If your potted plants have you thinking you have a black thumb, let’s talk potting mix. Choosing the right potting mix can mean the difference between a plant that’s lush, full, and thriving and one that’s really struggling just to survive. Here, we share what makes a good potting mix, and what makes our favorite potting mix the best.
The Best Potting Mix
Professional potting mix isn’t a soil so much as it’s a “growth medium” – carefully designed in all ways to promote plant health. When choosing the right mix, you want one that’s light-weight – even fluffy. The goal is to have exactly the right combination of ingredients, so the mix holds moisture evenly but also lets the excess water drain, allowing the roots to breathe.
Our Berger All-Purpose Mix is made with the perfect ratio of quality sphagnum peat moss and perlite to create the ideal medium for just about any type of plant – including annuals, perennials, hanging baskets, indoor and outdoor containers, vegetables, and herbs. We’re so confident in the quality that we use the same mix in our Mulhall’s-grown containers too.
Customizing Your Mix
There are a wide variety of potting mixes available that have added controlled-release fertilizers or other ingredients, and these can be helpful for an all-in-one product. But if you’re planting a collection of plants with different needs or you realize your plants don’t need that much fertilizer – or you just want to customize your own mix – it’s best to have a mix without these added ingredients.
Berger All-Purpose Mix is an ideal foundation that you can easily customize for your plants’ needs. If you need even more drainage, add orchid mix which has larger bark pieces. If you need more water retention, you can incorporate additional sphagnum peat moss of Soil Moist. And you can add any fertilizer – liquid or slow-release, synthetic or organic – that you or your plants prefer.
Specialty Mixes
Most potting mixes are made to accommodate a relatively wide variety of plants, but some plants have such different soil needs that we do recommend using a specialty mix – particularly for cacti. Cacti mixes are extremely course and don’t hold a lot of water. This lets them drain very quickly, so the roots don’t stay too wet. Other popular specialty mixes include mixes for African violets and orchids.
Let’s Start Planting
For most plant, you just can’t go wrong with our favorite potting mix – Berger All-Purpose Mix. A huge 3-cubic-foot bag is only $19.99 – enough to go a long way in all your planting projects this spring. And if you want to customize your mix or you’re looking for the right all-in-one potting mix, just talk to the team in the greenhouse – we’ll be glad to help.
