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Peat Question


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Looking at fertile fibres website they are now offering a washed coir bale, I am confused if they advertised their coir to be salt free why are they offering a washed one? And should we be buying that one instead? If so can we use it straight from the rehydration or would there be any nasty chemical residue?

http://shop.fertilef...-coir-bale.html

I can see four different 5kg bales, with three different prices, on their website :confused:

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I'd be interested to hear any updates if you get any. I never got any response when I contacted them.

I recently purchased a bale ("washed and shrink wrapped") and my TDS meter gave me a reading of over 1000PPM, with the additional rain over the weekend, the water I squeezed out of the coir gave me 600PPM.

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Interesting as I haven't looked at Fertile Fibre's site for quite a while. I had quite a bit of contact with them some time back on behalf of the CPS, but things got a little quiet when they had to lay off a couple of people when the recession caused them some problems. Since, I found the actual owner to be poor at getting back.

On their previous website, this one has had a face lift, they use to have a chemical analysis of the 'organic' coir bales and bricks. This stuff was retted in fresh water and being 'organic' the coconuts were not treated with chemicals such as bromide. I use this exclusively.

The washed and shrink wrapped looks like an additional coir product since the last time I looked and I notice it does not mention 'organic'. Thus I assume this comes from coconuts retted in salt water and hosed down with fresh water to remove most of the salts. This is common to most other coir on the market and given the 1000PPM/600PPM possibly reflects this.

Whilst assumption can be a dangerous thing, with the Soil Association kite mark I would still plumb for the 'organic' coir bales and blocks.

When I get a moment I'll contact the owner myself and if I get a response will post more on the subject. If any one beats me then would be interested to hear.

Tim

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Tim I am glad you have joined in, I have not heard back but my last email to them took several weeks for a reply.

Like many others with the decline in peat I think it is time we as growers know where to buy coir which is safe. Their website now is confusing over what product we should buy and as I mentioned before the whole salt free subject is well hidden away. So how salt free is their product?

I have read comments on the from where coir is consider a waste of time, so I looked at buying in moorland gold but the price was very high especially the delivery and I tried it a few years ago and personally do not rate it.

But ifGiulio pandeli in Italy can grow amazing sarracenia and dionaea in coir with no issues so can we! But it would be nice if we Identify some good sources to recommend to everyone, so those who wish to come away from peat can do so.

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Tim I am glad you have joined in, I have not heard back but my last email to them took several weeks for a reply.

Like many others with the decline in peat I think it is time we as growers know where to buy coir which is safe. Their website now is confusing over what product we should buy and as I mentioned before the whole salt free subject is well hidden away. So how salt free is their product?

I have read comments on the from where coir is consider a waste of time, so I looked at buying in moorland gold but the price was very high especially the delivery and I tried it a few years ago and personally do not rate it.

But ifGiulio pandeli in Italy can grow amazing sarracenia and dionaea in coir with no issues so can we! But it would be nice if we Identify some good sources to recommend to everyone, so those who wish to come away from peat can do so.

I'm pretty sure I bought the standard non-organic coir but I'm also pretty sure that it wasn't shrink wrapped so it's possible that their supplier has changed. I know this isn't a great deal of use but I've been using the stuff I bought for two years now with no adverse effects at all.

Obviously it's better to get coir that's not got a high salt content but if you want to be certain just wash the coir before use. That's what Borneo Exotics do.

I don't rate Moorland Gold BTW either. It's full of weed seeds (you can buy a heat treated version though) but mainly I don't like it because it's got a very fine texture and needs opening out with quite a bit of substrate.

Phil

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Fertile fibre is said to be organic and free from salt. Now i was just wondering if anyone used this and how they get on with it, as they sell it in a few different ways. In the brick washed, in the brick organic, it also comes in a compost already done but there are 3 diff types, seed compost,potting compost, and a multipurpose compost. but this says it contains slow releasing nutrients But it says as with other mediums and compost foliar or liquid feeds are required to provide easily available nutrients to give lush growth. (obviously this isnt aimed at cp's i think just plants in general.)so i didnt know if there would be anything in the ready made compost that could harm the cp's, or should i just buy it in brick form and if so should i mix it with any other component ie: perlite sand ect. hope some of you guys out there can help me with this as its doing my nut-cluster in lol! :wall2: :wall2: :wall2: .......

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My advice is only to use the 'organic' blocks and bricks. I've used these exclusively for 6 years with no problems. :tu:

I'm checking with the company the background to the washed coir blocks/bricks, but no answer yet. I assume that this coir originated from coconuts retted in salt water and has been hosed down to leach the salt with freshwater prior to drying and baling.

Don't use any of the prepared composts for CPs! :bomb:

I use a mix of 2 parts coir to 1 part perlite.

Tim

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