So go ahead and mix your own.

Karen

Good question! I was also wondering about the same question... We hope to get a pros advice there are so many on the wintersowing forum...Thank you

Not dirt, but a soilless sowing medium. Yes, you can mix your own - I can't buy Pro-mix here, no one carries it - but watch your ratios so you get something that retains some moisture without becoming soggy considering the problems you've had with damp off both indoors and out.

Promix is my favorite but last year my Home Depot carried nothing but MG. No choice at all. I went to several local nurseries and bought what they use for their seed starting- Fafard from one place and MetroMix from another. Also bought one bag of MG organic and used it. All worked well for me.

Every one I went to had only MG on display for sale to the public but not one of the professional growers said they use it. They told me they don't like it, they get better results with their professional brands. Now that says a lot to me.

Probably what I like best about Pro-Mix is that I can drag home one huge bale and have enough mix to last a long, long, time.

Karen

I use MetroMix 510 now, because my nursery supply always has it in stock, but I only use it as-is for sowing seeds and small pots, and I frequently cut it with various additives, depending upon my needs. It has ferts...something they call a "starter nutrient charge," and even after going as high as a sales & marketing VP at SunGro, I've been unable to find out the exact nature of the ferts.

For larger pots (trade gallons and up), I use Al's (tapla) mix, from his many postings on GW. It's the best potting mix I've found to date.

Have you tried out some of the store brands offered by hardware stores? I had good luck with the potting soil at Ace Hardware stores.

We use compressed bales of pro-mix and highly recommend it for winter sowing and for transplanting. Soaking is unnecessary-just smoosh and use (though I DO dampen it before filling pots; i do this with whatever 'soil' i happen to be using). One bale fills 20-25 flats of 32 3" pots or 35-40 10" hanging baskets. When you produce ALOT of plants every year, it saves time and is more cost effective to purchase bales. For inside seed germination we use a sterile seed starting mix (a much, much finer medium).
This works for us, but you should use whatever works for YOU.

Big deal about ProMix?

Irregardless of the price or the format it comes in, it works well and I am quite sure that you will read as such in past posts of which there are many.

I'm not saying that there are no other brands out there that perform just as well if possibly not better.

In my case, MG is way too expensive to buy in the quantities I use. I will buy a compressed bale of PM at $35.00 Can. which will last me the winter and then I buy another to start the gardening season and possibly transfer seedlings into bigger pots.

And, yes, there is a difference between such soils and 'dirt'. I transplanted some Goatsbeard seedlings in 4 pots of 'dirt' this past spring and another 6 were transplanted in PM. The only difference in anything was the growing medium, yet the ones grown in 'dirt' struggled badly. The ones in PM did so well they were placed in the gardens in late June.

Minnamouse - I posted this at the end of a different thread you posted but perhaps you didn't see it. Here's a cut & paste section, followed by a few new thoughts:

"Minnamouse, if you had all that trouble with damping off you might really want to consider a good commercial blend. The reason I say that is because they are mixed to provide an appropriate level of moisture retention and trying to get that with your own mix could be a real challenge.

I like Promix and Sunshine mix best and personally dislike Miracle Gro. Part of that is probably due to regional growing condition bias. Miracle Gro dries out way too fast for me here while the other two stay at just the most perfect moisture level for much longer times.

I do think that Miracle Gro may have an advantage for people growing in wetter conditions. The same features that hurt germination rates for me and made planting out challenging would probably have been advantages in growing regions that got a lot of rain this year.

If you are still working at getting good results with WSing, I'd make ProMix a first choice in areas where you usually don't have muddy gardens and Miracle Gro potting mix a first choice in areas where mud in the garden is common. (Sunshine mix is less readily available and more pricey.)

I'd hold off on using home mixed mixes for anything but seeds you have in huge abundance where won't be upset if they don't grow. That's actually what we do - I use our home grown container mix for things like zinnias where I have many giant bags of seed available. When you have a load of surplus seed you can live with a potting mix that wicks water in a less than perfect way or that might crumble or break apart when you try to transplant hunks of seedlings."

To specifically address your question today, in my opinion the biggest deal about using a purchased mix is that the moisture wicking and retention balance is better than anything you can put together on your own - and that can be VERY important in seed starting.

My family likes to be very cost conscious. We grow most of our own food. We have to container grow our veg in five gallon buckets here because the local soil is pretty much just rocks, coal and a bit of clay. (Nice if you want to run a quarry, lousy for gardening!)

Our growing & food producing containers are all filled with a home blend of compost with a little perlite. That's great for mature plants and not having picture perfect wetting and moisture retention is not a problem at that stage. Good enough is perfectly fine.

But for seed starting and seedlings we only use Sunshine mix or Promix. Yes, it's more costly - especially when I WSed over 3600 containers of flowers and hubby indoor sowed over 200 tomatoes plants and about 50 each of peppers, eggplants, gourds, melons, beans and the rest of the stuff.

Maybe I should also mention that hubby Pat's family has been commercial growers in England for at least 6 generations. They made all of their container mix (like you describe above) but bought in their seed sowing mix by the pallet load.

In his professional growing experience, and our personal home growing experience it is worth the cost to buy a good seed starting mix - and save home mixes for once the plants are past the seedling stage. That's how we do it because we consider the cost of seed and we want strong seedlings and high germination rates. That's also why I won't use miracle gro here - although if I was in waterlogged Pennsylvania this year I'd probably appreciate it's moisture wicking profile better.

I hope this helps. I don't know if you've seen any of my other posts but if you have you probably know that I've got very similar views to you about getting really good value for your money when you are gardening. To me there is such incredible value in planting a seed and getting a healthy strong seedling - ready to grow big and strong, provide flower or food, and then provide seed for future years. I just can't afford the cost of seed, time lost, and food lost by seed starting in a homemade mix - and that's even with having my own English gardener (with decades of growing experience) right here and his elderly mother(with even more experience) just a phone call away.

