Allotments 4 All

Hi
have 10 raised beds 3 size 12ft by 4ft others 8ft by 3ft  :o you either love or hate them unable to get bulk soil onto site had to fill with bagged compost what ratio should I mix with bagged top soil for good growing condition or will compost only be ok if I keep well watered in dry weather
Regards steve

last year I built raised beds on a poorly drained area.I am surprised this year as to how much soil and compost I have had to top them up.My advice therefore would be to use as much topsoil as possible and then just work in some compost to improve texture.Thats what I'll be doing this year anyway.

The price of bagged topsoil is so expensive only wish i had time to wheel barrow a couple of ton loose top soil down to allotment easier and cheaper to load car with 75 litre bags of mid range compost soil on allotment full of glass shards takes ages with sieve to get small amount of  clean glass free soil  :'(
Regards steve

when i filled my beds two years ago i used topsoil to mushroom compost to the ratio of 2:1 (seemed to work just fine) and yes i had to top up last year and this year, when i top up i put 4 buckets of compost per 3ft sq (last year i ran out of homemade compost and had to buy some in but this year it looks like I'll have enough :)) this year though there has been less shrinkage but I'm sticking to 4 buckets as I'm not only interested in raising soil level but with feeding and improving the soil structure.

trouble is, steve,from what I've gathered ,all the goodness goes from bought potting compost in about 6 weeks, you'd have to feed it like crazy, specially for hungry crops..is there no one in yellow pages, we have a 'man in a green van' who delivers topsoil in bags, 10 for 20.00, big bags, bigger than a compost bag?  :)

What about frrecycle. I've seen topsoil in our area.
Janet.

There always seems to be plenty of skips around with topsoil in.  I hate to see it, people seem to be so casual with it.

I thought that I was doing badly with huge amounts of gravel, but now I have heard about your glass 'upnorth' I have nothing to complain about, at least the ice age rounded mine off nicely.