Friday, June 15, 2012

Bonsai soil mix used in Singapore

After finding how different bonsai soil mix used in South India is (see http://lomov.blogspot.com.au/2011/12/bonsai-soil-for-chennai-climate.html), I was curious about the bonsai mix used in Singapore. A couple of Singapore bonsai growers told me that they mix two components ‘burned soil’ and ‘top soil’. Burned soil (bottom left image) is imported from Malaysia. Apparently it is collected from oil palm plantations after they have been on fire. The top layer of clay soil gets baked and that’s what is collected. It is pretty much their equivalent of Akadama. What they call ‘top soil’ (bottom right image) is a good quality compost with coarse particles. The soil mix they use in Singapore is not that different from the one I use in Sydney after all.

1 comment:

Alexander Ho said...

Hi,
I was googling what soil singaporeans used as i was starting out on bonsai growing as well. I came across this article and noted that these two soils are the ones that are readily found at most florists and sold in clear, tough plastic bags.

I noted from the forums that some of them use 50% burnt soil to 50% volcanic rock as well... Did you happen to come across such a claim before?

Thanks!