Wool Pellets

Wool pellets are good for the plants ewe grow!

They

• slowly release nutrients into the soil (nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium) so your plants are continuously fed
• retain soil moisture, so you don’t have to water as often
• aerate the soil, by leaving air pockets as they break down
• break down completely in just one growing season
• repel/deter slugs and other pests
• reduce waste, because now we have a use for all of the wool!

Plus, they are 

• renewable – sheep grow wool for their entire lifetime
• sustainable – made in such a way we can and will come back and do it again next year
• natural – made with nothin’ but the wool itself, and the lanolin and the dirt it collected.  We just added some heat.
• biodegradable – they bread down within a few months when mixed in with the soil
• humane – each sheep gets an annual spa day: a haircut followed by a mani-pedi.  In the barn, we say that’s shearing and hoof trimming!

Ingredients: wool skirtings (that’s the pieces that are too short or too dirty to make into yarn)
Does heat count?  We added it but they didn’t stay warm 🙂

How they’re made:  after the skirtings are chopped into short pieces (about 1/4″ long), they’re heated and pressed into pellets.  Check out the video here!

What size shoud I get? 
We recommend 2 oz per gallon of soil.  That means the small package will be good for 2-3 houseplants.

For your garden or raised beds, mix 1 pound in 10 square feet of soil.

I used 1 pound to plant 4 dahlia tubers:  a 1/2 cup or so in each hole, mixed in with the soil, and then the rest to make an 8″ slug-deterring ring around each plant.