Re-using soil for vegging only?

[clowntown]

 

[southwind]

yes

yes

I have used old soil for just this thing and all worked out well.

I have also bloomed out some plants in used soil.
BUT when I have used soil that has sat outside uncovered I have had some pests come in with it.

Soil from indoors was fine.

If you have gnat problem at all you may see an increase, sue to more larvae being in the used stuff.

 

[Guest]

Man I pay 19.99 a bag and I wouldnt think of ever reusing my soil,if you're starting in a small container and transplanting up as the plant grows,your not going to have much but a rootball when you harvest anyway,trying to shake the soil from the rootball would be more work than its worth I think.Work is what you're trying to avoid right?

 

[LifeLess]

Soil isnt cheap but Id say no to re-using it. Deff wouldnt be up to par. Im not sure maybe someone else can answer this. There could be a build up of salt in the used soil. I think i read that some where. Works great in the flower beds in the spring. And i think my yard is 4 ft higher than before i started growing.

 

[Guest]

I guess it depends on how serious you really are,I've spent a lot on 1K fixtures co2 equipment AC's atc and it makes little sense to cheap out on the medium.I have read threads where people do it with soil beds but I never would with pots

 

[JJScorpio]

In the winter, when soil is hard to find where I live, I have reused a lot of it. I dump it into a wheelbarrow, let it dry and then shake the old roots out of it. Believe it or not I had good luck with it. I would much rather have fresh soil, but if you have to, make sure you add some more dolomite lime and mix it in good.

 

[Guest]

Dont you have to flush out all the old salts and buildups from the previous grow?

 

[Dan42nepa]

I just got rid of two males that had been veging for 2 months in 5 gallon pots. My soil is comparable to FF and I dumped it in a large container and added some bone meal and worm castings.. I wish I didnt now because i am worried about the PH. I think i should have just mixed it with some new soil and perlite. We will see.. I may try it on one clone and see how it is. I am letting it sit covered for a few weeks.

 

[clowntown]

Man I pay 19.99 a bag and I wouldnt think of ever reusing my soil,if you're starting in a small container and transplanting up as the plant grows,your not going to have much but a rootball when you harvest anyway,trying to shake the soil from the rootball would be more work than its worth I think.Work is what you're trying to avoid right?

Yeah I'm just trying to avoid the work and mess really. At $10 a sack for FFOF, it's seriously not a big deal at all. But the thought of having to remove the root ball, packing up that dirt neatly into bags and disposing of them into the community trash, then bringing in a new sack of dirt without being noticed, then mixing the dirt again, etc. I'll probably just use the straight sack if I go with new dirt though, cuz I'm lazy and no real amendments necessary for simple vegging.

If I lived in a house with a backyard and all, or even just my own garbage can, believe me I'm getting new soil. Just that it's can be a bit messy and awkward in an apartment situation. Certainly doable, but a lot of work just for vegging out a few plants for a month or so, and chopping.

Sounds like it's doable, though... so will the Hygrozyme take care of the rootball? If so, how long 'til it's reusable again? The soil was fairly dry at the time of chop, so I wet it with 2 gallons of Hygrozyme'd water (8mL/gal) and put the lid on. The Rubbermaid has holes all around the walls to help the soil breathe... not sure if this is a good or bad (or neutral) thing for Hygrozyme.

 

[longshot]

Best advice I ever heard about soil and re-using it is that you should treat your soil like a veg plot. Just keep digging in the goodness and after a while you have a thriving soil. I reckon your soil is no good unless you've been recycling it for a few years... it just gets better and better...
That is, of course, providing your soil is ORGANIC. As mentioned earlier you can have salt build up problems with chemical fertilisers.
Best additives imo are manure and worm casts/compost, but a little of everything is good.

Hope that helps
longshot

edit... Just wanted to add that I have enough soil for about 3 grows and I just use them in rotation, adding what ever I think is necessary at the end of each grow and then storing the soil for a couple of grows. It works very well for me.

 

[Maj.PotHead]

I read this thread on re-using soil, but I'm still not sure.

What I want to do is to grow a small handful of plants to take cuts from for growing out some potential mothers. I don't plan on flowering them or taking them very far really, just want a super low maintenance platform where I can raise some plants to take cuttings from.

Right now I have a 18 gal Rubbermaid tub with about 3/4 sack of FFOF and almost a full sack of FFLW, and a little bit of added perlite. Just chopped 7 plants from it today. I sliced out the very main part of the rootball, right under the stem, but left the remainder of the rootball in the soil. Mainly because I didn't want to make a big mess from having to pull out all that root mass, and because I'm real lazy.

FFOF being only about $10 a sack out here, it's not so much for cost reasons. But instead because I'm too lazy to be bothered with emptying out the soil, bagging it and taking it out to the community garbage cans without a mess or being noticed. And too lazy to have to re-mix more soil for such a simple purpose (although if I had to, I'll just go with straight OF and no LW this time).

Could I just pour a 8mL/gal Hygrozyme water over it and hope it eats up the root mass, and call it a day?

this should give ya plenty of ideas http://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=35452&highlight=3lb+soil+recycle theres also a thread by 3lb on how they recycle soil somewhere around here

 

[silvertrain]

recycling is a good thing.. not having to throw all that dirt away.. is a burden off anyones shoulders. and bringing in 20 bags of dirt every 2months looks a little suspicious..let the roots dry out really good and its a snap.. or you could go spend 19.99 a bag. ballin

 

[JackKerouac]

I have re-used soil several times. For 5 gallons of spent soil, I add a half cup of bone meal, a half cup of blood meal, a half tablespoon of green sand and moisten and stir it with epson salt water. Perlite to taste. It was re-used 3 times, but started to get a weird slick consistency when watering.

If you get any soil-borne nasties or root rot, re-using is a definite no no.

 

[Pops]

Clowntown, being an old man, I don't like hauling soil every 2 months. I have used soil for up to 4 harvests, by flushing extremely well at the end of one cycle, adding worm castings, kelp fiber, manure and some more perlite. I take out the main root ball, but leave the small roots. Most of them are covered with beneficial bacteria.

If you are just growing up some plants to take some cuttings from them, I don't think you will have any problem.

 

[Pops]

Dan, the major PH problems that come from old soil is the amount of peat in the soil. Peat breaks down over time and becomes more acidic. I don't worry about it much, as my water supply has a PH of 8.5 . As J.J. said, add a litle dolomitic lime and check the runoff water occasionaly to find out it's PH.

 

[Guest]

I reuse soil all winter long, I replace in the spring only. I just pull out the stems and biggest roots, roto-till the soil well to fluff it up (by hand of course), add my enzymes, beneficial bacterias, and fungi, wait a week and plant again. The first 3 waterings I add more BB, fungi, enzymes, and sugars to help everything flourish. I also add more when going in flower. I get better results from used soil. I use chem nutes + organics but I water excessively to avoid build-ups. Immagine if the forest would need new earth every 3 months! Just create a bio-system and you will have no problems with used earth + better results/less chances of screw ups from imperfect conditions. You won't save money though as enzymes, bb, and fungi can be expensive if you don't make your own or assure continous growth and reproduction in your system. I bet that the broken down roots contain hormones/nutrients/etc. that are specificaly beneficial to canabis and are found nowhere else, any leads on this?

I must admit though that I use new soil for my mothers. I reuse that soil then after to grow on.

An old cleaner dude once told me: the secret to success is not to work your ass off, it is to slack off but in a smart effective way.

 

[killa-bud]

re useing soil right now ,plants look fine,but i'm sure new soil would be better