To clean limestone floors, mix a solution of mild dish soap and warm water, and rinse it with clear water. Dip a clean sponge or cloth into the sudsy mixture and clean a two- or three-foot square section of the wall starting at the bottom. Wear protective gear before cleaning drywall dust, and use a flat mop with a removable dusting cloth for smooth walls. For exterior limestone walls, remove loose debris with a broom or brush and use a gentle cleaning solution mixed with water to scrub the surface using a soft-bristle brush, making sure to rinse.
Rock dust is a powerful tool that can transform soil into a fertile environment for plants. Azomite, an expensive but high-nutrient rock dust, has a well-balanced nutrient value. Another method is to apply a mixture of foam and rock dust to a mine wall. Rock dust is applied to coal mine walls for mine fire suppression in combination with a chemical foam containing a saturated fatty acid, preferably stearic.
Quarry dust, also known as crusher dust or rock dust, is a finely crushed stone material that results from the mechanical crushing of rocks. It can be purchased at stone yards, quarries, and excavation companies. To make rock dust, start with rocks or buy a bag of granite meal/dust.
In summary, cleaning limestone floors involves a combination of cleaning methods, including the use of rock dust, which can help create a fertile environment for plants.
📹 Cleaning out Landscape Rocks
This video shows the method I used to separate the dirt from the landscape rocks around our house. This was by far the best way I …
📹 How To Reduce Dust In Your Home (DUST-PROOFING Hacks!)
Today we’re showing you how to reduce dust in the home, keeping your space cleaner for longer. If you want to dust-proof your …
I have used this method in the past. Two other great ways to clean the rock are vacuum and blow. If you don’t want to move the rock, grab your shop vac and while keeping two to three sections of the hose pipe in the vertical, you will be able to vacuum out the loose dirt and dead matter. The rocks will make it half way up the pipe before falling back to the ground you may have to occasionally reduce the suction to allow the rocks to fall back, but they won’t get to the vacuum. I’ve also taken the dirtiest of river rock in my wheel barrow and spread on the driveway. Hose it down then let it dry in the sun. Run a broom across it for a minute to loosen the dirt off the driveway. Then use a blower straight down to separate the dirt and debris from the stone. Both worked great for me.
This method works great with one addition. Raise one end of the screen up about four feet so the rocks will roll off the screen and pile up at the bottom. Toss the shovelfuls onto the top of the screen and let gravity do the rest. I propped up one end with a step ladder and put a wheelbarrow under the screen to catch the dirt. Worked great.
I did basically the same thing, just a little different. I had a metal framed table that the glass top was missing from. I put expanded metal on top for the screen material. I can put the wheel barrow under it to catch the fines. It saves some shovel work. Good idea and great article. It is a lot of work though. I can save on gym membership for a while!
This is a great idea! Thanks for the article. We built this frame on Friday and did the first chunk of our garden yesterday. It worked awesome. I love stone landscape gardens and ours was filled with old mulch, dirt, and moss. We lifted the frame more off the ground and set it on the front of the wheelbarrow so we could push it right in and save on shoveling. We got rain for a few hours right after we finished. I’m sitting outside this morning drinking coffee and that stone looks BRAND NEW. Thank you for the idea on how to do this.
I just did this when I was refurbishing my 25+ year old rock garden. The rocks had sunk into the dirt and became compacted. I went a step further though and washed the rocks to brighten them up and get the mud off, the sun and weather will finish the job at bringing the color back, my pressure washer is currently broken so I just have a high power hose nozzle. I took all the rocks out a handful at a time, and then once I was down to the old plastic wrap bed over the clay that was all rotted, I tamped the soil out and graded it away from the foundation, and then laid down a thin bed of sand, and then landscaping fabric over top of it. Then I took a milk crate propped up on bricks and did a crateful of rocks at a time and hosed them down. Once they were cleaned, I dumped them back into the garden pit. It makes a big difference, as I had photos from the 90s of when the garden was somewhat new and it was a lot brighter and more colorful and the rocks were more “fluffed up” and not so trampled. I found a lot of blueish and red colored rocks and I put those aside to save as a topper to make it more colorful and “pop” without looking too planned out and still randomized.
This is exactly what I’m looking for. The guy installing a gravel pad for my new barn did a half ass work. He took my money and left tones of work for me to finish. My yard terrain does not level. He used the gravel to form a slop at the lower end. Now I need to build a retaining wall at that spot instead. But first I need to remove some already mixed gravel and dirt from there. Then this tool will be ideal for the next step of separating the gravel from the soil. Thanks.
Finished making one of these (or similar) today, and it’s working pretty well! I actually had everything I needed around the house except some good screws, so had to pick those up. I have some smaller rocks that I’m trying to save and reuse, so I’m using the smaller 1/4″ square mesh that I had. The dirt falls through easily though and it goes quicker as you get the hang of it. I’m actually using a garden rake to stir and pull the rocks. I use the normally used side to pull the bigger, heavier rocks, then flip it and use the flat top side for cleaning the smaller ones off. Thank you for the idea!
