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thoughts about substrate
Seen that I had no response to my previous posting I've tried to make it
more interesting.
I did not decided yet for my substrate but here are my condiderations.
1.I would use humus because it has very high CEC and because it is decayed
organic matter so it should not cause any problem with high oxygen demand
and with fast leaching situations. But beacuse its CEC it's totally
dependant on Ph I will use also vermiculite and in greater amount, first of
all beacause I will never menaged to pick up some humus in woods without
picking up also some undecayed organic particles, second because it has the
capacity to old nitrogenum in the form of ammonium, third because
vermiculite has been reported to be a very good ingredient for substrates.
2.Maybe I will mix with that also some laterite (Dupla) first of all
because it has some kind of AEC (anion exchange capability) second because
it can make phosphates insoluble, then because laterite is a very good
source of Fe and micronutrients
3.I don't know if I'd better use a little amount of peat first to keep the
Ph of this soil a little bit on the acid side second beacuse it has humic
acids that can be usefull to plants even if peat is known to cause problem
because is a decaying material wich has high oxygen demand, but probably I
will solve this problem using a cable heater.
4.I will certainly use small gravel
The problem is that I'm still thinking about the ratio of these components
I know that Karen Randall has very good results using laterite and also
George Booth but I had only poor results using only laterite as suggested
by Dupla men
I will very much appreciate any comments
Bye
Simone Vicini (psvicini at mdnet_it)