Rant: I stopped trusting nursery soil labels after finding garbage bags buried in my raised beds in Boise

Tessa Fisher · 2026-09-30T21:55:04.252247+00:00

Three springs back I bought six yards of "organic compost blend" from a yard in Boise and dumped it straight into my raised beds. Come July, my tomatoes were stunted and the soil felt greasy, so I dug down about a foot and hit shredded black plastic, coffee cup lids, and what looked like a piece of a garbage bag. The seller just shrugged and said it came from their green waste pile, which told me everything about how they screen it. Now I test every load with a cheap sieve and a bucket of water before it goes anywhere near my beds, and I turn down anything I cannot see the source of. Has anyone else pulled trash out of supposedly clean compost, and did you find a supplier who actually screens it?

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Rant: I stopped trusting nursery soil labels after finding garbage bags buried in my raised beds in Boise | Botany Lovers - Discusd