I hope I don't sound like I'm just a member of some kind of Pro Mix fan club. I'm not. I like anything that gets me top notch results. That just happens to be that pricey Pro Mix and Sunshine mix.

Lynda

Here is a link that might be useful: This is why I seed start in Promix or Sunshine mix

We mix our own. I am an organic gardener and I have other ideas about fertilizing my plants then the chemical fertilizers that are now routinely added to most store bought potting soil mixes.

Scott, the lawn products company owns Miracle Grow. And I'm pretty sure I heard that Scotts is owned by one of the large chemical companies that is not only producing chemicals for the garden but is into genetic engineered plants. Monsanto, maybe? I really don't want to give my money to a company that produces chemicals for the garden and I'm especially against any kind of genetic modification of seeds and plants. I would rather give my money to companies who are making an effort to change that direction.

I would rather use my own compost mixed with perlite, as a previous poster does, but on a 1/4 acre it's pretty hard to make enough compost to do that. So I mix peat moss and perlite for potting soil when I need it.

It is less expensive that way. It makes a lot. It's very light and drains very well. It isn't rocket science to get the proportions right. Everything I've grown in it has done very well from seedlings to grown plants and potted shrubs. I can add my own fertilizer choices that are organic.

I have found that large bags of Perlite are not as readily available. There are no Agways close to me and local nurseries, Home Depot, Lowe's don't carry it in large enough sizes. I have found an organic nursery that I go to that does carry a large size that is just right for me, so now I am all set.

Lynda, the problem is that I don't have constant conditions. It can go from a long drought to a long period of constant rain. We seems to get a lot of extremes, but not neutral ground. I have no idea which would be better for me. And I also have no idea if I can get bales around here.

Pro-mix said that most seeds do well in PRO-MIX BX w/Mycorise but smaller seeds would do better in their finer peat mix, which is PRO-MIX GSX or FPX.

Should I just get a bad of PRO-MIX GSX or FPX so I don't also have to buy a bag of BX? Should I get it with fungicide??

Does anyone know of a nursery supply place in Maryland? I'm in Montgomery/Howard Co. I can't seem to find any that don't just sell wholesale. I need to buy flats and other things (not for winter sowing) and would like to get them all from one place without having to order online and pay shipping.

Minnamouse - with variable conditions as you'd get in Maryland I'd use Promix, any formula I could find in stock. I just got a back-up bale of BX today at our local feed store. I don't like Miracle Grow here because we have drought periods and it dries out a lot faster than the Promix for me. It's also a lot more variable bag to bag.

When my local feedstore doesn't have Promix, and for wholesale quantities of perlite and nursery pots I order form here: http://www.bfgsupply.com/content/locations.asp and pick up. They don't have a Maryland store but maybe they could refer you to a nursery supply store in your area. For tons of flats and 3 inch pots delivered to my house I usually go with Greenhouse Megastore online.

If you just can't find Promix close you should still get good results with Miracle Gro - just keep an eye on it, especially during dry periods. My gut feeling on the Miracle grow is that they fine tune their moisture controlto prevent waterlogging in bigger sized flower pots and containers - and that they know a lot of home gardeners often kill plants by over watering. But it does still work pretty well in milk jug sized winter sowing in dryish areas, just not as picture perfect as Promix.

Don't worry about whether you get the Promix with the fungicide or not. Part of the beauty of winter sowing outside in containers is that the temperatures, temperature changes through days, nights and weeks, and the cap OFF of milk jugs to allow gentle airflow end up preventing a load of problems.

One other idea for flats and the like. Check out HomeHarvest in Baltimore. They are mainly hydroponics but I think they stock a bunch of basic nursery ware too.

Oh - also check out Cropking on line. They might have some of what you need and they ship from Ohio so shipping might not be too bad.

So what are you going to sow this winter? Any idea how many containers you are planning to do yet?

Lynda

I've been using pro-mix for several years now & love it! It's not cheap, but a bale goes a long way. I have several plastic totes under my potting bench that I fill with the dry pro-mix, add the water, & by the next day it's good to go. The big box stores here haven't carried it in a long time, but my locally owned Agway has it, so they also have my business! Try a local feed-type store if you have one in your area, or I remember a previous thread that I think someone contacted the company-I think they are in Doylestown PA (when I had trouble finding it once I thought about driving over there! Ha!)

Its a better deal per Bale vs Bag, I hope its isnt the price that you are contentious with, if you actually paid for the ingrediants and mixed, you would save some money, but not alot for a 1-2 yards worth, you probable would have to do more, which I dont need.

Im not sure what you want to use otherwise? You can buy water soluble fertilizer if you wish at 1/4 strength a few weeks after germination. I rarely bother with that, I put them in the ground small, I rely on mostly organic methods, good old horse manure, alfalfa pellets and plant tone a couple of times a year. What I would suggest is not to purchase el cheapo potting soil or top soil or anything else that is that cheap, you will not see great results from it. Pro Mix is a great sterile mixture for starting seeds, whether that is indoors or out. You can find similiar products, but I've never been disapointed with using ProMix, its a quality product with good quality control.

Silverkelt

I'm in Montgomery County, Md. I've used Miracle Gro with pretty good success for WS.

Merrifield Garden Center has their own house potting mix that I've been tempted to try but haven't yet. I have family near the store, so stopping by wouldn't be a big deal. If I do try this mix, I'd be happy to let you know how it works. Merrifield has a good reputation locally, but they are pricey.

kt

Here is a link that might be useful: Merrifield potting mix