I also get bark at Orange County Farm Supply on Chapman, just a little east of the 57 fwy. It's Gardener's Proffesional orchid bark/seedling 2 cubic feet. The last bags I purchased had so little waste, less than 1 cup for each bag, that it probably doesn't need sifted. They were less than $10 per bag. Wolfinbarger's in Chino has pumice, perlite and gypsum in bulk. (I take a large plastic jar for gypsum. They fill and weigh it. Saves having to transfer it when you get home.) They also have dirt, rocks and bark, etc. Their price list is on their website. They have the bark sometimes, but with a lot of waste for our purposes. This is off topic, but I visited the Sam Maloof house and gardens today in Alta Loma. They have a garden art exhibit going on right now. If you haven't been there, it's a great place to see with loads of great ideas. Linda

Bone meal breaks down so slowly in containers that you may as well call it ineffectual. I hope you'll consider using dolomitic (garden) lime in its stead, @ 1/3 - 1/2 cup/cu ft. How much blood meal you can/should use depends on a variety of things, chief among them being soil biota population level, which determine how rapidly the nutrients become available, and soil temperatures. Blood meal really encourages fungal growth in containers, but more importantly, it can be extremely difficult to manage in any media that contains a high % of organic materials; it breaks down very quickly & can burn easily; it also loses much of its N through volatilization (gas), and is very high in ammonium (ammonium toxicity becomes a major issue in soils below 55* or above 80*). High soil temperatures inhibit the conversion of ammonium to nitrate, and low temperatures exacerbate ammonium toxicity in organic soils at rates as low as 2 lbs/ cu yd. The cup (1/2 lb) suggested is enough to (by itself) supply maximum nitrification to more than 7 cu ft of soil (>55 gallons), and this doesn't take into account the added N from other sources. This makes the potential for extremely rapid delivery (and burn) very great, with no way to control the rate of delivery. Al

I did the same as Jenn everyone that sells mulch near me has wrong sizes as well. I can get the greenall but have to drive 45mins to an hour lol. To me not worth the time. So I now settled on the earthgro. I screened my first batch last night. From a 2cf bag I lost less than half a 5 gal bucket worth to oversize bark. Doesn't seem to bad to me. There was a good amount of sapwood though maybe a qtr of bucket that I had to pick out so far but again worth the effort at $4 per 2cf vs 10$ + 3.85(gas per gal at 11mpg in my guzzler truck)+$5(bridge toll) for one bag of greenall. So that's easy math to me lol. I can get at least 5x as much earthgro bags. The only downside is picking out the sapwood. Even then I'll just watch for nitrogen issues after I get to lazy to pick it all out. lol. I still think it will be better than potting mix. I'm still go one do potting mix as well just for comparison since I have multiples of each type of pepper, so I know for next season. This post was edited by flipback23 on Thu, Mar 6, 14 at 11:03

Hi all, I am planning to make al's 5:1:1: mix for which I am looking for a good source for perlite. I buy my small bag perlite( miracle grow - 8qt) from home depot /lowes for around 4.50 - 5$. As I need more than 50 gal of this mix.. I need to buy more. Does anybody know a place from where I can buy it for a good price. My hanks in adv. Vidyas