[st0ne5ish]

Hi,

I enlisted  the help of my kids this evening and made a load of 2" paper pots ready for the coming months, one of the jobs I have next on the list is obtaining some compost to put in them.

Is it cheaper to make my own by buying the ingredients or to purchase a large amount of ready made stuff? If I made my own where do I get the mixes/ingredients from and is it too early to mix it?

If I buy it ready made do I buy John Innes seed mix or no1?

Sorry about all the questions but I've never done it before.

Cheers 

[DD.]

What do you intend sowing/planting?

For larger seeds I find a multi-purpose compost or grow-bag contents are more than good enough. These are cheaper than JI.


Making your own without any of the ingredients ready to hand would not save you a lot, I would have thought and there's all the faffing about.

[st0ne5ish]

Planning on growing all sorts, beans, parsnips, carrots toms etc...

[JayG]

Percy Thrower would probably turn in his grave but I have to agree with DD; multi-purpose seems to work just fine; just don't buy the cheapest you can find though.

[DD.]

You don't have to start everything in posts. Carrots and parsnips can go straight into the ground. What sort of soil do you have?

[st0ne5ish]

Ah I thought it was better for some reason. The soil is pretty good so I'm told, it's quite a clay soil but I have been working in lots of manure over the last couple of months except for the root beds. Quite a few stones though.

[Totty]

Make bore holes for the carrots and parsnips and fill them with grow bag compost  if you have stoney soil.
 If i am sowing seeds that are to be planted out fairly soon after i use straight seed compost mixed 80/20 with vermiculite.
 If i am sowing seed that will be staying inside in modules for some time (onions and leeks which are already sown) il mix roughly 60% seed 30% multi purpose and 10% vermiculte

Totty

[solway cropper]

I'd agree with what's been said. If you are starting out it's easier to go with ready made composts and possibly think about making your own next year. If you get an area set aside for composting waste vegetable matter and leaf mould, etc. you will have some base material to work with in a year or so's time.

Don't forget also that seed composts contain very little nutrient so you'll have to get potting compost as well when you transfer the seedlings. If you are growing in containers you'll also need some plant food, either liquid or granular.

[noshed]

I use multipurpose for most things. Check on your allotment site - we have some good bargains in compost on ours.

[Kristen]

My local Garden Centre has 3 x 60L bags of Arthur Bowers (so not "own brand" nor "Brand-X") for £10.

I reckon one bag will fill about 100 newspaper pots ... so that's about 3p per plant

[DD.]

That's precisely what I bought as well, may as well name mine - Wyevale.

[Kristen]

That's precisely what I bought as well, may as well name mine - Wyevale.

Mine is Wyevale too. Not the cheapest place on the planet for sure!

P.S. Actually, not sure they were supposed to be £10 for 3 bags, I thought I saw a sticker price for more, but that's what my till receipt says.  I'm a member of their Garden Club, so might have been some extra off for that.

[DD.]

Not usually, but it's easy to get to for me. Happened to get lucky with this offer.

The only other time I usually go there is for their 50p seed sale.

[st0ne5ish]

Many thanks for the answers!

Out of intrest what seeds do people mostly plant in the paper pots? Now I have a large collection of them.

[mumofstig]

erm...........beans, sweetcorn, cabbage, early peas, and chard ...I'm sure that's not all