Lazyman Soil Products| Know them? Use them?

Eric Frei

Have a look through this site, from soil aeration to conditioning.

LazyMan™ Liquid Soil Products for Lawns and Gardening

Interesting.

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newguy18

is that stuff just for flowers and lawns or could it be used for trees?

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old schooler

Knotahippie

The stuff really works on soil, improves tilth.

Compaction (foot traffic, vehicles etc...) can be a problem across the board.

Garry Brockley

The food side looks good but the claim it reduces sub surface thatch is a bit far fetched, the only way to reduce that is to physically punch through it by aeration and reduce it by scarification, ive dealt with these types of companies alot in the past and disproved alot of their claims, about how their feed can physically change the growing environment within a lawn sorry used to run a very successful lawn treatment co and tried lots of these products out, just sceptical i guess. some of the best are made by a very large company in the US of A whos name is like the country north of england and they have the best research facilities in the world, they state that sub surface thatch cant be broken down without physical intervention.GRRR but the food side looks good

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Knotahippie

I use 1/2" compost (biannual) to reduce thatch gradually, no aeration required. always had excellent results.

Thatch is usually from too much N. not enough bio. action.

Thatch and How to Manage It - Lawn Challenge - University of Illinois Extension

By using compost I reduce N application by 2/3 and water by 1/2.

Lessons in Nature by Malcom beck has some great info on carbon cycles and applications too.

I grew this wheat grass in wood/leaf chips only with no animal products (except insects!) and no fert.

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Eric Frei

Err, dont know that much about lawns however I'm more interested in the soil decompaction for trees and lately from this thread, Soil Aeration Experiments| Grade Changes| Compaction| Decompaction , it appears that aeration for decompaction is a little bit IFFY.

Aeration, I feel is more suited to a boggy soil. Decompaction, I have even recommended a rock breaker style of gizmo on a bobcat etc, to fracture the soil.

However there seems to be some evidence that organic treatments will do the work anyway, so read the aeration PDF's, read this guys "claims" and Knotahippie also mentioned some other methods to deal with compaction that dont involve equipment.

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Garry Brockley

We used an air injection aeration system about three years ago on a large area that gets used for car parking. there are hundreds of trees in that field and they are nearly all still healthy (apart from the ones that have been run into). i cant remember the name of the system but you drove it along and it pushed tynes into the ground and a compressor blew air at high pressure into the ground lifting and breaking up the hard soil from several inches down, good system and seems to really help with compaction, we do have alot of rain too so that may have helped things along aswell.

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Knotahippie

Just by fracturing soil slightly and adding a little LOW nutrient compost, water infiltrates better, O-A layer/ gets to where it needs to be...call it aeration or what ya' will,

"Air fracture" and the increase of pore space really makes soil drain better, makes it easy for important fine absorbing roots to grow.

Many plant's don't like stagnant water.

It takes about 8 passes with a backhoe to cause severe damage to roots (landscape below ground I-II).

With so many problems assoc. with const. and compaction wev'e gotta' have methods to reduce damage quick!...suggestions?

http://www.forestry.iastate.edu/publ.../for00-008.pdf

http://www.treelink.org/joa/2001/may...ON_randrup.pdf

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	soil_compaction_tree_roots_coder.pdf (27.4 KB, 79 views)
	SOIL_COMPACTION_randrup.pdf (67.0 KB, 532 views)

MTS247

I would have thought that mechanicaly breaking up the soil would only "break up" the soil up in to lots of smaller hard clumps!, not realy helping the root hairs as they are microscopic. this may improve drainage but would not reduce the effects of soil compaction.

Im not picking on anyone, just trying to help

Eric Frei

I recommend both to cover my ass.

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Knotahippie

Seems like a good idea to take it case by case...

Some nutrients aren't mobile in water, could take a couple years to get in the soil. Right after compaction is a good time to hit it.

And as Ekka mentioned, it's these soil building agents that really do the job.

I went to a conference where Malcom Beck told the story of the old Pecan tree on his property, here's the story..

Texas Bug Book: The Good, the Bad ... - Google Book Search

I use the Malcom Beck method of a garden hose, 4' of pvc and a plastic nozzle, made for tunneling under sidewalks, to "drill" holes.

I make a 12" pile of compost and drill right into it, 2' on center.

From what I understand this gets soil builders under the compacted area and by using water, blasts soil builders into pore spaces

When I'm done, rake and go. Usually looks no different, no root disturbance. Things are "aerated" and drainage improved...for the long run.