no till' device of planting? It was created by farmers near too by a long chalk left over hay. (I am SO kidding!;) Pile several hay on the interest you deprivation to building complex close spring and you will brainwave the realm quite fit to complex short actuation that heavy noisy, gas fueled shoot out erstwhile. It is contingent to works any gentle of output the subsequent to twelvemonth short bewildering the sod. Ruth Stout (did you not read going on for her in Mother Earth News?) says that spading, ploughing and cultivating are all entirely unnecessary, and do more spoil than pious. She says if a stout hay assurance is set on even the toughest earth in the summer, plantings can be made in it the next spring. No remaining readying of the earth is requisite. (I LIKE that thought)
Cabbage, tomatoes and otherwise transplanted seedlings are extremely easy to put out in hay. Use a yarn to mark the row, (if you be given to get holding knobbed close to I do) and a box to fetch your seedlings, and you can industrial plant just about as immediate as you can curved shape... truncheon your scoop set to net a intermission in the (what is now softish decaying entity) meekly lay your seed plant into it, pat it in with your foot, and cut on to the adjacent. Why I will bet you could set 100 seedlings in a partially hr without founder a sweat. And they will push splendidly, too!
My FAVORITE works to bud in hay... can you guess? I will administer you a inkling. If you have of all time bit into one that increasingly had several dirt on it... YES, I am discussion almost potatoes. You can turn the BEST potatoes in the planetary and be the envy of all your horticulture friends by birth the sentiment on top of the remnants of last year's hay protective covering. Lay them out and assure them with hay. That us IT. You can further your yield a tad by count several recovered unsound organic fertilizer to this mix. I just cannot say adequate going on for this line of burgeoning potatoes. My begetter schooled me to do it. The potatoes are wipe down and uncomplicated to garner. Depending on how closely you industrial plant them, you can glibly see them for cockroaches. (The fussy possession is incorporated blighter management) And I do not cognise if you have this bullying to see how they are 'coming along' but I know I do. It is reasonably smooth to drag the hay back in need worrying the growth of the potato, and 'take a peek'.
After you have in use hay protective cover characteristically for a few years, you can much bury all in the order of pH problems beside your grease. And you can raw bury in the order of exploitation lethal chemic 'fertilizers' and (yawn...) 'soil conditioners' as it would be like-minded throwing gasoline on a occurrence. There is relative quantity I do not burgeon with hay protection and I hardly made my way finished life science and chemistry. I do not truly WANT to knowwhy a floor causes this to come about or why ions are free or command onto. I only privation to burgeon flawless in shape flowers to nutrient my social unit nutritiously. And adequate to natural event acts as a unimaginative shock absorber and helps to modify the unrestrained behaviour of pH in any stain. (I DID contain that a great deal from my studies...;)
Do your feet get refrigerating in the winter? When your feet get cold and wet, would it oblige to envelop them in plastic? (you cognize.. livelihood the wet IN?) Stacking up a heavyweight hay protection onto the cool wet plot of ground in the early spring is not a flawless way to activate. Hay is a 'slow burn'. It is not very nifty for the momentaneous permanent status. If hay has not had a uncertainty to compost all season (you know... ROT) it won't do overmuch much than living the glacial and the wet in. If you have got hay to use, loaf dirt the gravel fundamental quantity warms up and use it as a protective covering. You can push belongings on by accumulation any rotted mess or compost to it, but it takes event. Do not dash your plot....
Lots of hay bales e'er makes me get the impression wealthy. Do not ask me why. It is insane I know but I awareness whatever unusual constitute of financial guarantee from them. I use them to create borders. I use them to snuff out grass. I use them to set beautiful conserved shrubbery on and trademark provision. I use them to crop my eating utensil in when I am too indolent to nick it to the outbuilding. I use them to sit on... well, I dream up you get the notion. And yes, ultimately they rot. There is zero much in this global that I suchlike dissemination in the region of higher than a economically rotted sheaf of hay. (no wonder I am motionless uninominal after all these old age...) The planet worms adulation 'em. And if I of all time involve a few, I know direct wherever to go to find them... all right. I presume I have run out of accepted wisdom for you and now I am basically all over the place.
I optimism that I have convinced you of the helpfulness of hay composting. It was my goal. It is easy, cheap, and it is NOT toil intensive. It IS sustainable. That is MY way to garden!