Time to consider joining RHS and going peat-free in the garden

GARDENER’S World is back on TV, the weather is turning a little milder and people are starting to get busy in their gardens mowing, pruning and planting as the growing season gets underway.

Lockdowns have seen people take a greater interest in gardening, growyour-own and the nature on their doorstep.

And with the official start of spring behind us and plenty of gardening ahead we even have a free bumper gardening pull-out in today’s edition of the Western Morning News.

So it is a good time to consider how we can best tend to our plots in ways that are friendly to the environment – the pesticides and weed-killers we use, or don’t use, as well as the compost we buy for our pots, planters and vegetable and flower beds.

The UK’s gardening charity the Royal Horticultural Society (RHS) has set the ball rolling by pledging to go peat-free by 2025, and is urging green-fingered householders to follow suit.

The RHS, which runs Rosemoor in Devon among other Westcountry gardens, is almost there in achieving its ambitions already, with its gardens 98% free of peat, with the exception of use on some rare and exotic plants, and it stopped selling peat-based bags of compost in 2019.

The moisture-containing and nourishing properties of peat have always made it a popular compost for gardens, but the harm caused to the environment by its extraction has led to calls for a complete national ban on its use in compost by 2025, with slow progress being made on a voluntary phase-out for amateur gardeners.

Peat digging damages peatlands which store carbon, thereby increasing emissions of greenhouse gases which contribute to global warming. Healthy peatlands are not only good for the climate but also provide important wildlife habitat.

The Government states that it is “fully committed to transitioning away from the use of peat”, with Environment minister Rebecca Pow saying: “We will be setting out plans to end the use of horticultural peat imminently, as part of a package of measures to restore, protect and manage England’s peatlands.”

The challenge for the industry is in finding compost alternatives, as Alistair Griffiths, director of science and collections at the RHS, points out, saying “finding a replacement for the two million cubic metres of peat used should not be underestimated”.

The RHS will be trialling alternatives including farmed sphagnum moss, organic material from anaerobic digestion, wood by-products, and waste materials over the next few years.

And the charity is calling on gardeners to halt their use of peat by buying peat-free bagged compost and using compost bins in their own gardens to create home-grown soil improvers or putting garden waste in council bins for wider use.

So now is surely the time, when preparing the garden for the months ahead, to look twice at the labelling on any bagged compost you buy and consider following the lead set by the RHS.