Where to get Mel's Mix

I live in Easter Ky. and getting ready to fill my SFG Beds, however I can not find any where that sales the Mel's Mix. Not even on the new website in South Carolina. Does anyone know where I can purchase the mix in Ky. Ohio or West Va. ?
Thanks in advance,
ken

Welcome to the SFG Forum. You will have better results if you make your ow, with a 5 way blend of compost. DO you have or have you read the All New Square Foot Gardening book?

Thank you. No I have not read the book yet, my son has read it and is supposed to bring it over for me to read sometimes this week. If he doesn't bring it over I will probably just purchase my own copy.

After look everywhere for the mix I had come to the conclusion that mixing my own may be my only option. The Five different compost should't be to difficult for me, if different types of manure counts as different compost. I have access to Cow, Horse and Chicken manures locally and I also have access to Lobster compost since I have a friend who lives in Maine and will be comming for a visit soon. I might just go ahead and try to mix it myself.

I just thought that since I am new at SFG it would be best to start with Mel's Mix if I could locate it.
Regards,
ken

To me those sound great, especially lobster compost. Just remember you need five, then after mixing them, you need one part of that mixture, one part coarse vermiculite, and one part loose peat moss.

Thank you. No I have not read the book yet, my son has read it and is supposed to bring it over for me to read sometimes this week. If he doesn't bring it over I will probably just purchase my own copy.

After look everywhere for the mix I had come to the conclusion that mixing my own may be my only option. The Five different compost should't be to difficult for me, if different types of manure counts as different compost. I have access to Cow, Horse and Chicken manures locally and I also have access to Lobster compost since I have a friend who lives in Maine and will be comming for a visit soon. I might just go ahead and try to mix it myself.

I just thought that since I am new at SFG it would be best to start with Mel's Mix if I could locate it.
Regards,
ken

It's just my opinion, but if you can find all the ingredients locally to make your own Mel's Mix, I think you will have a much better balanced product. Just my .02

I like your thinking, home made Mel's Mix, with homegrown compost is the best you can get.

I agree with Rooster, but Oh my goodness, if your friend will bring you some of that lobster compost..... that would be great. I LOVE that stuff.
So... until you can get your hands on a copy of the book, there is some good reading here on the forum. If you go back to the home page and take your curser over to the left side of the screen where it says, 'Hover', that should keep you busy for a bit.

I'll take a look at HOVER until I get the book.
My friend is bringing me 100 lbs. (2 cu.ft.) of something called "Quoody Blend" which he says is Lobster Compost. This compost I had planned to add to my bed's after they were filled but can use them as one of the five compost. So, i'll have my choice of the following to choose from, or us all of them. I'll only be mixing about 40 cu. ft. to start with and had planned to us 14 cu. ft of that as compsot.
1. Quoody Blend, Lobster Compost {2 cu. ft.}
2. Cow Manure, any amout needed
3. Horse Manure, any amount needed
4. Chicky Poo, {2 cu. ft.}
5. Forest Compost, any amount needed
6. Yard waste Compost, any amout needed
7. Worm Castings, {2 cu. ft.}

I'll need to read the book first so as not to over do it with the manure I guess, but i'm sure the others will fit in good. The Peat Moss and Vermiculite is sold near by so that shouldn't be a problem but will need to check to be sure it is "course" Vermiculite.

This will be a new experience for me, I have always raised a garden in the ground, the old timer way. But the last two years terrible, especially on my tomatoes. So, I thought I would try to take a little more control in the way different things grow and hopefully raise some better veggies.
Regards,
ken

Wow, I wish I had access to all those composts here. I'd use all 7. I would just watch what is contained in the yard and forest composts. You may have to adjust your peat ratio.
Are the manures aged?

RoOsTeR wrote:Wow, I wish I had access to all those composts here. I'd use all 7. I would just watch what is contained in the yard and forest composts. You may have to adjust your peat ratio.
Are the manures aged?

Yes, all the cow and horse manure is natural, frinds farm. It is 3 or 4 years old.

How lucky to have all those composts. I found Quoddy Blend at Wegman's in Northern VA. during my last trip to visit my daughter. Bought 2 bags for just in case and mixed up a new batch of 5 blend in preparation for the fall garden that will not have to wait till spring. I hope it will add a different set of minerals to my old mix.

Kay

At this point, I would have to agree with the above posts, try and make your own, and avoid purchasing the pre made mix. good luck! You are very fortunate to have all of those composts available! wow! Please keep us updated!

