Beginner Gardening: Good Growing Practices - an Overview for Beginners, 0 by tapla

tapla wrote:
JJ - I think that one point that almost all container gardeners are stuck on is that the soil somehow has to be the source of the nutrients. So often we get excited over rich and black soils because we know thing usually grow well in that type of garden soil, but water behaves much differently in garden soils than it does in containers. To answer your question .... I haven't grown anything in a commercially prepared, peat-based potting soil for more than 20 years. What I make and help others to make is soo much better and less expensive, it makes no sense for me to use commercial soils. The only reason I could think of to use a commercially prepared, peat-based soil is if you didn't understand the importance of good drainage and aeration, or put another way - if you didn't understand the negative impact of excess water retention; AND, you placed a lot of value on convenience - on the fact that you can just buy the soil and have a plant in it 15 minutes later w/o having to actually make it yourself.

When it comes to nutrition, the best thing a results oriented container gardener can do is shoulder the entire burden of ensuring his pl;ants get all the nutrients they need and that the nutrients are always available in a favorable ratio and at a favorable concentration. By far, this is easiest to achieve through the use of soluble synthetic fertilizers. I have nothing against organic sources of nutrients, and I depend on them almost exclusively in the gardens & beds, but when it comes to container culture I find it difficult to conceive of how effective nutritional supplementation could be any easier or efficient than with soluble synthetics. Combining them with a durable and well aerated soil is getting pretty close to foolproof.

If you scroll up to the picture I posted on 10/29, you'll see pine bark fines from 3 different sources. You'll usually find the product labeled as something other than pine bark fines - pine bark mulch, soil conditioner, landscape mulch, others. The important thing is that most of the particles are in the size range of dust to 3/8" for the 5:1:1 mix, or screenable to 1/8 - 3/8 for the gritty mix.

Just so we're clear - I don't make any judgment about an individual when it comes to discussing what people choose to grow their plants in because I haven't walked a mile in their shoes & would never suppose to order someone else's priorities, but judging a soil is quite different from judging a person. It is very often possible and in some cases easy to make judgments about practices or soils, and to compare soils based on science. My aim is to lay out the information people need to become more proficient at growing and to gain greater satisfaction from the experience. I fully realize I have no control over other people's choices, and don't want it. I do get a lot of satisfaction though, from being associated with people who DO want to learn and who will put forth the little bit of extra effort it takes to shrug off the limitations that are inherent in heavy soils and practices that make little hort sense. ;-)

Al