Growmore, blood fish and bone, or chicken manure pellets — which should I use?
Three products that do the same job by different routes — what each one actually releases, how fast, and which suits your soil and your patience.
beginner15 min4 min read
Soil & Compost
The part of gardening that decides everything else.
87 guides in Garden
How do I compost when there is no room for a heap?
Five systems that fit a courtyard, a balcony or a strip of paving, what each one can and cannot take, and how much waste each actually absorbs.
beginner1 hr4 min readHow do I improve the soil in a border I cannot dig?
Everything worth doing to a planted border happens on the surface — the annual routine, the timing that avoids damaging emerging growth, and a realistic timescale for the change.
beginner1 hr 30 min4 min readHow do I make leaf mould?
Turning autumn leaves into the best free soil conditioner there is, with almost no effort.
beginner1 hr2 min readHow do I tell if manure is well rotted enough to use?
The look, smell, heat and structure of manure that is ready — and why 'well rotted' answers the scorching question but says nothing at all about herbicide residue.
beginner15 min4 min readWhen is the soil too wet to dig or walk on?
The smear test settles it in ten seconds — and on clay, getting the answer wrong in February costs you three years of structure.
beginner10 min3 min readDo sand, gypsum and clay breakers actually improve clay soil?
Four popular clay treatments assessed honestly: what each one physically does, the one situation where gypsum is genuinely right, and why sand is worse than doing nothing.
intermediate20 min4 min readCan I compost diseased plants, or does it spread the problem?
Which plant diseases a home compost heap destroys, which ones it happily preserves for next year, and where the rest should go.
beginner12 min4 min readCan I put cardboard down on my soil?
Which cardboard is safe, what the inks and glues actually are, how long it lasts, and the two jobs it does better than anything you could buy.
beginner45 min4 min readHow do I garden on chalky, alkaline soil?
Recognising thin soil over chalk, the deficiencies it causes, and the substantial list of plants that positively prefer it.
beginner1 hr 30 min3 min readHow do I make plant feed from comfrey or nettles?
Two free liquid feeds with genuinely different profiles: nettle for leafy growth in spring, comfrey for flowers and fruit from midsummer — plus the concentrate method that avoids the smell.
beginner40 min4 min readMy bag of compost smells sour or looks mouldy — can I still use it?
Three different things people report from a bag — sour smell, white threads and green growth — and only one of them means the compost is actually a problem.
beginner20 min4 min readShould I lime my soil, and when should I not?
Lime is a specific correction for a measured problem, not a routine autumn job — when it is genuinely needed, how much moves the number, and the four situations where it does harm.
intermediate40 min4 min readWhat is bokashi, and does it actually work?
What bokashi does that a compost heap cannot, what comes out of the bucket, and the step people forget that makes them think it has failed.
beginner20 min4 min readCan I tell whether my soil is acid or alkaline without a test kit?
The plants, stones and local evidence that give you a reliable answer for free — and the two folk tests that do not work.
beginner15 min3 min readHow do I mix my own potting compost?
What a potting mix has to do, workable recipes for seed, potting and long-term container use, and why garden compost alone fails in a pot.
intermediate45 min3 min readWhat is the difference between a fertiliser and a soil improver?
One feeds the plant this season, the other builds the ground for the next decade — and the products sold as both usually do one of them badly.
beginner12 min4 min readWhich manure is best for a garden — horse, cow, chicken or sheep?
What each animal's manure is actually good at, the bedding that changes the answer more than the animal does, and the contamination risk that varies between them.
beginner15 min4 min readWhy will nothing grow where a conifer hedge used to be?
Four things happen under a conifer hedge at once — total dryness, exhausted soil, a mat of surface roots and a thick needle litter — and they need dealing with in that order.
intermediate3 hr4 min readWhy does the soil in my raised bed drop every year?
Some of the drop is normal and healthy, some of it means the bed was filled wrong — how to tell which you have, and what to top it up with.
beginner30 min4 min readWhy has my compost heap stopped working in hot weather?
Composting is done by organisms that need water, and a heap in a dry summer stops for lack of moisture rather than lack of heat. How to tell, and how to restart it.
beginner20 min5 min readWhy is there white mould, moss or green slime on my compost surface?
What is growing on the top of your pots, why almost none of it harms the plant, and what each kind is telling you about how you are watering.
beginner10 min4 min readAre Epsom salts good for plants?
They correct magnesium deficiency, quickly and cheaply, and they do nothing whatever for anything else — which is the opposite of how they are usually recommended.
beginner10 min3 min readCan I mulch with grass clippings?
Free, high-nitrogen and genuinely useful — as long as it goes on thin, and as long as you know what has been sprayed on the lawn.
beginner15 min3 min read