Soilmix
If you save your own seeds, make your own compost and recycle and reuse in your garden, many people don’t need to buy anything except some lime if they have acid soil and starting mix in order to start plants indoors.
A lot of people ask me about making your own seed starting mix, so they can avoid buying anything for their garden. What’s particularly troubling for many is nearly all seed starting mixes are based on either peat, which is often harvested in unsustainable ways, or coir, which is a waste product of the less than ethical coconut industry, and gets transported long distances. Starting mixes not based on peat or coir need to be sterilized, usually requiring fossil fuels or chemicals such as household bleach.
I don’t know if this is truly a recipe for everyone. Perhaps not everyone raises bats for guano? Anyway, Alan just posted a great recipe for starting mix, he makes nearly completely with waste or other products from his farm. I think this is a great starting point for many people to think about making something similar with sustainable things you may have available locally.
Yakraut
And Owen on Radix4Roots posted this great looking recipe for fermented yacón root! Something guaranteed to keep your digestive system in motion.
Island Blog
From a working 400 acre farm on Manitoulin Island in northern Ontario, this is a blog of someone I know from elsewhere on the Internet. DirtSunRain
I saved all my potting soil last year and am trying to reuse it this year. Seeds will get sifted, oven sterilized soil and potted on plants will get sifted soil. Hope it works well, that stuff is pricey to keep buying!
Thanks for the link Patrick, these ideas will at least plant a seed for “alternative” options for folks in the near future. Since this link was posted I’ve made some updates and new observations at the blog that folks interested in a self sustainable seed mix will want to check out as well. Bat Guano isn’t necessary particularly, you can use a good composted poultry litter or other source of nitrogen and some plants won’t even need it, I actually mostly include it for beneficial micro-organisms.
Dan, I have saved potting soil over year to year as well for re-use, usually without sterilizing and usually without any ill effects as long as soil wasn’t saved from plants which are particularly diseased. When I was in high school we actually purchased a soil sterilizing oven which worked quite well. The smell was interesting in the classroom to say the least.
I should point out that potting mixes used on the farm here, those produced from our own mixtures, actually get re-used often, particularly if they were from stratifying seed in the winter.