question on rice hulls

Do rice hulls have to be composted before adding to MM? The Phillipine gardeners can get a lot of rice hulls, but no peat or vermiculite.

I actually used a prebagged mix that had 40% peat, 30% black forest compost and 30% rice hulls. The rice hulls work in a similar way as the vermiculite so if that is what they can access it should work just fine.

Here is what I found

Clean Air Gardening Blog

Gardening tips and advice.

Rice Hulls as a Soil Amendment





Photo courtesy of benketaro at Flickr.com.
One purely organic way to amend a clay soil is to work in rice hulls, the fibrous material left over after rice processing. Though nearly devoid of nutrients (except for a trace of nitrogen), rice hulls will effectively lighten and loosen a heavy soil, adding organic matter that helps retain water and is slow to decompose. Because of its disadvantages as a fertilizer, it works best when used in concert with compost and other organic soil amendments.
You may be able to find it in some feed and gardening stores, packed in enormous bags due to its lightness; otherwise, it can be obtained from rice processing operations. You can also use coir, known as coconut fiber, the same way as rice hulls.

Seems like if there is utterly impossible for Phillipine gardeners to get vermiculite they could do worse that use rice hulls. I was complaining how hard it was to find 5 sources of compost and corse grade vermiculite thanks for putting it in perspective. I mean, sure it was hard but at least it was not impossible.

I picked up a bag this morning on the way to work (at my local feed store - it was about $11 for 6 cubic feet). I'm mulching everything with it, beds and containers. There should be more than enough to do everything. I have 14 tomatoes in 5 gallon buckets, so they'll each get about 1" of hulls. Not sure how watering over them is going to work in the ones that aren't SWC, but I guess we'll find out.

Does anyone know if mulch will help keep soil gnats down? I'm having major problems with the little buggers.