the evolution of an organic gardener

[Siskiyou]

This is an excellent discussion. Thanks for starting this up Bmac1.

 

[ReikoX]

I just now made the switch to no-till organics. This is a very interesting discussion.

 

[Guest]

Dank: If you have a grower that knows how to read plants and add back to the soil very slowly only what that plants have used(never happens), testing isn't as important.

It is impossible to know the soil balance without a test. Period. If you add back that 1/2 cup of amendments every couple rounds your setting yourself up for failure eventually.

You use the test as a scale in your own little micro-universe. Use the numbers, round after round, to know what levels you started at and what the nutrient draw down was. The numbers are just a scale for your observation.

Kind of like building an engine without precision measuring equipment, ie calipers, mics etc. You may get it to run, but for how long and at what % of optimum performance...

Amendments last a lot longer in the bag waiting to be mixed than in the soil being made available and then washed out the bottom of the container.

I look at testing soil as a security blanket of sorts. I have only a few grows with moderate success and the soil Im getting ready to use is a new batch thats been sitting for about 6 months with worms in it.
I have no other people I know or trust that grow to ask opinions from in person. Im grateful for this place and a couple other resources online. With testing I can at least see if there is a glaring problem and try to correct it and learn from it.

 

[Boyd Crowder]

im using coots mix from buildasoil, and initially its too hot, takes around 3 rounds to get it in the sweet spot
i dont test soil, and my research coincides with dankfrank. the life in the soil is whats important, and its what breaks down the ingredients as needed into usable nutes

im not aboive using a little bottle of this or that when something says i need a lil more of something

fish sauce, protekt or sulpomag if its needs individual attention
but i havent reamended anything yet , i just add more ewc each time i no till into 10 gallon flowering pots

 

[Bmac1]

I picked up a couple bags of promix hp yesterday. They were as expensive as a whole bail but much more discrete and then i also do not have to concern myself with where to put the half bail.

I should be able to get the mix together this weekend and get it cooking for a couple weeks.

 

[KIS]

Probably too late for this mix, but wanted to caution folks to go light on Sul-Po-Mag or K-Mag. It's very high in Mg and K. The K is probably fine but the Mg can be a problem. Most container media like this have good levels of Mg already. I choose not to use it based on the soil testing I've done with my mixes, but if you did want to use it I would start at like an 1/8th of a cup per cubic ft to be safe and limit other Mg sources.

You can get the K and the Sulfur from other sources.

 

[Boyd Crowder]

Probably too late for this mix, but wanted to caution folks to go light on Sul-Po-Mag or K-Mag. It's very high in Mg and K. The K is probably fine but the Mg can be a problem. Most container media like this have good levels of Mg already. I choose not to use it based on the soil testing I've done with my mixes, but if you did want to use it I would start at like an 1/8th of a cup per cubic ft to be safe and limit other Mg sources.

You can get the K and the Sulfur from other sources.

hey thanks for that info

you wouldnt be affiliated with those guys KIS who do soil and amendments n supplies would you?

 

[Bmac1]

Probably too late for this mix, but wanted to caution folks to go light on Sul-Po-Mag or K-Mag. It's very high in Mg and K. The K is probably fine but the Mg can be a problem. Most container media like this have good levels of Mg already. I choose not to use it based on the soil testing I've done with my mixes, but if you did want to use it I would start at like an 1/8th of a cup per cubic ft to be safe and limit other Mg sources.

You can get the K and the Sulfur from other sources.

This is something that is on my mind. I do not want too much mg and want to ensure enough ca. I have dolomite and sul po mag as well as gypsum. I may just go with gypsum for sulphur and ca and maybe use some epsom salts. I would still need to ensure I am getting enough k going that route.

 

[Gr33nSanta]

The more I learn about soil biology the less I feed my plants. I am sure I could go in my yard and dig just about anywhere, fill a 7 gallon pot, and grow a fucking nice cannabis plant.

To me, it's more about genetics, as long as you give your plants water, light, and good environment/temps, and ample room for the roots to grow, you should do well.

 

[Limeygreen]

Calcitic lime is a nice choice to add calcium without magnesium as well, soft rock phosphates help as well for calcium and phosphorus but generally take awhile for the phosphate to fully integrate into the soil, up to three years in field soils.

 

[Boyd Crowder]

i love these organcs threads
build em upfront properly and enjoy the soil for years and years as it keeps growing and living
i think ima grab some worms from the bin and introduce em to some new homes tomorrow, i usually throw a good 25-50 into each pot every flower for some reason
just somethin weird i do , sorry im rambling again

 

[Bmac1]

I think i will add worms eventually as well. Im wanting to get this mix started here and am really on the fence at the moment. I have the dolomite lime but am now on the fence about using it along with the sul po mag and there being too much mg. If I dont use the lime, I will then have much less calcium and I dont believe eother to be an ideal situation.

It would take another week or so to get some oyster shell flour as I have been looking locally for the past week and cannot find it.

I have some new seedlings going that will need an up pot before long and I want to get this mix composting.

 

[Mikell]

Had to ask a nursery that carried Gaia to bring it in.

