COIR COMPOST - ANYBODY USED IT??

I have used coir for a couple of years growing thousands of bedding plants for the Parks Dept not out of choice but because I was told too. I found that most plants grew reasonably well but needed constant feeding as most coir only has a low volume base fertiliser and feed leached through the compost too rapidly. Some plants grew poorly and were chlorotic and even a folia feed didn't induce recovery. My experience has only been with bedding plants and not veg, perrenials or shrubs. Coir just doesn't have the same structure as peat.
I have given up using coir (at work) as I need to produce 100% quality plants which I couldn't if I used coir. A 50/50 coir/multi compost would be a better bet.

 

I bought a lot from a company called fertile fibre a couple of years back.
It was used mostly with large banana plants. I bought the large "bricks" as it was a great way of storing a significant volume of compost in a small area.

After using for a year i never really saw any difference or benefit to using it instead of multi purpose compost, other than the storage volume so i went back to multi purpose which is easier to source and cheaper.

 

Armandii,

To be clear, back then i was using a 40% 40% 20% general mix of coir, multi purpose and perlite.
I would forsee significant nutrient (and subsequent growth) problems trying to use coir alone.

In my case i saw no growth benefits with using coir, and i recall adding more fertiliser to the compost mix than i usually would have to make up for the lower nutrient levels.

The end results of the above for me at least were very similar to using a 80% 20% mix of multi purpose and perlite, no better no worse.

Hence as you suggest, for reasons of cost and convenient supply i went back to multi purpose
which today i mix with perlite and sharp sand and i find this provides a good general purpose mix.

Coir is clearly attractive for sustainability and within an overall compost mix can provide reasonable growth. I do have doubts of its green credentials given its transported here from afar.
So at this point i struggle to see what coir really offers us but i like to remain open minded on these things.

I hope this additional detail answers the questions.