Our master gardeners had a huge plant sale a couple of weeks ago to benefit a botanical garden we are building. It will be a long work in progress for a couple of years.
This past week we had our monthly MG pot luck lunch followed by a speaker. Some of you may know him, or heard of him --- Wae Nelson, who was the owner of Florida Gardening Magazine, which he recently sold. Wae spoke on Bio-Char -- he's very knowledgeable about it and I know a lot of the MG's were very interested in learning more about it. I first heard Wae talk about this a few years ago -- he actually came to my garden and help me set up all the bits and pieces in order to make the "char". I was concerned about the flames (n a residential area) and my next door neighbor saw them and thought we had something seriously go wrong - ready to call the fire department. I now make my bio-char the simpler way - with brute force. I use plain charcoal (no brickettes with added chemicals); put some chunks in very heavy bags and pound it with a hammer (you still get dusty). Then after charging it and letting it settle for a few days, it's ready to add to your garden.
