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David E. Ross · 09-05-2009, 06:31 PM posted to rec.gardens

On 5/9/2009 6:45 AM, wrote:
I had an organic gardening book from Sunset many years ago - we're
talking decades - that contained a recipe for making your own soil.
It had peat, sand, dolomitic lime and low-nitrogen fertilizer. I lost
the book and didn't write the recipe down anywhere, but I used it for
many years and it was great. Anyone have that recipe? It also had a
variation for a lighter mix for potting soil.

I'm looking at Sunset's "Western Garden Book" (second edition, 9th
printing, December 1965). On pages 31-31, they describe "U.C. Mix: The
New Artificial Soil". According the the book, the mix was first
developed in 1950. The primary intent was to develop a mix for
container gardening and raised beds.

There are four different recipes for the mix, depending on the types of
plants:
* general
* cacti, succulents, and other drought-resistent plants
* azaleas, rhododendrons, camellias, and other acid-loving plants where
drainage is restricted
* light-weight for azaleas, rhododendrons, camellias

The mix is hardly organic. Even your cited dolomite lime is inorganic.
All four recipes involve potassium sulfate and superphosphate. For all
four recipes, there is also a single, standard follow-up monthly feeding
that includes ammonium nitrate (which I think is restricted since the
Oklahoma City bombing).

If you want one specific recipe, let me know. I won't bother
transcribing all four recipes (almost 1-1/2 pages of small type).
Otherwise, you might look at my own
http://www.rossde.com/garden/garden_potting_mix.html, which I based on
the U.C. mix. However, my mix uses coarse sand instead of fine sand and
needs to be watered more often.

--
David E. Ross
Climate: California Mediterranean
Sunset Zone: 21 -- interior Santa Monica Mountains with some ocean
influence (USDA 10a, very close to Sunset Zone 19)
Gardening diary at http://www.rossde.com/garden/diary