Screened topsoil prices

adocholiday

Hi all,

What would be a good price for 10t of screened topsoil? I'm getting quotes between €500 and €700 delivered but a local guy told me he has 'unscreened but very high quality stuff' for €200 delivered. Just wondering what the going rate is these days.

looksee

The 500 to 700 sounds like prices for tonne bags, its a lot for a loose load. You may not need screened soil, what are you using it for? If you can get a look at the 10 tonne for 200 it would be worth taking a punt on it. I got a similar amount for a similar price last year and its fine. A few slightly big stones in it but nothing serious, generally good stuff.

adocholiday

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119574788#Comment_119574788

I had an existing lawn and an area of scrub taken up so I need to bring the soil level up in places and improve the soil quality where the scrub was because it's quite compacted and sticky when wet. The guy selling the rolls of turf recommended using the screened topsoil for a better result.

brokenangel

Its 50 euro for a ton bag of top soil in my area and then 20 delivery per bag

If buying in truck it should be cheaper and thats what you want

looksee

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119574817#Comment_119574817

You would probably want to take his advice, but if you are prepared to do a bit of raking out of the odd stones the ordinary stuff should do. I tend to the view that screened soil can be too fine and is easily compacted, but I would hesitate to push this idea, every load is a bit of a gamble.

The Continental Op

Locally one tonne in one of those dumpy bags is €88 delivered.

Having taken delivery of thousands of tonnes of topsoil I would always put a big question mark over screened topsoil. The reason being that it can be screened building site rubble. Actually screened building site rubble can be good if you want a well drained soil but its low on organic matter. The other thing they sometimes do with screened topsoil is "enrich" it. This often means you are buying very quality soil that is mixed with mushroom compost or Again sometimes thats good of thats what you want but they aren't up front about it.

Screening does have the advantage of removing most perennial weed roots which can be an advantage over banked soil (banked = dug and moved to a big pile ready for reuse). However I'd go with your local guy but tell him you'll pay cash but only after inspecting the load on the trailer onsite which should help stop him delivering rubbish.