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Team Microbe's Living Soil Laboratory
- Thread starter Team Microbe
- Start date
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Very true, I think I let BlueJay's advice stroke my ego a little too much there - but even he can be wrong so now I know that and will keep a more open mind about things he says (even though 95% of them have been true up until this point).
And it's creepy that you just mentioned the experiment with the clear cups man... I was literally walking out of my grow room last night after putting the plants to sleep and thought about doing the same exact thing with clear cups! I only have 3 clear cups in the grow room as of now, and I wrap black socks around them to protect the roots from the light. But I use those cups to gage how wet the bottom of the cup is getting, so I know how much to water the rest of the minions. That's what actually made me wonder if lava rock increases drainage; I noticed how much moisture resides in the lower half of the cup after the top half dries out completely. This prevented me from watering right then and there, and when I waited for the bottom half to dry out the plants thanked me and grew a lot more than the ones I've been watering every other day. I just wish I could see through my 25 gallon containers...
W
wodi
Great info guys, thanks for sharing
Hmmmm, for 25 gallon size I would suggest look at "drum liners", they have them in all sizes and thicknesses. Not 100% "clear" but transparent enough to see what's going on.
The other option is to make little windows around an existing 25 gallon container; cut holes at various spots (not too close together) and patch them with heavy mil clear plastic to make "windows". I did this with a 5 gallon container (not any bucket but the exact container I grow in) to particularly verify certain absorption properties/characteristics of Fossil Shell Flour and calcined clay (aka 100% clay kitty litter); it helped me find the "sweet spot" when combining these two water sucking aggregates. Too much of one fucked up the mix, but when the correct combination of the two was mixed with the grow medium....it was like Prius yesterday, Ferrari today.
The other option is to make little windows around an existing 25 gallon container; cut holes at various spots (not too close together) and patch them with heavy mil clear plastic to make "windows". I did this with a 5 gallon container (not any bucket but the exact container I grow in) to particularly verify certain absorption properties/characteristics of Fossil Shell Flour and calcined clay (aka 100% clay kitty litter); it helped me find the "sweet spot" when combining these two water sucking aggregates. Too much of one fucked up the mix, but when the correct combination of the two was mixed with the grow medium....it was like Prius yesterday, Ferrari today.
BigBozat
Member
You just gave me such a product idea:
see-thru test containers in varying vols & shapes, for soil tinkerers optimizing their water properties!
Who knows a container manufacturer?
What is your royalty rate?
lmao
But, seriously, I would buy one just stumbling around the local stores, and upon learning how a mix for 1/2 gal is diff than what's needed for 5 gal is different than... mebbe online to order the whole kit (cuz I'm too lazy and/or non-handy to rig up my own well enough to avoid leakage affecting my testing)?
Koz, u listening? You have some more projects now, lol...
Actually the "see thru" thing is for understanding how a particular aggregate behaves. But once you have the aggregate selected for a particular quality (CEC, absorption, pH, aeration, buffering, etc) the final answer will boil down to "porosity ratios" (air/water); for this exercise "seeing" has nothing to do with it. You definitely must use the actual container for this part of the exercise and taping up the drain holes is no big deal (actually twice--once to determine container volume and then again to saturate the soil to determine the water holding capacity). A good scale is ideal (one the weighs more than 5 lbs....gallon of water weighs over 8 lbs) and doing this outside makes clean up easy.
Well, it was like 70F outside today and sunny so I mixed up my seedling soil for the outdoor starts I germinated last week. I based this off of Buildasoil's seedling mix; I've used this once before and it's worked really well for me so I'm going to use it again! This isn't exactly their recipe, but it's fairly close using what I've got laying around in the garage right now -
Cutting/Seedling Mix:
1 part peat moss
1 part compost
1 part aeration (rice hulls, lava rock, pumice)
Mixed with: (per cu. ft.)
Oyster shell flour - 1 cup
Gypsum - 1 cup
Crustacean meal - 1/2 cup
Kelp meal - 1/2 cup
I'll use this for the first 30 days of veg indoors, then transplant to a complete living soil mix (both indoors and outdoors). This only requires a week or two max to break down, that's why I like this recipe a lot. Compare that to harsher inputs like guanos, blood meals and things that take 4 weeks to become available.
Cutting/Seedling Mix:
1 part peat moss
1 part compost
1 part aeration (rice hulls, lava rock, pumice)
Mixed with: (per cu. ft.)
