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Re: [compost_tea] Re: moss



Go back to first principles here. 

Moss grows in the lawn why?  Something allows it to out-compete the grass. 

What are the probable things? 

Lack of iron - interesting work by Tom Cook at Oregon State University on this.

Lack of oxygen - soil becomes water-logged, grass roots can't tolerate this, moss can survive as a surface growth, so moss outcompetes.  This probably explains the iron relationship.  When soil is water-logged, iron becomes reduced, forms hydrides in the soil, which are plant unavailable forms of Fe.  Interesting work on this by a number of soil scientists, but I can't remember their names. 

Shade often correlates with areas of compaction, so shade and moss are thought to go together.  Lots of places where moss isn't in a shady area though.  My backyard, which I have ignored for the last 10 years, for example.  Compaction is rampant.  Rain, rain and more rain is an important factor in that problem, along with lack of diversity, and the home owners association spraying chemicals.

Is soil pH part of the problem?  Is it a causative factor?  I do not know of any data that shows that if you increase pH, or decrease pH, you will as a result, have moss start to grow. 

So, pH is neither a cause nor a cure.   You can play games with soil pH, and kill the moss, but you then likely kill the grass, and you get to start over. 

The real solution?  Well, you have to set the stage to let the grass win.  You need to cycle the nutrients that have been made grass unavailable back into grass available forms.  That means getting structure back into the soil. 

Tillage can open up the soil, and start things aerobic again.  But none of us want to till the lawn, because you are then starting over.  If you do start over, how do you prevent the same thing from happening again?

Form and maintain soil structure.

How do you do that?  You all should know, I've gone over this enough times.  Those of you who haven't read through past answers to this, please go read the archives. 

Or go to the Soil Foodweb web site, or come listen to one of my talks.

Elaine Ingham
President, Soil Foodweb Inc.
www.soilfoodweb.com
SFI Oregon, USA
SFI Australia
SFI New York
SFI Europe
SFI New Zealand

"Hope is not a feeling. It is not the belief that things will turn out well, but the conviction that what we are doing makes sense, no matter how things turn out."   --  Vaclav Havel, former President of the Czech Republic


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