John:

I find it does well for water retention. Since I have an automatic
irrigation system I'd rather use a fast draining soil to minimize the
risk of over-watering. I try to keep Biogold chunks in each pot as a
food safety net and I tend to hit them every other week in the growing
season with Dynagrow or fish emulsion.

I was using 1/3 Turface MVP, 1/3 Grant-Grit (decomposed granite/chicken
grit) and 1/3 composted pine bark mulch. This was based on several
recipes I had read. After talking with Jerry Stowell about his concerns
with the alkaline in the chicken grit and after my struggle to find a
reasonable organic component year after year I started checking out more
soils. I spoke with Chase Rosade and with Jim Doyle from Nature's Way
and after checking out their soil mixes I decided to drop the organic
component completely.

I now use lava rock and Turface MVP in pretty much equal parts. It
holds moisture, drains well and does not break down and clog the soil at
all from what I have seen so far. It is still an experimental soil but
I can say I'm using it in almost all of my plants, it's affordable and
easy to sift.

My concerns for this soil mix:

1) All feeding is controlled manually (Probably a good thing)
2) Ph of lava rock (I heard some of them are high depending on the
source)
3) Hardness of the mix (Doesn't allow fine root to penetrate like
Akadama)

If the price was right I'd try Akadama instead of Turface or maybe
instead of both but it's too expensive and it does break down more
quickly than I can afford to replace it.

wmcorcor

== -----Original Message-----
== From: Internet Bonsai Club ] On
Behalf
== Of John Dhom
== Sent: Thursday, July 01, 2004 1:55 PM
== To:
== Subject: [IBC] Bonsai mix - source for organic component(s)
==
== Heya Bill,
==
== Well... it'd certainly be easy as I have good sources for the
inorganic
== components
==
== Does this have a significant impact on water/nutrient retention? Can
you
== provide an example recipe? What you use for moisture retention and
how
== you
== adjusted it's portion when you dropped the organic component?
==
== Best,
== /jhd

************************************************** ******************************
++++Sponsored, in part, by John Quinn++++
************************************************** ******************************
-- The IBC HOME PAGE & FAQ: http://www.internetbonsaiclub.org/ --
+++++ Questions? Help? e-mail +++++