A Note About Coco Coir

[BurnOne]

Organic growers using coconut coir should be aware of the heavy salt content present in some commercially packaged or bricked coir. Past test with TDS meters have shown extremely high concentrations of salt present within the coir. Salts can be detrimental to a successful organic grow and may not be discovered by the grower who may believe their problems lie elsewhere in their method.
To remove most of the salt simply expand your bricks in a bucket of warm water. Saturate the coir and pour off the excess water thereby diluting the salt that is concentrated there. You can do this several times to be sure. Most of the water will run out of the coir when you tilt the bucket over and hold the coir in with your hand. A 1/8 inch mesh is also helpful for large quantities.

Good luck with your grow.
Burn1

 

[Guest]

do you know which brands you've found to have the most salt? i was under the impression that most horticultural quality coco has already been rinsed

 

[bartender187]

^^
Thats what they claim,,,, but I always rinse my coco... VT + others get by fine tho just soaking his Botanicare Coco..... ive found that each brick has a different salt content.

 

[hogwild]

do you guys flush your botanicare coco as well? i havent been, maybe i should in the future..

 

[Relik]

I always rinse my coco too. We only have two different brands (in fact only one brand, because the other kind of coco is under the form of raw unpackaged bricks), and even if the horticultural grade seems ok, it costs nothing to rinse it. When I'm not lazy and I have a microbial tea ready I sometimes innoculate the coco from the beginning, but I don't worry much about it since I use homemade compost in my mix and feed with teas.

Peace

 

[kush07]

do you know which brands you've found to have the most salt? i was under the impression that most horticultural quality coco has already been rinsed

It may be rinsed, but they never said what water they used to rinse it with. Some mulch companies will wash their mulch in salt water to help cleanse it or something along those lines. The same is true of Coco Coir producers. I always wash all my mulch and coir just to be safe. Nothing bad comes of being cautious.

Happy Toking

 

[THCpulmonary]

I thought botanicare was the brand that carried coco bricks that were gauranteed to be aged and leached of all salts?