Re: Should I grow in pure compost?

  For what it's worth, here's how I did mine. Dump a pile
of compost(aged cow manure from a local dairy in my case)
where you want the mound. Spread it out and till it in.
Shovel the stirred up dirt and raw compost into a pile, and
spread more compost about and on the hill. Till it in
again, including the hill, it'll kind of demolish the hill,
but that's ok since your going to pile it up again. Repeat
the above steps untill the mound is too high to run the
tiller over. 
  Now you just keep adding compost to the surrounding area
with the hill as a center, keep mounding the tilled
compost/dirt mix onto the hill, mine ended up about 4 feet
high and 6-8 feet across, this spring I'll probably go even
wider, say 10 feet, so the sides are less steep.
  Now that the hill is made, continue adding compost to the
area and till in. Our soil is rocky, but has fairly good
tilth, but little organic matter, so the compost helps it
hold water as well as providing fertilizer. I added as much
as I could to the patch, my wife seems to think the other
plants in the garden needed compost too, so I didn't get to
use it all on the pumpkin patch.
  Add as much to the soil as your willing to expend the
effort on, but dig or till it in. You want to "tie" it in
to the existing soil, or it may just sit on top of an
impermiable layer of soil, wich will hinder the plant going
deeper. Compost is great at keeping soil loose, so the
roots can go down even into the subsoil. We have dry
summers, and the loose, compost rich soil doesn't pack down
so the roots can reach the damper soil below, it also
doesn't pack down, so the water soaks in rather than
running off. I like the compost more for what it does
mechanicly to our soil than for it's feeding benifits. I
can always buy fertilizer, but only the compost makes it
spongy.
  If you have clay soil, then add sand too, it'll help keep
it from packing down so bad.

--- "Geoff B." <geoffbaggins@yahoo.com> wrote:
> I have very poor soil, and I read that I should dig a
> 2ft cubic hole and mound it with compost and plant the
> pumpkin seed/seedling in the middle of the heap. 
> Would this be a good idea?
> 
> 
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