Scottish peat? Good for greenhouse grow?

[Shamanbud]

I have bags and bags of Scottish burning turves that I use as fuel. They are pure peat harvested in Scotland no additives. Would they be a good base for tropical sativas in a small greenhouse?

I’d like to go organic and guano etc. Try and keep it as close to tropical conditions as possible.

 

[exploziv]

It may be quite acid, but other than that if its pure peat it should work.

 

[Shamanbud]

Ok thanks. Maybe I don't need the ph drama as a beginner. I was going to use rainwater too.

 

[Fungalfreude]

Instead of peat moss you could consider using leaf mould.

 

[KidCharlemagne]

Ok thanks. Maybe I don't need the ph drama as a beginner. I was going to use rainwater too.

You don't need pH drama, but luckily we're far from drama with bare peat. It sounds like you're either in Scotland or N. England if you've got peat for burning still. (For Americans: This is a complicated topic where our current trend of "Peat is Bad and Unsustainable" can get us into trouble. For some folks in the British isles peat is the most local product, and it's often already being used for fueling power plants still.) Plain peat has an acidic pH but all you have to do is lime it in order to bring the pH up. Avoid hydrated lime, but most garden centers will have cheap options for liming the soil.

Peat has incredible CEC, but it's all potential if we just leave the sites empty. Liming the peat will take care of some of that with the addition of Ca, but you'll still need some sort of fertilizer added so that the peat doesn't just become a nutrient sink itself.