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Author Topic: Improving peaty, water-logged soil  (Read 20414 times)

Hermit

  • Joined Feb 2010
Re: Improving peaty, water-logged soil
« Reply #15 on: February 14, 2011, 12:24:07 pm »
we have a line of three springs at the back of the house, one is bricked out as  a proper well. The old wells are usually surrounded by a couple of large stones to stop them silting up and a cover stone, nothing much just a frame for the well.

ambriel

  • Joined Jan 2011
  • Kinlochbervie, NW Sutherland, Scotland
  • Mad, bad, and dangerous to know!
    • Harbour Cottage
Re: Improving peaty, water-logged soil
« Reply #16 on: February 14, 2011, 06:34:50 pm »

That sounds very much like what I uncovered - a stone lined chamber with a slab of slate covering it. I might try pumping it out in the summer to get a proper look at it.

The house was built around 300 yrs ago, I think, so must have had it own well for a long time.

Persistent rain today. I'm going to have to do some digging tomorrow, I think.

Hermit

  • Joined Feb 2010
Re: Improving peaty, water-logged soil
« Reply #17 on: February 14, 2011, 07:04:34 pm »
In Shetland they used those old wells till the fifties. If you can get an old map of your local area from your local history group or archives the wells should be marked on there. It is rare to find them complete with capstone , how interesting.
 :( Gale force winds here :(

robert waddell

  • Guest
Re: Improving peaty, water-logged soil
« Reply #18 on: February 14, 2011, 07:12:50 pm »
AMBRIEL    are you sure it is a well and not an old burial chamber

doganjo

  • Joined Aug 2012
  • Clackmannanshire
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Re: Improving peaty, water-logged soil
« Reply #19 on: February 14, 2011, 11:06:33 pm »
Hey, that's a point - maybe we need to get Time Team involved? ;D
Always have been, always will be, a WYSIWYG - black is black, white is white - no grey in my life! But I'm mellowing in my old age

shetlandpaul

  • Joined Oct 2008
Re: Improving peaty, water-logged soil
« Reply #20 on: February 15, 2011, 08:25:49 am »
thats an idea. get them to put a trench down your field.

waterhouse

  • Guest
Re: Improving peaty, water-logged soil
« Reply #21 on: February 15, 2011, 08:45:18 am »
We've been using the prunings from our Leylandii in the field gateways and it's far better than straw or chippings.  There had to be a use for the stuff

doganjo

  • Joined Aug 2012
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Re: Improving peaty, water-logged soil
« Reply #22 on: February 15, 2011, 09:42:48 am »
Wow, brilliant, could I use that in my chicken run?  Is it poisonous to them if they peck at it? I have a run of leylands either side of my property.
Always have been, always will be, a WYSIWYG - black is black, white is white - no grey in my life! But I'm mellowing in my old age

Cinderhills

  • Joined Jul 2010
  • North Yorkshire
Re: Improving peaty, water-logged soil
« Reply #23 on: February 15, 2011, 09:52:44 am »
We've been using the prunings from our Leylandii in the field gateways and it's far better than straw or chippings.  There had to be a use for the stuff

What a fabulous idea.  Although not sure how poisonous it may be like doganjo said, and also for goats.  I did read somewhere I think that it can be toxic to pregnant ewes and their unborn lambs.

waterhouse

  • Guest
Re: Improving peaty, water-logged soil
« Reply #24 on: February 15, 2011, 05:24:42 pm »
I think this is one of the many areas no-one has researched cos no-one wants to pay for it.  I'm sure its poisonous but not in the same league as yew.  Our predecessors went to the tree shop and bought the catalogue, practically all of which have now been eaten by the horses.  But they also bought a hundred leylandii which grow much faster.  Even when we had a starvation paddock next to a hedge of leylandii it was barely touched.  My horse is partial to a mouthful, but this is a guy who can graze and canter at the same time, not completely successfully.

When we put some branches in a gateway of liquid mud in January the horses looked interested perhaps because there was no grass but ate very little.  We just put some more in another gateway and no interest at all - actually more interest in the secondhand straw from the sheep nursery.

My conclusion is that the animals will nibble but don't like it and won't eat it unless there's nothing else.  We're getting some grass growth and the sheep are less interested in the haylage let alone the leylandii.

We put woodships in the hen house because we had a tree down last year and got a metre cube bag of it

shetlandpaul

  • Joined Oct 2008
Re: Improving peaty, water-logged soil
« Reply #25 on: February 18, 2011, 04:26:17 pm »
we can now see were the old drain system went because its that wet. the entire drain system needs redoing. someone filled in the top 50 metres of it and diverted it its going to have to be put back. hint don't mess with old drainage systems. layers of branches used to carry railways across bogs. so maybe with a membrane down and gravel on top you would have a floating gateway.

ballingall

  • Joined Sep 2008
  • Avonbridge, Falkirk
Re: Improving peaty, water-logged soil
« Reply #26 on: February 20, 2011, 12:26:59 am »
Leylandi is an evergreen, and all evergreens are generally bad for livestock. However, the previous posts are correct- whilst Leylandi isn't very good, it's not really, really poisionous, like yew of rhodenren (sp?). I have seen goats eat some leylandi and they are fine with it- however I wouldn't like to see them eat any more than a few mouthfuls.


Not sure about chickens, but I can't see them being that interested in it in any case.


Beth

bloomer

  • Joined Aug 2010
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Re: Improving peaty, water-logged soil
« Reply #27 on: February 20, 2011, 09:09:58 am »
on the subject of leylandii for putting in runs

my only concern is the chippings and compost they eventually make is very acidic and not great for the soil don't know what impact it would have in a chicken run as they get trashed anyway...

if we mulch leylandii at work we leave it in heaps for 2 years somewhere that doesn't matter before spreading on the land

shetlandpaul

  • Joined Oct 2008
Re: Improving peaty, water-logged soil
« Reply #28 on: February 20, 2011, 10:22:15 am »
thats what we did it turned into a very peat like compost.

 

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