Read what some of our compost mentors have to say….

“I am doing my bit in composting at home and educating staff and service users at work on composting, which has become a routine part of every ones daily routine. I think your scheme is great. I wish more people would reduce their waste and recycle and compost instead of just mixing the lot and it ending up in another landfill. I will continue to spread the word about composting, as I’m passionate about it.  Thank you for all your effort and hard work there and keep up the good work.”  Jon Dale 

“During my time with the St Austell Time Bank I sorted out quite a few compost bins for members and then I heard about you mentor scheme and gained many friends.  Now I have become a self-employed gardener my customers are grateful for help when it comes to using the compost.  The most amusing moments were a young couple who are interested in growing their own and proud of their new compost bin but filled it with topsoil thinking it would turn into compost suitable for seeds!  I also suggested to one person that they use a pint or two of good old wee as a compost accelerator.  She replied that this wouldn’t be very safe as this might work for us chaps but sooner or later a lady would fall in the bin and probably hurt herself! I have always grown my own vegetables and I like to source older varieties.  At home I have an extremely small garden so I grow a lot in containers (not all varieties have been successful).  My friends allow me to use their redundant farm where I can use as much ground as I need.”  Alan Clements

“Thank you for my copy of the summer newsletter; the debate over the use of peat based compost is one that I’ve been following for some time now, especially as I’m an active member of many wildlife conservation groups. Furthermore, when I acquired my allotment, just over 12mths ago, I was keen to ensure that even if I couldn’t claim to be organic I gardened in the most environmently friendly way possible. I therefore did some research into composts for various stages of growth: I found that most peat free composts worked well for potting on, including my own home made compost. Some gave better results than others but this can also be said of peat based composts. Finding a suitable seed sowing compost however was a slightly different matter. After getting some advice from Terry Walton on the gardenersclick.com website I started to experiment: last summer and this year all my seeds have been sown in a home made peat free seed sowing medium. The results I’ve achieved have been just as good as I could have wished for had I used a John Innis peat based seed compost. Last year, before I had sufficient home made compost I used a bought peat free compost which was sieved through a 4mm mesh, I added some good sieved garden soil and also some gardener’s sand to aid drainage.  This year, I did the same thing using my own home made compost. It took a little bit of trial and error to get the right ‘feel’ and rate of drainage/water retention for my seed compost but I now believe I’ve got a recipe that works for me. If anyone wants to give it a go the ratio I use is (and this is approximate you should play with it to get something that works for you) 3 parts sieved compost, 1 part garden soil and 1/2 – 1 part garden sand. I’ve used this now for the past two summers to grow everything from peas and beans to fine seeded plants such as certain flowers and vegetables.  It requires some effort but every bit of it is peat free! ”  Christine Horsley