A Gardeners Forum Forums Members History Forum Life 2006 Ground-up corn cobs

I have access to a new area that I would like to garden next year. It is about 40' X 60'. When I've started a garden in the past, I always went to a local cotton gin and bought cotton seed hulls to add to the garden. I always bought several truck loads because it was soooo cheap. But, I've checked with the same (and other) cotton gin and the same cotton seed hulls that I once paid next to nothing for are now outrageous. It seems that the gins got wise to some farmers buying the cheaper loose cotton seed hulls under the pretenses or using them to improve their soil. But instead, they were using the loose, rather than the much more expensive bagged cotton seed hulls to feed their cattle. So now, the price of a pound of loose hulls costs about what I once paid for a ton!

As I was perusing the web the other night, I came across a place that said that if you needed something to add to your soil to improve its quality and to keep it from packing, ground-up corn cobs are the ticket.

Have any of you used large amounts of ground corn cobs to amend your soil? If so, do they work well? And, where did you get them?

There is lots of field corn that is produced in my area, but all of it that I know about is shelled as it is picked. This destroys the cob and scatters it over the field. So, I don't really know where to start looking.

Any help you are willing to share will be greatly appreciated.

Robert

Some of the popcorn companies still "ear out" the popcorn and process it. Anybody grow popcorn near you?

Roger

Roger,

As far as I know, no one around here grows poporn (on a farming scale). As far as I can tell, the only corn that is grown around here (and there's lots of it) is what we call field or feed corn. And of it, there is only one farmer that I know of who grows white corn. The rest grow yellow hybrid field corn. But, I thank you for the input just the same. And, to make sure, tomorrow I will contact my Ag Ext. Agent and the Farmers Co-Op and see if they know any different.

Robert

I picked up FREE cotton hulls from the gin near me. But I did not ask for a TON.

Maybe if you just ask for a standard size truckload they will give it to you.

I use white oak leaves because I have a lot of white oaks on my property and the leaves do not decompose quickly. Only thing is they (the oak leaves and manure) are acidic so I usually til the leaves & manure in fall then lime in early spring. My neighbor suggested cotton hulls this year. SO I tilled cotton hulls, white oak leaves and horse manure into my garden this past fall and will lime certain parts of the garden in the spring. Tomatoes and yellow squash love acidic soil so I leave some of the garden for that. This is the first year I have tried cotton hulls..I am interested in seeing if the cotton hulls make a difference.

Oui, thanks for the suggestion. The gins that I have talked to are the ones that I have used in the past. I have always gotten them by the long wheel based, full sized pickup truck load. And, depending on who was working, in the past they would give them to me (regardless how many I needed) for a price that ranged from free to about $15 per ton. But, the gins are no longer locally owned. I was told that they were sold to a northern company and that company sets the policy. Unfortunately, their policy is that cotton seed hulls are to be sold at cattle feed prices... regardless of the quantity OR quality! Oh well!

As for using the cotton seed hulls, I think you will be pleasantly surprised with them. I've used them for years because unlike pine needles, oak leaves and some other things, the hulls did not seem to affect the soil's acidity. Instead, they seemed be a compost which only improved the soil's quality.

I've already done a soil test on this other place and the pH was a solid 2.0. High acid levels are a problem that we have in the area where I live. Because of this, I don't want to add anything to the soil that would increase the acidity even more. I've already limed the area and turned it in with a tiller, so it should be alright in the spring. But since the soil has such a high clay content, I wanted to add something (cheap or inexpensive) to improve it. And as I said, it is about 40' X 60', so it will take quite a bit of the "something" to improve it.

I've been doing some research on mulches for gardens and have come across what might be the answer to my needs. On a couple of occasions, I have used old hay to mulch tomatoes with. I bought the cheapest grass hay that I could find. The reason that I quit using it was because of the problems that were caused by the tremendous amount of grass seeds in the hay.

But according to what I have read, if one will use Coastal Bermuda there is not such a problem with the grass seed. Not such a problem that is, if you make sure that it is predominately Coastal Bermuda. It seems that unlike other Bermuda grasses, the CB produces little to no seed and is vegetatively propagated. Therefore the thinking is that the CB makes a good mulch/compost without the problem of Bermuda infestation.

