I posted the following message in happy fl gardeners bigger garden post, but I thought I would start a new post for discussion. I posted the following in response to pnbrown's comment about the necessity to mix mushroom compost into the soil so it doesn't stay bone dry all the time:

"pnbrown, I read what you wrote about the mushroom compost being bone dry. I put a layer of mushroom compost down at the end of summer along the side of my house. I never planted there. It is always bone dry and the surface of the compost hasn't really broken down much. I kick the dry top away and the microorganisms in the ground are slowly doing there thing from the bottom up.... very slowly. It's great mulch, not a single weed has popped up through it!

I was doing a little online research about "EM" microbial inoculants and I think that it may be just what mushroom compost needs if you don't want (or are physically are unable) to work it into the soil. Since the mushroom compost is pasturized twice, all the microbes are killed.

It is the microbes that break down the compost into a usable form. If you mix it in with your garden soil, then you are introducing the microbes already present in the soil to the sterile compost, which is probably why you have better results with it being blended into the soil.

According to some websites, adding the inoculant to the soil helps the soil to retain moisture during times of drought. I am going to give it a test run in my spring garden to see if there is a difference.

I have talked to several people who have built raised beds using mushroom compost to avoid nematodes. So if you have nematode infested soil and don't want to mix it into the raised bed, this may be a solution. Albeit, not a cheap one."

I did some online research and found an interesting post about using microbial inoculants on the lychee online website. They don't sell the stuff, so they are either on to something or they are victims of a good sales spiel.

I think the point of using the inoculant is to restore balance to the soil, however it will do it naturally given enough time.

What do you think? Has anyone used the stuff?

Here is a link that might be useful: Lychee's article