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Is it OK to compost grass and moss which have been treated with mosskiller?
Bouleversee
Posts: 68
in Talkback
Greenthumb recently sprayed my lawns with mosskiller and a feed and I asked my new gardener to scarify them today to get the blackened moss and any thatch out. He used a slitter rather than my scarifier so didn't get much moss out and then mowed the lawn and put what was collected in the bag in my compost container. When I was doing my own gardening (can't do it now) I never composted the cuttings immediately after moss treatment and certainly not the moss, not that he got much of that out. Is it OK to compost this stuff or would it be best to take it to the dump? I went over one of the lawns with my scarifier and got a lot of blackened moss out. I don't plan to compost it. Who is right?
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Did the treatment contain a weedkiller?
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
I don't think it did, though I don't know why not. The bill just says they have sprayed with a micronutrient feed that gives good colour; it also helps with the control of moss and indeed (after the 2nd application after I had complained that the first had a series of black lines, with large gaps between) it does seem to have killed off most of the moss. I think I am going to give them the heave-ho and revert to applying a combined moss killer, feed and weed if I can get anyone to do it it for me. Or move to a flat!
As Verdun says, I put the first three cuts in the council bin after applying a lawn treatment - they usually contain weedkiller.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
If it's just mosskiller rather than weedkiller, it might be OK. The mosskiller we use says it's safe to compost it as long as it has at least 6 months to break down in the heap. Our compost has between one and two years in the heap, so we don't worry about it.
As did mine when I did it myself but Green Thumb do treatments a year and this one was (somewhat belatedly) the winter treatment which was just mosskiller and light feed.
That should have said they do 4 treatments a year.
Its likely just an iron feed to kill the moss which does green the grass up a little bit, you can more a less watch the moss going black it kills it that fast.
Thanks for replies. Perhaps I'll ask Green Thumb what they recommend.
What about weeds? I wouldn't put anything with seedheads or serious roots in the compost but I see some huge dandelions with flowers and long roots have gone in whereas non-woody clippings from shrubs have not.