I must have been good in a previous life

I must have been good in a previous life .... good karma and what goes round .

Last Thursady evening just before I went away on a long weekend / short break with my family I was offered up to 50 tonnes of four feet deep leaf mould from a newly cleared wooded site that was covered in mixed trees for the last two hundred years or so at £30 per small ( 2 tonne truck ) load plus £ 5 delivery to my square foot gardens

I can also get 120 litres of large vermiculite chip insulation which is now only £15 per bag inc taxes .

I've also been offered as much free pig , sheep , cow , goat ,horse and chicken muck as I want ,
Plus however many small trailer loads I want of waste veg trimming and parings etc. from a veg prep business that supplies hospitals and schools with prepared veg for the meals..." Fill yer boots Davy boy " I was told .


Now for the more serious part of the post .. is it considered acceptable to use the leaf mould in place of the peatmoss content of Mel's Mix ?
Now I've had the opportunity to see a bucket of it filled with water and left to drain out for a day ,it's water retentive like wet peat & will dry out to a similar state to dried peat

@plantoid, what a great find!!!

Your question was excellent, as I'm always interested in potential alternates/substitutes for some of the ingredients in Mel's Mix. Especially if they can be more readily found and/or are cheaper.

When I searched on "leaf molds", I found it is described as a "compost" component. So though it may not be a substitute for peat moss, it certainly is a great find for one of your compost ingredients.

I also found that it can take much longer to compost than of the compost items. recommended shredding the leaves first (a lawn mower can work well for that) before throwing on the compost pile.

For the most of the leaf mould compost it's had nigh on 200 yrs to compost .
The top most stuff has had nearly five years to break down but there are the odd a bits of branch in it that will need removing .

That is marvelous to find so many varieties of great stuff.
Hope you have your compost area ready to rock n roll!