Bone meal?

[iann]

Not sure what that has to do with it, Julie. Most plants in habitat aren't restricted to a small plastic container, nor are they placed under a piece of glass, yet that's what they must deal with in this country.

Nutrients in habitat come from a wide variety of sources, at much lower concentrations than we supply in pots, but with roots spread over a wider area. The majority of nutrients other than nitrogen come directly from weathering of minerals in rocks and soil. This simply cannot occur fast enough in the restricted environment of a pot so we must supply them in other forms. They can also be supplied from decomposing animal and plant material, which at some point in the past would have come from weathering of minerals. Nitrogen in habitat comes from different sources, decay of plant or animal material in the soil, direct and indirect fixation of atmospheric nitrogen by bacteria, and nitrogen salts which have been dissolved in rainwater. Nitrogen salts suitable for takeup by plants are not commonly formed directly by weathering of rocks, since there are few stable minerals containing nitrogen. Decomposing plant and animal remains are scarce in most arid environments, hence nitrogen is in short supply unless plants make it themselves, although other nutrients may be plentiful.

[DaveW]

I did once read Julie that scientists reckoned there was not a square foot of the earths land surface that some animal or human had not died on in the thousands of years since life began on earth, many of those presumably had bones!

DaveW

[Trevor]

Who says its COW bones ??? Soylent Green anyone ???:embar:

[Diane]

Wasn't there some stories going around about anthrax from bone-meal? Which would have come from sheep....

[iann]

Anthrax has been known to be imported in bonemeal from countries where the disease is active. This used to be a greater issue than it is now, because bonemeal is no longer fed to animals. My suggestion, for any number of reasons of which anthrax is the least important, is not to eat bonemeal

[James Pickering]

This brings back memories. When I first started growing cacti (1939 in Lancashire) Bonemeal was about the only fertilzer recommended for cacti in cultivation (ala "The Journal" and vera Higgins).

James