A PEAT-free compost range made from sheep’s wool, bracken - and now comfrey - by Dalefoot Composts has been shortlisted for the first ever RHS Chelsea Sustainable Garden Product of the Year Award.

Dalefoot Wool Compost with Comfrey, launched earlier this year by the Penrith-based firm, is one of ten shortlisted products to be recognised for their green credentials in this prestigious RHS competition*.

Family-owned Dalefoot Composts spent five years perfecting the addition of comfrey, a plant superfood, into its popular peat-free Wool Compost range.

Comfrey is now grown sustainably at Dalefoot farm near Heltondale as a commercial crop allowing the company to scale up peat-free compost production to supply many more garden centres and nurseries across the UK, plus online for home delivery.

Blending comfrey into the composts complements the company’s on-farm approach to no-till soil management, adds structure and additional flowers and biodiversity to the landscape benefitting insects and pollinators, and, importantly from a horticultural perspective, provides increased nutrient content in the final compost product.

Professor Jane Barker of Dalefoot Composts said: “As firm believers in true sustainability – social, economic and environmental - our team is over the moon to be shortlisted. We take real care to employ environmental best practice at Dalefoot.”

The company sources bracken from Exmoor, Northumberland and Wales, as well as locally in Cumbria. Sheep farmers are benefitting too as supplying undipped wool for the compost means they have a market for a product they struggle to sell.Over the past 12 months, compost production has doubled.