Making your own mixes

Chris Collins shows us how he makes his seed sowing compost mix. Like all things,  there are different ways of achieving similar results so we would encourage you to use the local materials that are available to you and experiment to find the right mix for your needs. For example if you are able to gather autumn leaves in your garden you could use sieved leafmould instead of loam in your mixes.

When using loam in a mix, there is the possibility that it may contain weed seeds and carry damping off diseases (where your seedlings collapse as they come up) so we would also advise you pasteurise it first by baking your loam in the oven at 85^oC for around 30 mins.