Thanks again, and good luck with your cotton seed hulls!

Robert

Cotton seed hulls cannot be good nutrition for cattle. Yuck.

I think that they will find that noone will pay big $ for something that is not nutrious for cattle verses something that is.

Getting free filler feed for cattle is a lot different then paying for it.

hummmmm....

I saw mulch on sale at WalMart for .99 a bag the other day. Do you think mulch could work?

Okay Yesterday my neighbor (who has a vegetable garden to die for) Put several tarps over his garden site. I had to go over there to see what he was doing. He said he is trying something new.
He has put sawdust all over the garden and is planning on throwing food scraps paper and used coffee grounds under the tarp. He said he will til it once a week and keep it covered until planting time...hummmm Just when he tells me to use cotton hulls he trys something new. <sigh>>

The joke may be on him, Oui. Any significant amount of sawdust will bind the nitrogen in the soil, and vegetables won't thrive. It takes several years for sawdust to break down.

Yep, I'd have to agree with pepper too...

Oui, I'm quite sure that you are right about the cotton seed hulls not being a good nutritional filler feed for the cattle. But, I also know that by volume, they are a lot cheaper than many other choices that the farmers have. Lots of cattle farmers around here use quite a bit of them as filler feeds.

As for the .99 per bag mulch, that's pretty reasonable for bag mulch. But, to cover an area that is 40' X 60' with about 4" of mulch, the cost would be rather high. Also, it would take quite a bit of time for it to decompose to the point that it would improve the soil's quality.

Peppereater is quite right about the sawdust. Right now, I know where there is around 3 or 4 tons of sawdust that came from a stockyard. And, it can be had for free. If you go in a pickup truck, they will even load it for you for free. But, I wouldn't have it if they delivered it for free.

About 4 or 5 years ago, I had a friend tell me about the free sawdust. He said that he figured that the cattle manure mixed in with it should make an excellent amendment to the soil and the sawdust should improve the quality of the soil. So, I tried it. I got enough to cover an area that was about 30' X 30' with about a 2" layer. I tilled it in and let it lay over the winter.

The next spring, I set out almost 100 tomato plants, 6 pepper plants and 6 yellow straight neck squash. I also planted peaches and cream sweet corn, purple hull peas, green beans and okra. The results? The corn got about 4" tall and died! I replanted it 3 times with the same results. From the tomato plants, we picked just a little over a 5-gallon bucket full before they died. We picked about 12 or 14 squash before they died. Got a little over a gallon of okra before it died. The purple hull pea vines looked pretty descent, but produced only about 25% of what they should have. The green beans did the best. They produced about 60% of what they should have. But the plants were very sickly looking from the time they came up until they died.

All of this from a garden that had produced very healthy plants and a multitude of vegetables the two previous years. And the ONLY thing that I did different was to add the sawdust. Until I read what peppereater said, I did not know what happened, but I quickly figured out that adding sawdust to a garden is a big NONO!!

I sincerely hope that your neighbor has better results than I did, but... The first advice that he gave you was the best. As I told you before, I don't know of any amendment qualities that the hulls provide. But, I DO know that they will greatly improve the quality of heavy clay or sandy soils.

Thanks for the replies. Have a Happy New Year.

Robert

I am surprised that my neighbor who is a vegetable garden guru would do something detrimental to his garden. It is not a lot of sawdust and he has it covered with tarps and is apparently adding potato peels etc (like compost) He also puts cotton hulls in his garden.
He has a few months to mess around with the soil before it is planting time. I wonder if he knows about the problems sawdust can cause. I will ask him. I was not planning on trying it myself because I did not know anything about using sawdust.

Green sawdust from a sawmill works fine for me, particularly that made at the first saw which slices up hardwood logs & contains bark bits along with moisture which enables the sawdust to decompose fairly quickly.
I stay away from pine or other coniferous sawdust, though. I think pine resin causes a stubbornly long nitrates depletion problem. Cedar sawdust--and shredded cedar-- ,though, is pretty benign,making it a good durable mulch.

