I've just made a heap of 5-1-1 mix for the upcoming growing season (i'm in the southern hemi) and ran out of peat half way thru so used coir and also another part compost....its definitely easier to wet for sure.

Been playing around with a moisture meter, the coir/compost containers do measure slightly more moist than the straight 5-1-1.....prob was expected.

Edit: this question is more suited to the Container forum!

Shredded leaves, shredded straw, compost, almost any other form of organic material would be better than peat moss.

kimmq is kimmsr

Thanks every one, I appreciate your advice and recommendations. I was thinking soil but the container forum probably would have been a better place. Ops. LOL!

I use potting mix which can be bought in large bags and organic. Miracle Gro makes one as does other companies. I use this as my peat mix. I mix it with orchid bark and perlite or lava rock for my mixes.

It is difficult when you are repotting large plants in large container as the cost can be prohibitive. Watch the sales on potting mixes. Just think of them as your peat component. Look for organic.

Jane

Hi Jane,

Thanks. Yeah cost is an issue at the moment and I have about 30 trees and bushes to re pot into bigger pots.

I think for perennials and a longer lasting mix you would use the gritty mix (instead of the 5 1 1) which from memory does not include peat moss.....have a look into that.

Hi antipodean,

Your right, gritty mix doesn't have peat. Its been a while since I made any but it looks like it's 1:1:1 pine bark, turface, and grit. I might give that a try on some of the trees and see how they do. Thanks.

I agree with Pam that the comments about adding straw, leaves, compost, or almost any kind of organic component that is already fine or breaks down quickly are far more likely to get you into trouble (in a big hurry) than to leave you glad you went down that particular path.

FWIW - EVERY experiment I've ever done in which coir was substituted for
peat and CHCs for pine or fir bark, the results were very clearly
inferior in the coco products because of inherent issues that either
need addressing or can't be addressed for large % of plants in which
allelopathic symptoms are made manifest when using coco products.
Since the only reason to use peat in the 5:1:1 mix is to increase the
water retention of the bark/perlite, you might consider replacing
the peat fraction with unscreened Turface or Calcined DE. You could even
replace the perlite with same.

Keep in mind that you can start with ingredients from which you can make a near perfect medium, but mix them in such a way as to render them unusable. Proportions are very important, and if you're to benefit from enhanced aeration and drainage, it's important that the ingredients are mixed with a proportion of coarse material so large that the smaller fraction of fine material is insufficient to fill all the large pores between large particles. The threshold proportion occurs exactly at the point where there is just enough fine material to fill all the spaces between coarse soil particles. The easiest soils to grow in will always favor coarse material such that a great deal more fine material would be needed to reach the threshold proportion. Growing in a 1:1 mix of pine bark + peat offers no appreciable degree of better aeration or drainage than growing in peat alone. You can see this in your mind's eye when you look at the fact that at a 1:1 ratio, all pores between bark particles are filled with peat - so no improvement in aeration or drainage over peat alone. When you get somewhere around 5-8 parts of bark + perlite and 1 part of peat/compost/other fine material, you're in the area where changing the ratio slightly to adjust water retention w/o destroying aeration is simply fine tuning.

Al

Perhaps this video with Eliot Coleman may be of some interest to those that want something other than peat moss for a soilless mix.

http://www.growingagreenerworld.com/year-round-growing/

kimmq is kimmsr

...... and growing in the ground under a hoop house is related to container culture/media how?

Al

Maybe I missed it but was there something about container gardening in Mr. Coleman's very informative video?

edit: I was watching the video when Al posted his response

Hi Al,
Thank you for the info. After doing some more searching it looks like coir is more hydrophobic than peat. I can get some Turface locally and repot some of my trees using Turface vs peat and see how it goes. Need to make some gritty mix for the house plants as well. Fortunately, I still have all my trees after Matthew came through and I only lost a some fruit.

About 15 minutes into the video Coleman talks about using a seed starting mix of about 40 percent compost.

I have used compost as a seed starting medium, as well as potting soil, for many years with none of the problems often expressed by some here.

kimmq is kimmsr

No matter what someone thinks or says, it can be stated with certainty that because of the size of the particles in finished compost, it will be extremely water-retentive, which is the issue central to the reason a very high % of growers flock to fora seeking remediation for a conspicuous lack of vitality in their containerized plants. One might suggest that he is never subject to the limitations inherent in a practice, but when a motocross participant drives his mini van on the street like he rides his bike on the track, then claims his van is getting superlative gas mileage, it makes one wonder how that's possible.

Al