Compost types?

[BirdsongNC]

I am putting in 2 new double dug raised beds in my very very sandy yard. I plan on adding at least 6 inches of compost to the beds. The local garden center can deliver 3 different types of compost in bulk, they are eggshell compost (??), horse manure compost, and a mix of compost and top soil. I am not familiar with eggshell compost. Which of these types of compost would be best for tomatoes??

[Redbaron]

Why not ask them what eggshell compost is? They made it. It could be that it is just regular compost but with added eggshells for calcium? Hard to say.

[dice]

The one with topsoil will have less air space in it. I would go with one
of the other two.

[ArcherB]

I purchased a manure compost last year that had a lot of horse manure in it. Unfortunately, it was also loaded with herbicide that severely set back the tomatoes that were planted in it. Make sure to ask them what these horses were fed. If it's herbicide free, I'd go with that.

[dice]

Anytime you get manure, from a stable, farm, or wherever, it makes
sense to test it before spreading it in your garden. One can mix some
up half and half with container mix and plant some fast growing,
broadleaf plant in it to test for aminopyralid, clopyralid, etc. If it is
warm enough for it to sprout, buckwheat is a fast growing broadleaf
plant to test with.

This page has some pictures of plants that have been affected
by aminopyralid herbicide in manure:
http://whatcom.wsu.edu/ag/aminopyralid/

(It does not kill hay, and using it on hay fields kills broad leaf
weeds that grow in the hay. Then the animals eat the hay,
and any aminopyralid on it passes right through them undigested,
into their manure. It takes years to break down completely, and
it kills tomato plants and other broad leaf vegetables at very low
concentrations.)

edit:
This page on mulches
( http://www.extension.org/pages/65025...eed-management )
contains this paragraph on herbicides in hay (which translates in
the case of aminopyralid at least into herbicides in manure):

Some grass hay is produced with the use of weed control products
that contain highly persistent active ingredients, including clopyralid, aminopyralid, picloram, and aminocyclopyrachlor, all of which are
highly toxic to broadleaf plants. Hay from fields treated with any
of these materials can cause severe damage to tomato family,
cucurbit family, and other vegetable crops around which the hay
is applied as mulch (Plaksin and Bynum, 2007). Symptoms include
curling and twisting of leaves and petioles (leaf stalks), and stunted
growth, which can lead to crop failure or plant death. Subsequent
vegetable or broadleaf cover crop plantings may continue to show
symptoms for a year or more after initial contamination, and the field
may lose eligibility for organic certification until herbicide residues
have disappeared.

These herbicides are not degraded by composting. If horses or
cattle graze or eat hay from treated fields, and their manure is hot-composted, cured for a year, and applied to vegetable beds,
the vegetables can still suffer damage.

It always pays to check with the farmer who grew the hay
regarding weed management practices, herbicide use, and time
of cutting relative to forage seed set, before bringing hay onto
the farm for use as mulch on horticultural crops.

The person providing the manure may not know what herbicides
if any were used on the hay that his animals eat. (People with
livestock here often get their hay from people that truck it
in from Eastern Washington. They do not even know where
exactly it was grown, much less the farmer that grew it and
whether the farm was using broadloaf herbicides in the hay
fields.)