Seaweed

We're constantly told that seaweed is the bees knees in the garden. Chock full of nutrients including trace elements that are often in short supply in the garden.

Does it matter what kind of seaweed? Today I collected two great sacks of the mostly green stringy type, like grass but out of the sea. Towards the end of August we usually see great heaps of the brown flat stuff which I think is kelp.

Also, apart from the nutrients and the obvious advantage of improving soil structure, why is seaweed so great? I.e, why is it better than, say, horse poo or grass clippings?

 

That's an interesting question Clueless, but I can't answer it. What I do know is, that our farmers here are allowed to take it off the beaches during the winter months by the trailer load.

 

Its usually the wide, flat brown one that comes up in winter. That, I believe, is kelp.

 

I think it is "The trace elements" found in the seaweed. Cheers, Tony.

 

I used seaweed lawn fertiliser this year , seems to have done a good job. But the best thing about it is that your lawn smells like a beach high tide line for about an hour , so you can get the deckchair out

 

I saw something somewhere about some crofters poisoning their soil with heavy metals from seaweed, but that was pretty much all they were using as fertiliser.

There was a warning about eating a particular variety (not kelp) because of the arsenic in it, it wasn't banned, just an advisory not to eat it all the time.

Depends where the seaweed comes from too, if you've got heavy industry pumping contaminated water out then the seaweed is going to pick it up.

 

It's not kelp Clueless, we don't see a lot of that here. I'm hopeless at identifying seaweed but we get tons of the stuff that we used to squeeze and burst when playing as children.

 

I know the one. It dries to black and has big bubbles in it?

 

Spot on Clueless......so you don't know the name of it either?

 

That's the one I've collected for my rose bush. I'm going to collect some more to prep the beds for the winter. It don't half stink the car out!

 

I'll hold back on the "Seaweed Diet" then

 

Found it.

http://www.food.gov.uk/news-updates/news/2010/aug/hijikiseaweed#.UfIk_FVwbIU