ISHS Acta Horticulturae 294: II Symposium on Horticultural Substrates and their Analysis, XXIII IHC
QUALITY CONTROL AND USE OF COMPOSTED ORGANIC WASTES AS COMPONENTS OF GROWING MEDIA IN THE FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF GERMANY |
| Author: | Gerald K. Schmilewski |
| Abstract:
In the past decades raised bog peat has become the main component of growing media in European horticulture and overseas. Dependence on peat products in modern, industrial business is undeniable. Due to new growing methods and mass plant production quality standards for growing media have been established. Materials such as peat have made it easy to meet these standards. Before industrial plant production and before the development of peat based growing media growers mainly used garden soils, forest soils and leaf mold as basic materials for plant growing. The trend in the production of growing media is definitively not away from peat based media but towards stronger use of other components. Composted bark, the main organic component of growing media besides peat is commercialized mainly in accordance with the guidelines of the German Association For Quality Bark Products For Horticulture. Other composted materials will, as in the past, find stronger use in horticulture. However, their heterogeneous properties restrict their use to certain fields of application. Reasons for intensified use of composts in horticulture are increasing amount of waste, shortage of landfills and political causes. The German Association For Quality Composts was founded last year. Its objectives are to work out quality guidelines for the physical, chemical and biological properties of composts. These are preconditions for the appropriate production and useful application of composted materials. Compost analysis and seedling tests are indispensable for later application. | |
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