COMPOST REVIEW 2013

I've just opened up a 125L bag of Verve and it looks very much the same as JWK's (& Sheal's). I still don't think it's as good as Wickes 'original 2011' (having just been using both) as the Verve doesn't seem to 'wet' as well.

Old 2011 Wickes compost on the left and recently bought Verve on the right (bits of fibre on top of seed packet were in the Verve).



So it must have been a rogue batch of Verve that I posted a pic of a while ago, but rather unfortunate for anybody who bought any like that.

 

Is there much difference in price Scrungee as it may offset the difference in quality. I can't buy Wickes anyway, there isn't one on the island.

 

I posted earlier in the year about durstons multi purpose compost.
Brought another bag today £3.40 for 60l again it's great quality, been using it for 3 years now and not a bad bag in that time.
It's always a lovely dark colour and smells lovely if you know what I mean!
It does need alittle sharp sand adding for some seeds.

 

That does look good Mowgley. It's a long while since I've seen black peat, back in the 'dark ages' when it was widely available it came from Somerset.

 

Had a look at the MPC in my local Wickes today:

In the foyer was a stack of 70 litre bags. One of them was partially open and the compost inside was like the wooly 2013 compost in the pic posted by Loofah. On the bag it stated it was suitable for cuttings and potting up.

In the yard was a stack of 70 litre bags and on the bags it stated it was suitable for seed sowing, cuttings, potting up etc., but as none were open I couldn't check whether they were old 2012 stock (which wrongly stated on the bags they were suitable for seeds) or the 2013 compost bagged up in old packaging despite also not being suitable for seeds.

And the final confusion was seeing 2 pallets of 75 litre bags up on the high level racking outdoors. What's in those is anybody's guess.

What a shambles!


P.S. I found a small piece of broken glass in my B&Q Verve compost yesterday and remembered that I'd also found glass in their compost last year.

 

I had to sieve-riddle half a bag of JAB MPC on Sunday. There were hard black lumps that I could not easily crush with my fingers - so that went onto the garden. I'd say one quater was not sievable,
Jenny

 

I've had bags of JAB MPC that were like that. I pull mine off the top of a pile, clambering over the lower piles at the front!, to get bags that have not been compressed at the bottom of the pallet load, which I think exacerbates the problem. Also the bags I buy in the Autumn seem to be better (.e. few lumpynesses) than the Spring batches. Perhaps because they are processed and bagged in Summer when the weather is drier (I can but hope!!)

I drop the bag onto the floor, from waist height, alternatively on each face and edge - to break up the lumps before I tip the bag out to use it, which gets Gravity doing some of the work for me. I'm thinking about getting a 1" (i.e. very large mesh) sieve to work the compost through, rather than trying to break it up on the potting bench, as when I start potting I come across lumps that I have missed, and I'd prefer to get it "just right" before I start potting so I can crack on once I have started. But sieving through anything small takes ages, and not sure plants in 9cm pots, or larger, need it (I do use a 1/4" sieve for potting on into 1" modules though, otherwise some modules would get an allocation of very rough compost, and the plants would probably suffer)