Peat moss pests
I just read a bunch of reviews on miracle gro peat moss and most of them said that they had lots of pests. I recently bought some miracle gro peat moss and was going to re pot some of my houseplants until I read the reviews. My question is, is there anyway to sterilize it?
-
rainbowgardener
- Super Green Thumb
- Posts: 25279
- Joined: Sun Feb 15, 2009 6:04 pm
- Location: TN/GA 7b
You posted this in Organic Gardening Forum, so I'm assuming you mean any way other than introducing a bunch of poisons into your house. In which case I think the options are basically baking or freezing. Baking it works, but it smells pretty bad. Freezing it for a few days should work too, depending on what kind of pests you are talking about.
Peat moss isn't good for planting most things in anyway, except maybe as an additive in a soil mix.
Peat moss isn't good for planting most things in anyway, except maybe as an additive in a soil mix.
-
opabinia51
- Super Green Thumb
- Posts: 4659
- Joined: Thu Oct 21, 2004 5:58 pm
- Location: Victoria, BC
Peat Moss is generally not something that you want to use in your garden for these reasons:
1) The harvesting of peat moss from peat bogs in huge environmental nightmare because I) it releases more Carbon Dioxide and methane into the
atmosphere
ii) it destroys habitat for a myriad of micro and macro organisms
iii) it destroys habitat for birds
2) It contains no nutrients for plants
3) It is nearly impossible to wet all the way through and
therefore can be very troublesome to keep your
watered
Anyway, enough doom and gloom;
healthy alternatives are mulching leaves and placing them in your garden, cocoa bean hulls can be bought at most garden stores, straw works well and, (let me think) there are others. Check out some of the stickies in the organic section and the permaculture section may have some as well.
Also, note that Peat and the above listed alternatives are browns; being that they have a carbon the nitrogen ration above about 50:1 meaning that they are slow to break down into the something that plants can actually use (and peat doesn't have much, if anything) and as they are breaking down they will tie up any Nitrogen in the soil that plants actually need.
Alternative: also add greens like mulched weeds, grass clipping, manure, coffee grounds, tea bag/leaves and so on. These have a C:N ratio below 50:1, in fact most of them are below 1 and therefore have a lot of Nitrogen in them.
Note: Do not add more than a ratio of 50:50 greens to browns. In fact try to have more browns than greens unless you plan on taking a pitch fork and turning your soil everyday. Reason being if you have more greens than browns; your soil will start to smell due the the creation of secondary metabolites which not only are unsightly (and not nice to smell) but, are also harmful to plants.
1) The harvesting of peat moss from peat bogs in huge environmental nightmare because I) it releases more Carbon Dioxide and methane into the
atmosphere
ii) it destroys habitat for a myriad of micro and macro organisms
iii) it destroys habitat for birds
2) It contains no nutrients for plants
3) It is nearly impossible to wet all the way through and
therefore can be very troublesome to keep your
watered
Anyway, enough doom and gloom;
healthy alternatives are mulching leaves and placing them in your garden, cocoa bean hulls can be bought at most garden stores, straw works well and, (let me think) there are others. Check out some of the stickies in the organic section and the permaculture section may have some as well.
Also, note that Peat and the above listed alternatives are browns; being that they have a carbon the nitrogen ration above about 50:1 meaning that they are slow to break down into the something that plants can actually use (and peat doesn't have much, if anything) and as they are breaking down they will tie up any Nitrogen in the soil that plants actually need.
Alternative: also add greens like mulched weeds, grass clipping, manure, coffee grounds, tea bag/leaves and so on. These have a C:N ratio below 50:1, in fact most of them are below 1 and therefore have a lot of Nitrogen in them.
Note: Do not add more than a ratio of 50:50 greens to browns. In fact try to have more browns than greens unless you plan on taking a pitch fork and turning your soil everyday. Reason being if you have more greens than browns; your soil will start to smell due the the creation of secondary metabolites which not only are unsightly (and not nice to smell) but, are also harmful to plants.
-
rainbowgardener
- Super Green Thumb
- Posts: 25279
- Joined: Sun Feb 15, 2009 6:04 pm
- Location: TN/GA 7b
-
opabinia51
- Super Green Thumb
- Posts: 4659
- Joined: Thu Oct 21, 2004 5:58 pm
- Location: Victoria, BC
Hi rainbow! I noticed that you were a new mod, may I extend you a heartfelt welcome! this is a great site and I'm glad to be back. Though, I'm stilll incredibly busy trying to get yet another business off it's feet; I'll try to be buy more often.
Have you heard from Val?
By the way, sorry for Hijacking your thread Kurite.
Have you heard from Val?
By the way, sorry for Hijacking your thread Kurite.