Blog May 2020

Latest Update 9th May 2020.

I use 200 litre custom made bins to accumulate carbon rich organic waste in one bin and mainly nitrogen rich organic waste in the other.  They have woven plastic sides which allow air to penetrate so the contents are kept dry and not likely to decompose. 

Occasionally, if I'm not careful, wet waste from the kitchen or clumps of wet grass clippings with form anaerobic clusters in the nitrogen bin.  These smelly aggregates attract vinegar flies and on one occasion last year they took over the bin.  Not a problem, I thought, they wont survive the hot composting process.  Well that's true, but some of them migrated to my EcoPropagators before they were exposed to the composting process.  They were attracted of course by the propagator's constantly moist wicking medium.

Happily they were not attracted by the wicking beds which have much deeper soil and are dry at the surface.

It took me a year, after trying everything I could think of to eradicate them, to decide enough was enough.  During this time seedling quality and germination rates had nose dived and I decided to take a step back to a more conventional system.

I hung on to some of the beneficial features of the EcoPropagators, such as the cold frame inspired protective enclosure which mitigates extremes of temperature in summer and winter (mini greenhouse) and I placed the unit on a stand to make access a bit easier for my aging bones.

The unit has a simple built in slatted platform to support three 30 cell plastic seed trays.  Its much smaller and lighter than the wicking propagator it replaces and consequently is easily supported on a light timber frame.  The base of the unit is closed off with woven plastic fabric (heavy duty shadecloth) to keep pests at bay and provide ventilation in hot weather.

I have built 2 identical units so far, and although this is very much a work in progress, at this stage they are working well.