Related Articles

33 Comments

  1. Quick tips for you. 1) Keep it moist so the microbes and fungus survive. 2) Save your roots as others suggested. They are great sources of microbes and fungus because the roots is where they live. 3) Monitor temperature and don't use it if it's too hot. Growing organic and recycling soil when you amend with organic material it can start hot composting again. Don't use it for plants or seedlings until it's cool and finishes composting. Around 80f is my "safe temp" after composting finishes. 4) When you moisten on occasion add some sugars (molasses) to feed the microbes and fungus to keep them alive until you plant in it. 5) Don't worry about mineral amendments until you are ready to plant or transplant. Amending is based on pot or container size and it's pointless to amend the entire tub because you'll need some unamended soil for seedlings and seed starting anyway or different amendments for different plants/stages. 6) Veggie compost and wormcastings are safe to plant just about anything in if you keep the ratio around 30%. It won't be too hot to start seeds or for seedlings. 7) Make sure to drill some holes in the sides for aeration so it doesn't go anaerobic. Make sure you mix it around a bit every day or every other day. 8) every once in a while you will need to add some extra carbon so keeping some of your stems and grinding them up will be beneficial. It helps keep the soil balanced as you recycle and it keeps aeration in balance. 9) super pro tip here, once it is done composting cover crop it and leave the top off. They have spring/summer and fall/winter cover crop blends. The clover ones are the best in my experience but the bean ones are great too (for indoor that is). It will put roots in the soil, fix nitrogen, and prep the fungus and microbes to be active for your plants because they need roots to live. 10) when you go to plant after cover cropping for a few weeks you can save the cover crop and set aside. Amend your soil as you normally would with your nature's living soil and after you drop your seedlings in you can transplant the cover crop over your top soil in the pot. It works wonders. Then when your grow is done the cover crop will just compost back into the soil. Cover cropping also works as a living mulch keeping more moisture in the soil and helping to keep heat in as well as fixing the nitrogen.

    There's a lot more I do too, but it requires a lot of outdoor space unless you guys want to try your hand at dry fermenting and building worm towers suitable for your basement.

    Anyway. I'm glad to see you guys wanting to be more sustainable and potentially going fully organic.

    Oh, BTW, a cheap $20-$40 amazon grow light is all the cover crop will need in the tub before it goes in the tent.

    Répondre

  5. I took a new large cement mixing tub and dumped in a bag of oceansforest to get it going. Put in earth worms and kept the dirt real wet! Bottom 1” was a watery soup. Every day I’d toss in banana peels. Once a week I’d take about a dozen dry egg shells and blend them into powder and mixed in. Planted wild bird seed and let a thick cover crop grow and then when the crop was 4” I’d just mix them back in the soil and did that about 4x it was too hot for the photoperiod sprouts of wedding cake. Planted 9 at a foot tall I gave up on them they looked bad when they were 1’ tall. I put the pots out side and watered them but that’s it live or die. They started looking better and went into flower instantly. The recovery and growth when the could handle the soil was amazing. They have a few weeks to go but are cropped trained 2 1/2 feet bent at a 904” from the ground. 1 plant had a cola that’s about 6”tall and big around as a soda can super dense!

    Répondre

  9. I am on my first grow with happy frog and using the fox farm trio.. I have about 1/3 of an unused bag of it left.. once I chop the two plants I got going could i just flush the crap out of the used soil to get rid of the salt buildup then mix it with the unused and reuse it?… I got two seeds left and I really dont want to fk this up I already stunted the crap out of these two lol

    Répondre

  15. I've seen people make root screens using a wooden frame and small hardware cloth or chicken wire. However seeing her enjoyment of playing with the roots it's not at all necessary to construct one.
    Just a thought, maybe use a metal trash can to throw your roots in and hit em with the weed waker to break em down for compost, you could do the same with leaves.
    I was sort of concerned about mold ( the bad kind like trich) if you get it to wet with no F.A.E. but your loyal family have already touched on that.

    Don't ever change you two your a blessing to us all and I look forward to your first grow series using reconditioned soil.

    Répondre

  19. Holy smokes, "Hotaherb grow n tell" on FCP1 & 2 channel, is where to get great info. Try your used soil on some freebie seeds you get on the next run. I would say yes but the soil might need to be amended if you are looking for the same harvest as your last. Some soil sampling is only worth it if you have a large pile of used soil already sitting around and you want to get the soil back to FULL POWER. Nothing wrong with a little bit of gasoline if it's called for.

    Répondre

  26. Get some pet worms in there. Even a home made worm bin = free castings for the win.

    Roots are green waste to feed. If you go no till when they break up and feed the soil.

    Ages ago Ive had potting soil sitting over the winter and the slow release synthetic fert in there all became available and half cooked a plant. When I used it months later if your mixing it, I dont think it would be a problem. I never thought about it before and got caught out

    Répondre

  28. Add a cup of dried oatmeal to the soil, it gives the michrorizae food, and if everything is working propperly, you'll have a white beard looking thing in no time. P.s. thats what you want.

    Répondre

  29. try buying worm castings from Build A Soil they are super fresh and they don't sterilize their castings so it comes with all the good bugs and even live worms, would be a good way to get things going

    Répondre

  32. Put a large heavy duty tarp inside the bin first. You can turn the soil by lifting on one side of the tarp and vise versa to turn in opposite direction.
    For those times you want to turn the soil without getting dirty. Lol!

    Répondre

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.


*