Gardening Which Compost Trials 07

[Green Goblin]

Hiya peeps,

I have been used Westlands with added John Innes only for nearly 3 years constant and have been happy with the end product. But this year for whatever reason my nearest garden centre changed companies for there compost supplies, when arriving at the garden centre I was very happy to find they were still selling the Westlands with added JI, so I purchased 300 litres and off I went, happy as a pig in mud. When I arrived back and decided to sieve some compost, I was totally shocked to find such a total difference in the in compost I had purchased for nearly 3 years and the compost I had just purchased.

The fist Westlands with added JI that I used was black, gritty, small pieces of well rotted wood, no lumps after sieving, free draining and it was quite heavy compost, weight wise. I cannot describe the smell, but it had a very nice compost aroma, there was not bad smells of any thing still decaying with in the compost and it gave me predictable results.

The Westlands with added JI that I purchased recently was light brown, no grit was in the compost, there was no wood at all, instead it hay, every 8 litres of compost I sieved, I filled a 2 litre jug with very hard useless lumps, which I threw on to the compost heap and because there was no horticultural sand or grit added to the compost it just became waterlogged. So I had to add my own H/sand at a ratio of 3ltrs of compost to 1ltr of H/sand. This compost purchase quite recently was half the weight of the compost I had been using for nearly 3 years with no change in the compost. There is hardly any aroma at all from this light brown compost.

I have only just started using this compost, so I do not know what the difference will be yet, but I get the feeling it will not be as good. Also having to add 100 litres of H/sand to the 300 litres of compost put the price up considerably and it might need more added for my youngest plants.

If the 2 composts were in 2 separate piles, any one would swear that they were 2 totally different composts. How can this be when they are meant to be using a 50 year old recipe from the John Innes Institute and it is meant to be rigorously tested to make sure it is the JI recipe? But how can one be black and gritty, with well rotted small pieces of wood and the other be light brown with no grit and instead of rotted wood, it has hay mix in. 2 totally different composts as far as I can see.

I was thinking of complaining to the JI Institute my self, but as ot1 said, they will not take any notice, even though they make a lot of money from the users of 420.

Take it easy,

GG