Oyster shell flour - 1 cup
Gypsum - 1 cup
Crustacean meal - 1/2 cup
Kelp meal - 1/2 cup
I'll use this for the first 30 days of veg indoors, then transplant to a complete living soil mix (both indoors and outdoors). This only requires a week or two max to break down, that's why I like this recipe a lot. Compare that to harsher inputs like guanos, blood meals and things that take 4 weeks to become available.
What does everyone else use as a seedling mix? I know I'm not the only one mixing soil in this thread...
Oh yeah! I almost forgot...
This winter my buddy came up to shoot my last harvest, and one of the pictures we took made it into Hightime's (June's issue) Pix of the Crop! It's meaningful for me because my family has shunned what I do for so long now. This is some positive recognition I'll be able to show for now...
My parents don't take it seriously because I don't make any money. My uncle thinks that it's not medicinal, he laughs when I talk about it curing cancer and my PTSD. My other uncle thinks if you grow weed you're a scum bag drug dealer, and my distant family doesn't think I do much because I'm afraid to tell them I'm a grower due to fear of rejection (they're old school and think pot is bad still). It's pretty frustrating being a grower over here sometimes, but times like these are exactly what I need to keep my head up until the wave hits my state in January of 2016. It's been so overdue. We desperately need this medicine available in the north east for everyone, not just the growers that stick their necks on the line to grow it. Don't even get me started with commercial flowers...
Anyways, this was my favorite plant in the tent - so I'm that much happier that it made the magazine cuz now I'll have it to look back on time stamp to my first successful soil grow. This was my first harvest in living soil that wasn't chalked full of blood meals, bone meals, guanos, dolomite lime, and all that other garbage that Subdrool blindly promoted to us when he owned TGA SS. I can't hate on him too hard though, because if it weren't for him then I would have never been interested in running soil in the first place. That's why it's important to promote accurate info if you're in a position of high recognition like that... I hope Jeremy and other like-minded growers make it big so more growers can grow better, healthier, and safer meds for not only themselves but their families and patients as well. Everyone deserves the best of the best IMO.
This winter my buddy came up to shoot my last harvest, and one of the pictures we took made it into Hightime's (June's issue) Pix of the Crop! It's meaningful for me because my family has shunned what I do for so long now. This is some positive recognition I'll be able to show for now...
My parents don't take it seriously because I don't make any money. My uncle thinks that it's not medicinal, he laughs when I talk about it curing cancer and my PTSD. My other uncle thinks if you grow weed you're a scum bag drug dealer, and my distant family doesn't think I do much because I'm afraid to tell them I'm a grower due to fear of rejection (they're old school and think pot is bad still). It's pretty frustrating being a grower over here sometimes, but times like these are exactly what I need to keep my head up until the wave hits my state in January of 2016. It's been so overdue. We desperately need this medicine available in the north east for everyone, not just the growers that stick their necks on the line to grow it. Don't even get me started with commercial flowers...
Anyways, this was my favorite plant in the tent - so I'm that much happier that it made the magazine cuz now I'll have it to look back on time stamp to my first successful soil grow. This was my first harvest in living soil that wasn't chalked full of blood meals, bone meals, guanos, dolomite lime, and all that other garbage that Subdrool blindly promoted to us when he owned TGA SS. I can't hate on him too hard though, because if it weren't for him then I would have never been interested in running soil in the first place. That's why it's important to promote accurate info if you're in a position of high recognition like that... I hope Jeremy and other like-minded growers make it big so more growers can grow better, healthier, and safer meds for not only themselves but their families and patients as well. Everyone deserves the best of the best IMO.
The English Cut
Well-known member
Congrats TM, something to be very proud of, it's a beautiful pic too.
CimeTempestose
Member
MJtheIndicator
Member
I'm always happy for you especially now with the Silver's photogenics captured in print, but I saw that coming. I still think the Sicilian Revenge was the standout in that run, but more important was your realization of the San Andreas and for that I am truly joyful, so happy for you.
Kygiacomo!!!
AppAlachiAn OutLaW
i used happy frog this year as my seedling mix. i also tried out the BAS living soil on 1 plant and it fried it to a crisp. i kinda figured it would do that but being hard headed as i am i had to try it lol. it wasnt no important seed though just a back up thats been replaced now by dinafem power kush. it will go directly into the HF. after about 2 weeks then i top dress my plants with a very thin layer of the living soil which has worked really well. i got some other mixes that im trying out as well..50/50 happy frog/ocean forest it does very good as well.
Kygiacomo!!!
AppAlachiAn OutLaW
hell ya bro thats fucking amazing! ive seen quite a few pics from u though that could make front page high times. congrats!!
BigBozat
Member
the erlking
New member
Gratz TM
So nice pics.....
So nice pics.....
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