 

[Boyd Crowder]

I think i will add worms eventually as well. Im wanting to get this mix started here and am really on the fence at the moment. I have the dolomite lime but am now on the fence about using it along with the sul po mag and there being too much mg. If I dont use the lime, I will then have much less calcium and I dont believe eother to be an ideal situation.

It would take another week or so to get some oyster shell flour as I have been looking locally for the past week and cannot find it.

I have some new seedlings going that will need an up pot before long and I want to get this mix composting.

man, after doing months of research, I decided not to source all the amendments individually
instead i got a kit from BAS using the Coots ratios
KIS also has a similar mix

one thing id take into consideration next time i mix
Id let it cook 4 months instead of 6 weeks
My CC mix burned my girls for the first 2 rounds

but since then, theres nothing but good vibes on these microbes

theres some other stuff id like to add

some strains are really different than others and will show you things you didnt know about your soil

i have some biker kush from karma, and it is a calcium HOG
i didnt know it till i grew it, lol however

#1 you cant just amend some calcium to your soil to fix that - you fuck up your soil that way, it takes time to break shit down for most elements to be usable so, Id be 3 runs down the line before some of this stuff becomes available

#2 you cant just foliar fix deficiencies all the time either.

#3 each one of the major recipes is pretty much just a base mix to get all the stuff into the soil so the microbes can work and the plants needs are balanced and satidfied. they are just starting points. once you get to learning different strains and their relationship to your basemix, you can then REALLY custom build your mixes for what you know that strains gonna want. If for instance i grow mostly kush, id prolly want more soluble calcium and magnesium sources and so on down the line.

 

[Limeygreen]

I am curious, I have heard many people talk about certain kush plants being calcium hogs, I am thinking these plants simply have too much potassium and cannot access the calcium, that is to assume that calcium is adequate in the first place. It does hold true in hydroponics that if your calcium is at a good level but you see calcium related issues that dropping your potassium helps the calcium come up and problems are solved. I would assume that the same holds true in soil.

 

[Boyd Crowder]

well its difficult to have too much of something in organics providing your microbes are abundant and healthy. thers also plenty of calcium in my soil. the problem is that the microbes cant break it down into usable nutes fast enough i guess. with hydro , you can just toss in some sulpomag or whatever bottle you want and supply it right away
with organics, youd need to supplement the microbes responsible for breaking down the calcium, ive no clue what thatd be and honestly ,thats a guess not a fact.

i have no issues with any other plants ive grown with my coots mix, but the tacofans on my kush are not hurting anything right now. its not like necrosis bad.
i have one really heavy feeder of the 3, shes running though everything in the soil and fading at 2 weeks in - she will get some fish sauce to help her out, the other two are average in size and nowhere near the density or sheer nodes. these are from seed
so what im saying is you dont know what you gone need till you need it in organix.
fortunately, you can use stop gaps like fish sauce and guanos to try and adjust the big three. but as for the secondary elements, you have to learn how to adjust with whats available

 

[Bmac1]

I have kind of gotten a bit out of control at this point and wont do it again. I will have a diverse mix that i should be able to keep around for quite a while.

It has been a learning experience though so I wont knock it.

I am hoping to have plants in this mix within 2-3 weeks of mixing it so hopefully no burn.

 

[Limeygreen]

I have heard from other growers thats coots original mix is low in calcium so they switched to his modern mix. My soil test shows 85 percent calcium saturation, 8.5 mg, 4 K2, 2.9 H and 41 cec with 51% organic matter. I was low in iron as I used different rock dusts than him, different ones were available to me such as Spanish river carbonatite (generally it has a faster availability than say calphos). Copper, manganese were on the high side and boron was pretty good. Not sure if this information is of use for you or anyone but thought I would just put it up in case it was.

I suppose I should have added to this before so I am editing to add in now, I used leaf mold compost instead of the fish or other compost, I figured it was a better compost to use since we're trying to improve on fungal activity in the soil with this mix also been using jadam fertilizer outside this year on the vegetables which is using leaf mold as a base so it fit the bill for two reasons for me. I also only used neem cake as I couldn't find karanja cake.

 

[Siskiyou]

I have noticed that apparent calcium deficiencies occur whenever I have an underdeveloped root system. Recently I had this happen when I rushed a few plants from veg to flower, trying to grow adult plants with juvenile root systems. No other plants showed these symptoms when allowed time to develop good roots, even though grown in the same soil, including clones of the same plant that showed the deficiency when the roots system was underdeveloped and grown under identical conditions.

 

[Boyd Crowder]

I have noticed that apparent calcium deficiencies occur whenever I have an underdeveloped root system. Recently I had this happen when I rushed a few plants from veg to flower, trying to grow adult plants with juvenile root systems. No other plants showed these symptoms when allowed time to develop good roots, even though grown in the same soil, including clones of the same plant that showed the deficiency when the roots system was underdeveloped and grown under identical conditions.

thats very interesting siskiyou, ill keep that in mind .

one thing im noticing in my veg is some minor tacoing in my 2.5qt moms so im thinking i may need to reup some calcium into my soil real soon
not seen it before , and honestly i was expecting the n to fade faster than the Ca . Man I LOVE this organic shit , fucking facinating how much you learn by just doing it