Author Topic: Possible answer to compost whinge (Read 6205 times)

deepinthewoods · « **Reply #15 on:** April 27, 2012, 09:00:12 pm »

vermiculite is also used for insulation, try a builders merchant.

Plantoid · « **Reply #16 on:** April 27, 2012, 09:24:47 pm »

That's where i got my coarse grade stuff from 15 x 100 litre bags at £15 each inc vat. delivered FOC from Keyline builders merchants . the grain size varies from mainly 1/3 inch long . 1/3 wide by 3/16 thick down to a small amount of fine dust ,.

The dust is really too fine for doing seeds as is the remainder of the bag because of the large size chips .

The horticultural seed growuing stuff is about as coarse as medium brown sugar grains & so far appears ideal for the job .

deepinthewoods · « **Reply #17 on:** April 27, 2012, 09:26:17 pm »

fair enough, i use compost.

Plantoid · « **Reply #18 on:** April 27, 2012, 09:27:52 pm »

Quote from: Plantoid on April 27, 2012, 09:24:47 pm

That's where I got my coarse grade stuff from 15 x 100 litre bags for the soil les mix at £15 each inc vat. delivered FOC from Keyline builders merchants . The grain size varies from mainly 1/3 inch long x 1/3 wide by 3/16 thick down to a small amount of fine dust and not much in between ( I tried sieving it out to get the smaller size I was after ) ,.

The dust is really too fine for doing seeds as is the remainder of the bag because of the large size chips .

The horticultural seed growing stuff is about as coarse as medium brown sugar grains & so far appears ideal for the job .

PS the coarse stuff is OK for qiuck starting big seeds like peas & beans

suziequeue · « **Reply #19 on:** April 29, 2012, 07:22:22 am »

I finally found that piece about peat fee compost from Organic Way magazine.

here are some quotes:

"One characteristic that peat-fres made from coarse wood fibre share is that they invariably suffer from a lack of nutrients, which causes stunted growth unless given additional feeding"

Overall Fertile Fibre NMUltiputpose and Fertile Fibre Seeed gave poor results when used for seed germination but when used for growing on pricked out seeldings, they both produced respectable plants with extensive root systems"

The composts that produced the best seedlings were:

50:50 mix of home grown compost and leaf mould
New horizon Organic & Peat Free
Vital Earth Muli-purpose
Wool Compost (from the Organic Gardening cCatalogue or dalefootcomposts.co.uk)

Worst were:
Dobbies Select Organic & Peat Free Multi-purpose
Earth Matters Nature Works Peat-free Multipurpose
Aldi Gardenline

For latest results of this trial visit: http://www.organicinthegarden.com/forum/index.php?topic=69.0