Kyblue wrote:

RoOsTeR wrote:Wow, I wish I had access to all those composts here. I'd use all 7. I would just watch what is contained in the yard and forest composts. You may have to adjust your peat ratio.
Are the manures aged?

Yes, all the cow and horse manure is natural, frinds farm. It is 3 or 4 years old.

Hi Ken,
Welcome to the site and All New Square Foot Gardening .

With those manures composted and well mixed up the balance of the Mel's Mix ( MM ) you want to make will be fantastic .

I have done similar to you but had to use only three composted manures with straw till my home made composts were " cooked " so to speak. I had to add generous sprinklings of blood ,fish and bone meal to ensure enough nutrient range was present .

There is a heck of a noticeable change in the beds that have a fair percentage of the five way compost mix against mother earth gardening .

I have some seven animal based manures with beddings in much of my compost , do make sure there is not a great amount of just one manure though for that can upset the balance a wee bit and give you loads of lush greenery on every thing you grow . Which is OK for loose leafed cabbages but a pain on garlic and onions etc.
Some manures are far " hotter " than others ie too much nitrogen and if too strong it will " burn " the plants & make then weak.

If you were not aware of it .... carrots need to have fairly old well weathered " soil to grow in , grow them in newly manured/composted soil and they end up forked like a pair of cows udders.
Perhaps stack up in a covered heap a big pile of extra blended compost ( no peat or vermiculite for replenishing nutrients in the squares at a later date when the squares have had the crops taken out .

We have run into a small road block with all the manure. Not all the manures were composted good enough to suit my son, he is the nature boy here, so we have decided to compost it again with leaves, grass clippings, corn stalks and flowers/veg. plants we have gathered from our garden and from neighbors. At present we have one compost bin built out of wire fencing, four foot round and four foot tall full and covered. We mixed the manures one part horse, one part cow, one part sheep, one half part chicken and one half part rabbit manures to the pile. We also have a three foot by three foot compost pile about 2/3 full and plan to finish it this weekend. We still have a lot of manure left and have contacted our local city goverment to obtain several bags (all we need) of leaves this fall and will be build as many compost piles as it takes to use up the manure and fill with manures and leaves. Hopefully by early Spring we will have all the compost we will need for several new beds. Oh, and by the way I have some 19-19-19 fertlizer from a few years back and sprinkled some of it throughout the compost pile. It's so hot you can't put your hand down very deep in it, so we won't be using any more of it

In the meantime we have built two 4'x4'x12" tall beds to play with this fall/winter. Before cold weather we will have them enclosed with a home made greenhouse to play with and see what we can do during the cold months. For these two beds I have Lobster Compost, Horse and Cow Manure mixed, Mushroom Compost and adding twenty pounds of Worm Castings and about fifteen pounds of Azomite Dust to each bed that I have purchased at different locations in Kentucky, West Va., and Ohio. Anyone in this area looking for bed additions might check with "Root Naturally" in Columbus Ohio. They have the Worm Castings, and Aziomite Dust and adding new items. They are also reasonable on their pricing , especially when picking it up locally. So much for the update, now for a question/comments.....

Has anyone on here tried the beds during the cold weather as mentioned above ?? We are very much open to advice and/or comments as we are new at this
Regards,
kt

We are ready to fill 2 beds that require about 13.33 cu. ft. total to fill each box or about 4.4 cu. ft. of each ingredient. We are using our own compost. I have Peat Moss I purchased from Lowe's named "Majestic Earth". The bag stated ''Sphagnum Peat Moss " and "3 Cu. Ft./85L Compressed". My question is does this mean the the bag contains 3 cu ft. or will it expand to 6 cu. ft. when wet ?
Thanks in advance.

It will expand when you remove it from the cubed bag. Fluff the sphagnum moss (for our purposes it's the same as peat moss). Then make your mix by volume using a small bucket and measure your peat, compost and vermiculite. When adding it into the boxes, pour in some dry 'Mel's Mix', give it some water, add more dry mix, give it more water and so on, until the box is full. If you have to go heavier on one ingredient over another, go heavy on the compost.

Good luck with your garden!

