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Aloha,gardening gurus!
I don't have exactly "green thumb",so I could use some help.
I have a lot in Sea View.I was told it needs soil .I plan to grow all kinds of stuff that me and bugs can eat.The lot is 8000sq ft ,-800sg ft house, -catchment.
How many (trucks loads?) of soil do I need,assuming now is very little there.How much it will cost?What kind of good(organic?)soil you recommend?
I just need "ballpark" figures,since I need to be financially prepared.
Thank you for your time.
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You could start by setting up a compost bin. This will reduce the amount of stuff you haul to the transfer station. You can also get mulch from the Hilo dump, although I've heard cautionary things about what you could be bringing to your property with that stuff.
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The topsoil available often comes from construction excavations in Hilo, often from old housesites, and may contain debris (nails, glass, termites), not to mention all the weed seeds and sprouting roots. A layer of black cinders about 6" deep will grow just about anything when you add compost and fertlizer. Cinders would be cheaper too. For your lot, I'd guess 4 or 5 30 yd.loads would be plenty.
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Aloha Stillhope, good to see you here. This is THE place to be if your interested in anything Puna. A little more down to earth than Citydata, I don't think anyone on punaweb ever asked if we have a cannibal problem[  ]
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Beware of buying cinders, they almost always have tons of weed seeds, including some really nasty tenacious stuff. When we lived in Seaview our landlord had brought in cinders because he wanted a lawn, the grass died but all sorts of weeds sure did thrive. The bare lava next door was weed free.
I would start out planting the edges while creating my own compost, mac nut shells make great mulch and the coffee processors have literally tons of the outer part of the coffee cherries which are good mulch too. Just remember that if you bring in problem weeds in mulch or cinders you will have to deal with them for a long long time.
Carol
Carol
Every time you feel yourself getting pulled into other people's nonsense, repeat these words: Not my circus, not my monkeys.
Polish Proverb
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2 Truckloads of cinder soil mix from Brysons Cinders at approx. $500.00 a truckload should give you a nice area on your property to start immediately growing just about anything. Yes it also brings in the weeds....but weeds grow everywhere here regardless of how careful one might be.
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stillhope and leilaniguy: sorry, while this is off post, on another forum based out of maui, we refer to city-data as shi--ydata. feel free to fill in the blanks.
malia paha o lohe aku
perhaps they will hear
"a great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejudices."
w. james
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Cinder is indeed just lava. In volcanic events a fountain of lava would shoot into the air. Billions of small lava bits would fall and cool creating piles, mounds, mountains of "cinder". This is now mined in red, black and mixed red & black cinder.
Red cinder is usually used for road and walkways. Black cinder is usually used for planting areas.
People who are used to "dirt" are not accustomed to the growing abilities of cinder. Dirt is not much nesessary here unless you really, really like mud. Cinder is rich in the nutrients plants need and rain forest jungles spring forth from the cinder. Plants, at least tropical plants, will grow nicely in cinder.
Other soil mixes, if needed, can be created - but start with a nice load of black cinder.
It is qute astonishing that you can take a plastic pot, fill it with cinder, whack off a cutting of most any local plant and stick it in the pot and it will grow. Takes a bit of getting used to but it is true.
What cinder does poorly is retain water. Here, where it rains 100+ inches a year that is usually not a problem. But for those dry spells (we are in one now) I would make a simple recomendation that in Seaview you spend your most energy on catching and keeping water and think about building soils later.
Assume the best and ask questions.
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Does anybody know someone who is hauling black cinder right now in dumptruck lots? I called Bryson's a couple weeks ago and they said they were only hauling red at the time. Thanks.
Cheers,
Jerry
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We have used huge amounts of the 'green waste' from the County's grinder at the landfill. It works great. An occasional piece of metal or platic to remove. Not aware of any invasives brought in.
My very all-time favorite mulch: paper. All kinds of paper (except the shiny stuff -- it's nasty and to be kept out of the soil) - newspaper, phone books, cardboard, and on and on.
6th HPP (80' elev, 1 mile inland) we are growing 'pigeon pea' (cajanus cajan). Leguminous bush. Fixes nitrogen. Leaves and stems provide mulch for bananas, citrus, etc. Has a very strong taproot to eploit fissures in the ripped lava. With continuous pruning for mulch, the plants last about 1 to 2 years; so, we are continuously replanting. The dead stump and roots open up space and become organic matter for crop roots.
James Weatherford, Ph.D.
15-1888 Hialoa
Hawaiian Paradise Park
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