I am ready to pot up my seedlings into 1 gal containers and have heard the recommendation for both of the potting mixes above...both from great brug growers!!!
Which should I choose?
What do you use and find to let brugs grow quickly and well?
Pro-mix verses 1/2 MG w moisture beads & 1/2supersoil ?
On my potted brugs I used the regular MG potting soil, then put about 2" of mulch on top of that. I haven't tried the moisture beads with the brugs.
I don't use the moisture beads where I live because it is too wet. I would suggest trying that on a few first, brugs use a lot of water, but don't like wet feet, so maybe give it a trial.
I used to use the MG potting soil, then found the big bales of pro-mix at the feed and seed. I thought the pro-mix was a little "light" compared to the MG soil, though, so I amend it with either finely ground bark mix ("soil conditioner" at Home Depot) or composted cow manure ("black kow"), which makes it then feel heavier and closer to the MG soil, and winds up being cheaper per cu. ft. than the MG soil.
I have my present ones in the 1/2 and 1/2 mix on kells suggestion, I believe it was. Brugie recommends the pro-mix and I was afraid that it might need watering too often....I should check my feed store where I got the afalpha pellets from and see if they have pro-mix...and then I could see and maybe add an ammendment to it, if it seems to light!
Thank you all....I guess it depends alot on the weather in each of our zones...being close to kell in location, I thought I might do well sticking to her recommendation (?) It gets warm to hot here, but stays dry....low humidity and no rainfall at all over the summer months.
I've done several things that are probably wrong, the main one is that I planted my JT/Barbara plants in pots that were too big. Well, I started to plant them in the ground without a pot, as I did the common brugs which are growing like the plant Jack in the Beanstalk climbed, but I was too afraid something would happen to them, so they are in pots. I use my nursery guy's special mix potting soil, but I have used MG and plain old dirt and they have done just fine. Yesterday, I planted a seedling and 3 that I rooted in one of those tomato boxes from Gardner's Supply, which, I think, bec uses soil less potting mixture, as a test to see what they do. If the roots get all tangled, the only one I really care about saving in the seedling and I hope I can if the soil less soil and box doesn't work. I forgot them and we are having drenching lightening/thunder storms, followed by sun and two of the rootings wilted, but one and my seedling did not. I don't know, I guess I'll just do a little of all of it until I find out what is best here in my zone. Right now, I'm debating about using Sevin, I cannot stand the chewed leaves!!! I do use mulch to top dress all of my plants...
Mulch is the single best thing you can do for your plants whether in the ground or in pots, in my honest opinion. It helps maintain even moisture and even temperature, and prevents the soil from getting crusty on the top. Plus is gradually adds nutrients to the soil as it breaks down. Also, Mary's Black Kow is GREAT! I used it to amend my tomato bed, and I've got some whoppers!!! I also used it to pot up a banana pup in January, mixed about 4-1 with sand, but no soil, and that thing is growing like crazy -- its over 4' tall and needs desperately to be re-potted!!!
I am a real fan of Black Kow but I also use bone meal because our soil is low in phosphates and I want a lot of bloom. However, I'm kind of new to bruggies, first one was last year, this year 13! LOL. But I use Black Kow for everything and then later I use that Bayer's for roses with the systemic insecticide on the roses and the brugs....