Quote:
Originally Posted by barbc
Thanks, Cincinnana! I have experience drowning mangoes in too-heavy mix so I'm determined to keep it light with bananas. The new Miracle Grow stuff at Costco is even heavier this year (organic, looks like zero perlite) and I'm noticing that even my tomatoes don't like it as well as last year's stuff. Will definitely add perlite and probably cactus mix for better drainage.
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Pearlite is an excellent amendment for your soilless mix.
Some of our forum members use coarse sand to lighten their mix.......all is an acceptable practice.
Another mix I use is called
Al's Gritty mix ....it is a another homemade well draining soilless mix that can be custom made for a number of different applications. But in large container applications the mix has a lot of weight and makes moving a large container cumbersome. But the stuff works very well.
I put a link to some of my photos which show what the well draining "ratio" looks like..I use a custom perlite/peatmoss/pine fines based mix. Depending on what I am growing I just change the ratios of the materials to suit the plants needs.
In a 40 gal container the weight is still manageable with a perlite/peatmoss/pine fines based mix.
Soilless mix