This morning I was pulling up wallflower plants to add to the compost bin and after stripping off the greenery then started cutting the stems with secatures but cut off the roots to put in the general household waste bin, I never add roots of the brassica family to my compost and wondered if others do the same or am I just being a bit quirky
If there is a compost thread I couldn't find it so move if necessary
I don’t add brassica roots only because they take so long to break down, Chard roots are amongst the worse for hanging around in there.
I bung everything in and just accept that some things will have to go through several times before they break down. (Secateurs, fortuntely don't seem to break down, but do rust
)
I don't uproot wallflowers but leave them to go to seed.
I cut the seed heads off and collect the seeds (or shake the seedheads where I want them to grow,
Then trim the plants back to new wood and let them regrow - they behave like perennials.
Thinking about it, I do much the same with vegetable brassicas too - cabbages regrow from the stump.
In answer to your question - I don't compost brassica roots - there are none to compost.
I throw them in, and when using the compost if they’re still there throw hem back into the bin.
You don't say why you don't add the roots to your compost, is it because of the size of the roots being uncompostable or for fear of club root? I add roots of most things to my compost as I have 3 x 1.25 cu mt compost bins, 1yr, 2yr and the 3yr old for current use, so most things will rot away in that time and if they don't , like CTM, the bits get chucked back to rot for another few years.
When I was younger I was told not to add the roots of cabbage etc. as there's always the possibility of passing on club root and when talking to a gardener from a different area but of the same era he was the same and didn't add the brassica roots either
I’m interested in this perennial brassica idea. Is the regrowth as strong as the original plant like raspberries where they just send up new shoots, if so why have I been digging them up all these years!!
My brain doesn’t always join the dots, there is a foraging plant on the coast called sea cabbage which must be a relative, and the tempest doesn’t generally dig up and compost it.
(30-05-2020, 06:29 AM)Mikey Wrote: [ -> ]there is a foraging plant on the coast called sea cabbage which must be a relative, and the tempest doesn’t generally dig up and compost it.
Mikey a lot of the brassica family came from the sea cabbage