Jack Morgan's Expert Plumeria Care is the International Authority for Plumeria Soil mix and cactus mix

Soilless Planting Mix or Cactus Mix
For Container Growing Plumeria

The following is an excellent mix for anywhere one can find these ingredients or close matching substitutes. The ingredients are West Coast labels however with some imagination substitutes are readily available This mix has been thoroughly tested in the field for the following; plumeria, pachypodium, adenium and euphorbia milii. It is very fast draining long lasting and and has excellent cation exchange (CEC)**. Mix one part ea. product to make a completed mix. This mix contains no peat or sand to prevent decomposing into sludge then compaction. Sand can have up to 90% compaction rate by just adding water. Compaction is a detriment to the necessary gas exchange for your plants in containers or plants in the ground.

plumeria soil mix amendment #3 or #4 perlite

Number 3 or alternate number 4 perlite can be used.
More info: http://www.perlite.net

plumeria soil mix amendment agriculture grade pumice

This product is not available every where in the US. A good list of substitutes is as follows:3/16" to 1/2" crushed volcanic rock, add a second part number 3 or 4 perlite
More info: http://www.clppumice.com/horticultural.html

plumeria soil mix amendment Kellogs Big R

plumeria soil mix amendment Kellogs Big R

The addition to the mix of coarse shredded redwood is preferable however it can be replaced with coarse fir. It is a must to have at least 25% of the mix in coarse wood chips.
More info: http://www.kellogggarden.com/new/gardeners/big-r-redwood-soil-conditioner.php

plumeria soil mix amendment turf n tee

This is a semi composted forest humus product and should be readily available at a good garden center.
More info: http://sequoiabark.com/products.html#turf

The following information I doubt has ever been added to any published Plumeria Book or posted on a Plumeria Society web page. The following is a very basic horticulture science lesson; I could elaborate on the superiority of this mix over any brand of cactus mix + perlite. This is the short version; In our own side by side trials the superiority was hands down easily noticeable and lab testing confirmed a superior storage of usable nutrients in the the plants after the growing season. As I have stated many times prior there are thousands of ways to grow plumeria, root cuttings, start seed and so on. However, there are superior growing techniques mostly used by professional growers that have been proven year after year. Even cactus and succulent growers do not use a commercial blended cactus mix. The percentage of sand in professional growers mixes becomes less and less as years go by because of negative issues from the sand! "Sand holds nutrients poorly; properly tested amendments can help". This quote is from a scientific article on golf course maintenance. It continues "Adding cation exchange capacity is more effective with amendments that have higher CECs in smaller volumes. For example, 40 liters of sand has close to the same cation exchange capacity (CEC) (1,000 meq) as 10 liters of forest humus a four to one ratio( of Turf N Tee or Kellogg's Big R)". So it takes 1/4th forest humus to the volume of sand to hold the same amount of nutrients as sand. One reason cactus mix works for so many is the fact that plumeria can tolerate and somewhat perform in adverse conditions.

In my over fifty years of growing a large variety of plants common to our local area I have never found any other plant to tolerate as much fertilizing as plumeria. We do continuous feed where our plumeria are fed at a moderate level of nutrients at every watering. In addition, to this regimen I have added a foliar/leaf feed on a daily basis for two months and even longer periods of time. These foliar and leaf feeding experiments were to evaluate how much over fertilization (i.e. nutrients) a plumeria can tolerate. This proves to me the fact that their would be a significant health increase to plumeria when a foliar feeding program is added and soils having a greater nutrient holding capacity (CEC) are used for container or in the ground growing of plumeria.

**In simple terms Cation Exchange Capacity is used as a measure of fertility and nutrient retention capacity of a soil or potting mix. The nutrients are then readily available to the plumeria plant.

In soil science terms, cation exchange capacity (CEC) is the capacity of a soil for ion exchange of positively charged ions between the soil and the soil solution. A positively-charged ion, which has fewer electrons than protons, is known as a cation due to its attraction to cathodes.