I talked with my neighbor about the sawdust he is putting on his garden. He said it is old oak sawdust not new sawdust. He had about 1/2 inch of it on the top of his garden. He told me he is doing the sawdust/tarp procedure because the sawdust helps the food scraps decompose. He knew not to put NEW sawdust on the garden. He has already tilled it twice and still has it covered with tarps. He said he is covering it to keep moisture, and heat in and to keep grass and weeds from growing. Hummmm I think he spends entirely too much time messing with his vegetable garden.

Oh and he also said covering the garden with tarps attracts worms???? Huh???

He said he likes worms in his garden. Okay he is obsessed with his garden.

I am not looking over there anymore.

Sounds good..

(wish that neighbor of yours had a puter
he could come share some more of his wisdom...
We'd love to pick his brain..
Talk him into it!!!

Or next best thing.. you could go over for mini
lessons, and come back with the info...

He sounds like a wonderful neighbor to live next
to... they're the best...

He doesn't have a computer. He is nice usually. When I had my property surveyed to be sure I had the lot lines right, he was mad at me for a while, after that. He kept telling me that 3 feet of my property was his...Hummmmm...I will take pictures of his garden when he gets it started. He gets giant yields and his plants get so much bigger then mine..When I first moved in he sent one of his farmer friends over with a farm tiller to till up a spot for my vegetable garden. Everyday he sits out there at sunset and watches his vegetable garden in the summer.

He is retired, it keeps him busy.

I am so clueless sometimes. All I could think of when he said the tarp attracts worms was, "how can the worms breath under a tarp?" ..<<smile>>

Well, you tell him we'd love to hear
his tricks~of~the~garden....

I think it might do him good, you learn
and we have fun learning stuff to......

Tell him I enjoy a man that can sit out
there every sunset and enjoy his garden...
Nothing better than looking and watching things
grow, taking time to admire it and having the
time to do it..

I will tell him weezie..He is single..<grin>

He told me He has been working cotton hulls into his garden every fall for 20 years.

He has Blueberry bushes too..And has so many that I get to pick some every year.

Weezie do you think I should start a topic titled, "What is Oui's Neighbor Doing"

<smile>

Did your neighbor agree to it????
I wouldn't mind it...
I think it would be fun to find out all the little
tricks of the trade that he does..
And like I said, when he tells you, you'll be learning, and when you come back and tell us..
you'll be learning again, **cause it'll stick with you more, when you repeat and or remember it**
and then we'll be learning too..

But that's only if he'd like to...

Only problem is...he tells me stuff and then I put it up here..ie the sawdust thing. Then I do not think to ask him why sawdust, tarps...etc until later..I was worried that someone had put new sawdust on their garden after I read what new sawdust can do. I not a seasoned enough gardener to think of the right questions to ask until I come back here and see what the experts have said.

He never lets weeds grow on this vegetable garden he keeps it clean.

I would think that would cause erosion. But He has it tilled somehow so that the ground does not run off...hummmm

It would be nice if he could come on here, because I think it would give him a nice social contact. And he does have a lot of good advice.
<sigh> I hate to see him alone over there..He thinks computers are evil.

That is so funny. I'm jealous of his garden even though I can't see it.
I'm obsessed with my garden, too...I can barely stand to leave my house on nice days, 'cause I look at my garden area and just CRAVE some time to do more work there...
I sure am glad he didn't use fresh sawdust. I get free pine sawdust form a guy who makes surveying stakes, and I have a couple piles that are 2 years old...they're barely breaking down even now.

*Dave, I'm with you on that one too,
I am in my garden like almost all day..
and I feel like I should have more time
in the day to be there and do all I need
to do..*in such a short growing season,
it's really a hurry it up game*

***Oui, Have your neighbor do only that in
which he is comfortable with....You can tell
him you have several gardeners, who would love
to hear all of his secrets.. but we don't want
to make him uncomfortable, especially if he doesn't like computers. *he's not too way off
in his accessment sometimes, IMHO* but we are very precautious here and we try very hard to look out for one another here...
But whatever the two of you are most comfortable
with..