I used a piece of hardware cloth to clean the rocks in a small area and it worked well. Decided to do the rest of the yard in 3/4 stone … very pretty. But imagine my surprise when the 3 tons was dumped on my driveway and it was covered in sand and coarse sediment … it was unrecognizable. At first I did your big NO and tried hosing down the pile. … doesn’t work: the pile was too high and water didn’t penetrate – like you said. Then I spread it out on the driveway and washed it with the hose. Didn’t work: so much mud and sediment accumulated under the rocks, and the rocks just go roll away. And it was really a chore to sweep all the scattered stones into a pile and shovel it into the wheelbarrow because there was so much mud underneath. I was so frustrated so I used a large household sieve, filled and sprayed with hose. It only takes about 10 seconds to clean each fill bu the the but the mesh was tight and some of the coarser sediment wasn’t washed away. Just because it was SO tedious, I timed it. It took 30 minutes to fill a wheelbarrow half way. At 2 inches thick, it only covers about 2.5 square feet. I have 330 square feet. Today I will build a similar hardware cloth frame but I’ll elevate it so I can just push the washed stones into the wheelbarrow and deal with the mud as it accumulates. LESSON LEARNED: make sure if you are buying bulk stone, see if they wash it! And if they don’t, set aside a many, many sunny days when you could be kayaking instead but hey, think of the muscles you’ll build up dealing with the mess!
Thank you for your advice! Right now, I wish I had a handy partner, didn’t have health and back problems, weren’t a perfectionist, 4’ 9″, pushing 70, and didn’t have an issue with what was a beautiful yard in Michigan! I have stone beds that are in an L shape, with really cool stones that have fossils, Petoskey stones, sparkly stones, etc. I realized they were growing weeds, baby trees, and roots were coming out. I started to inspect, and found a mess! There is heavy plastic underneath, but huge roots, like trees, grew from somewhere, and poked holes in the plastic, lifted it up, and now I have two layers of dirt and roots intermingled with stones I need to free (and free the big worms above and below the plastic), sift and clean the stones, build up the dirt, level, replace the plastic or use sand or something to lift it higher. I’m breaking my back pulling everything out and cutting long roots with loppers, cutting little roots, moving the worms, trying to figure out what to fill the dirt in with, and looking on You Tube to see what to do. Now I guess I’ll have to build a sifter, sift, wash, level the dirt, put more plastic or paver sand down, and replace the stones. It will take me until the end of the summer! Oh, boy!
Nifty little rig you made there…. Yeah lot’s of work, I just filled in several elaborate flower beds around my house with decorative rocks about the size of various potatoes for mulch. They came from the ditches out by the street that were brought in by the first home owner, so much fun picking each one up by hand let me tell you… I placed down two layers of weed mats and I am spraying with a solution of white vinegar, salt and roundup as a weed preventative. Yeah they’re rock gardens now LOL… No more weeds in the flower beds and I can now just simply mow the ditches when I mow the yard…. I hate weeds…
Most of the work seems to be figuring out how to make a sifting contraption out of the cage wire and wood to do this. That’s the part I’m struggling with right now. Has anyone figured out a site where you can buy something to staple the fencing onto? This idea isn’t talked about enough and it’s exactly what many people need to do. Thank you for making this article.
I’m writing this to try n get a machine made that picks up and cleans landscaping rocks that have filled in with sand and dirt. Currently there are no machines that so that job. Cleaning the rocks from landscaping in front of most businesses. No one has a machine like that. Why, I don’t know why. It’s a problem for all landscaping companies. Removing and replacing the rocks that have filled in with dirt. Now and have been allowing the growing grass and weeds that grow out of the dirt. So much it fills in between every rock so much that now they look like dirt. No more does it look like rocks for landscaping. Look like dirt only. Filled in completely to look like ground to help weeds to grow. I hope I’ve explained my self well enough so inventers know what I’m talking about. To me it’s easy to see the problem that NO-ONE has a machine like that. Please make one for the landscaping industry.
Here’s a tip that may help your awesome design. I did something similar and had a wheelbarrow underneath but was still doing what you did with the hoe to sift everything. After I’d had enough, I strapped a reciprocating saw to the side, drilled a couple holes in the saw blade, then put bolts through the holes and attached it to the wire. Turn it on and it’ll shake shake shake shake shake it for ya! 🙂
Excellent idea. I already made a 2″x3″ frame 20 years ago that I shake on top of a cart to capture the good dirt. Now that I see that one can make a huge frame, I should consider it. I would save a lot of effort and time. BTW why are you putting rocks back? They are your source of problems in the first place. (My rocks were put in by some previous owners in the 70s)
This is also a VERY good example of why using weed barrier “fabric” is pointless. Dirt and weed seed just get blown in by the wind, they settle ON TOP of the fabric, and grow there instead. Within one year you have the return of weeds, and you are out 100s of dollars. Weed barrier fabric is good for one thing, and one thing only: preventing stone used in pathways from settling into the soil. It compresses the soil underneath of it, heats up the ground, prevents nutrients from getting to your plant’s roots, and it suffocates your plants. Use mulch or rocks instead, like this fellow. 😉 As a side note, I absolutely feel your pain. I spent almost a year digging red and white lava rock and old landscape fabric out of the top 4 inches of soil in my front yard, and yes. I did sift the rocks from the soil. Using a hand sifter. It has held up really well! But your way is SOOO much more efficient than mine! Very ingenious!