Best Supplier Of Compost 2023

Have you tried using the peat free when potting on more established plants?

We are finding in general, the problem with peat free is during germination and poor growth rates when taking cuttings and potting on plug plants. When using peat free with more established plants that have a good root germination and top growth, there is little to no difference between peat free and peat base compost.

 

I know you aimed that at @shiney ,but I've been trying it and im finding root development is poor in most of the stuff I've tried.
Plants seem to stop growing and turn yellow and on checking the roots they appear brown and dead, it's only after feeding and careful watering that the plants start to pick up but you have lost a couple of weeks growth.
It just doesn't have a good structure to hold water or fertiliser imo.

 

I haver had good results except with dwarf french beans, with which only half germinated, the others seemed to have rotted and turned to paste. I wondered whether I had kept them too hot and wet.

 

Most of the composts I have bought recently, particularly Westland and B&Q Verve do not hold any water at all, it just immediately runs straight through and adding a soluble feed seems a waste as that runs through as well.

 

Salvia turkestanica was mentioned by Chris Beardshaw on GQT yesterday @shiney probably the reason for all the orders.

 

He said they were great if you had a shallow depth of topsoil, 30cm or less and that they were very, very drought tolerant, he really recommended them if you have a garden with those types of conditions.

 

So, peat free resulted in a 60% germination rate for you.
To put that in to context, Fountain Plants are one of the largest brassica growers to the agriculture sector in Europe. They use peat and have a germination rate of 96% and grow 600 million brassica plants. Now imagine if they ended up with a 60% germination rate if they had to go peat free, that could result in 240 million less cabbage's, cauli's etc etc on supermarket shelves.

Large growers who are germinating edible crops will probably be excluded from a peat ban in my opinion.

 

I think you could be wrong on 2/4 counts ! Yes it is wrong and a waste of (peat?) compost
Compared with Morrisons at Horndean where the Danish trolley shelves were actually full of water draining by dripping gently into the fertiliser stack!

 

I have had the Royal Botanic Gardens at Edinburgh on the phone this morning regarding John Innes Compost.
We have supplied them for years but they are now going peat free, even though Scotland has not announced a ban of peat yet.
They have done their own research and we are not allowed to use coir as a substitute for peat. Their studies have comeback that by using coir, they will be increasing their carbon footprint. Even though JI is 7 parts loam, 3 parts peat and 2 parts sharp sand, substituting peat with coir is minimal. So I have to knock up a mix for them where the peat is substituted with compost bark. The problem is, they want me to knock up one bag of each JI No2 and No3 before they commit to ordering 4 pallets, which is going to be a pain.

 

Any leftovers could be sold cheaply to GC members,