Kyblue wrote:
1. Quoody Blend, Lobster Compost {2 cu. ft.}
2. Cow Manure, any amout needed
3. Horse Manure, any amount needed
4. Chicky Poo, {2 cu. ft.}
5. Forest Compost, any amount needed
6. Yard waste Compost, any amout needed
7. Worm Castings, {2 cu. ft.}

I'm drooling over this list...and a bit envious. By all means use all of them, and think about us "losers" who have to troll around Lowes and Hope Depot trying to piece together 5 that aren't mostly sand and filler.

daryl.weaver wrote:

Kyblue wrote:
1. Quoody Blend, Lobster Compost {2 cu. ft.}
2. Cow Manure, any amout needed
3. Horse Manure, any amount needed
4. Chicky Poo, {2 cu. ft.}
5. Forest Compost, any amount needed
6. Yard waste Compost, any amout needed
7. Worm Castings, {2 cu. ft.}

I'm drooling over this list...and a bit envious. By all means use all of them, and think about us "losers" who have to troll around Lowes and Hope Depot trying to piece together 5 that aren't mostly sand and filler.

I love me the Quoddy Blend lobster compost!
Hey Daryl, this list is kind of old, but there are some good composts listed. Maybe you can get your hands on some. http://msucares.com/crops/comhort/organicsuppliers.pdf

Thanks for the advice, I didn't think a 3 cu ft bag could expand to 6 cu ft but needed to hear it from someone who knows a lot more then me on the subject.. Thanks again.

RoOsTeR wrote:

Thank you. No I have not read the book yet, my son has read it and is supposed to bring it over for me to read sometimes this week. If he doesn't bring it over I will probably just purchase my own copy.

After look everywhere for the mix I had come to the conclusion that mixing my own may be my only option. The Five different compost should't be to difficult for me, if different types of manure counts as different compost. I have access to Cow, Horse and Chicken manures locally and I also have access to Lobster compost since I have a friend who lives in Maine and will be comming for a visit soon. I might just go ahead and try to mix it myself.

I just thought that since I am new at SFG it would be best to start with Mel's Mix if I could locate it.
Regards,
ken

It's just my opinion, but if you can find all the ingredients locally to make your own Mel's Mix, I think you will have a much better balanced product. Just my .02

I definitely agree, don't buy the pre made, make your own. good luck, sounds like you have some awesome ingredients already!

Be sure to wear a dust mask when fluffing up the peat (and when dealing with the Vermiculite). Where I'm getting the peat, a 2.2 cu ft bag fluffs up to 4 cu ft and half a 4 cu ft bag does a little less than 4 cu ft. I've got a trash can that I marked after filling it up with 4 cu feet of compost (6 five gallon buckets - each bucket holds .66 cu ft). I've also read that its good to wear gloves when fluffing up the peat.

First Thanks to all for the advice, it made things easier for me and hopefully stopped me from make costly mistakes,

We now have two beds full and waiting on spring. Each bed is 4ft x 4ft, one is 10 inches deep and the other 12 inches deep. Each took between 5 and 6 cu. ft. or Peat Moss and Vermiculite. Each bed has 1 cu. ft. of Lobster Compost, 1 cu. ft. of Mushroom Compost, 30 lbs. of worm castings and 20 lbs. of Azomite Dust. For the other compost we used compost we started back in June. It was made up of half composted Cow, Horse and Sheep manures alone with a smaller amount of chicken and rabbit manures. Also in our compost we used half rotted leaves, grass clippings and flower garden waste which we run through a shredder to break it down even more from the start. We also had quit a bit of kitchen vegetables scraps from 3 different households.

We saved back 20 lbs. of worm castings and some Azomite Dust to used when planting and had one five gal. bucket of mix left over to used when needed or go in the next bed. We don't know exactually how much of each manure, leaves etc. are in the beds so our local Farm Coop. is going to Analyze it for me and tell me what is needed to balance it all out before planting. Thanks again for all the good advice.
Regards,
ken

Kyblue wrote: The Peat Moss and Vermiculite is sold near by so that shouldn't be a problem but will need to check to be sure it is "course" Vermiculite.

If you don't mind me asking, where are you buying the vermiculite locally? I've just started my search, but so far Home Depot is the only place I've come up with that has it. Thanks!

Check out the forum vermiculite database and see if one of the KY companies is near you.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AkxGrCEb40U2dExrM09fbk9zWnE4cC1Gb2oyamVOMVE&hl=en#gid=0

Kay

walshevak wrote:
Check out the forum vermiculite database and see if one of the KY companies is near you.

Kay

Thanks. I did check there, but there was nothing even remotely local listed. I live a pretty rural area. The closest place listed in the database is about 2 hours away.

IF anyone has a Blue Seal Feed and Grain store or any Feed and Grain stores at all or a Tractor Supply near by, check their garden dept. They carry such components for gardens.