Hey guys, I will be starting to grow here in a week or two, and I've got pretty much all the necessities that I believe I need, minus soil. Now, I'm all about organic shit, and really don't want hardly any chemicals going into the soil while I grow. Granted, I know some chemicals are necessary, but I'd like to do my best to avoid it if at all possible. So, what kinds of soil should I keep my eye out for when I go out shopping? Also, beware that I live in west Texas, and they don't always sell the same kinds of soil they do in Cali or NY.....we're used to regular ol' dirt round here....
Decent mushroom compost is great stuff. That mixed 50/50 with peat based compost and amend with Dolomite Lime for acidity regulator, about 1 cup per 5 gallons is good, make sure it's fine, grind in pestle & morter if course/quite gritty. If you want to use Horse or Cattle or poultry manure you've got to get pre-rotted and semi composted or add fresher manures only a couple of weeks old say and leave to blend and break down for 6 weeks before using. Fresh manures are "hot" and the Nitrogen will burn young plants. There's manures and guano which aren't so hot which can be incorporated to the base medium as enrichment and/or teas. Personally speaking. I like to mix and amend my medium early and add some Humus liquor and Molasses to get the mediums organic engines breaking everything down early and really incorporating those componants, changing into another container or bags every couple of weeks to aereate the mix and stir it up and at 6 weeks i consider it ready for my plants. I also add spent and leeched compost to add a third of the bulk of my medium,i recycle every litre i use to grow and leaving everything to incorporate for 6 weeks energises the old medium as good as fresh if not better for further biodegredation and energising with Humus. I also add a half cup of Bonemeal per 5 gallons of mix, which after 6 weeks of breaking down before use, is almost instantly available P' and Mg for final potting for 12/12 and a few grammesof SuprPhosphate ensures they get P immediately, ground very fine and mixed in for final potting, Bonemeal is good for rootmass development during veg, it's not all about N in veg' as is often thought, P & K are important throughout, just less N in finishing, common mistake, eliminating N early. I mainly use cheap compost and only add premium, like Mushroom compost, sparingly, this with the Humus liquor and a bit of time allows me to get a rich medium with mainly cheap and recyled compost, which keeps costs down. More to do, one could just use 'Shroom or peat and guano etc fresh each grow and spend more, i believe weed should be cheap as possible though and don't see merit throwing medium out and paying more when Humus converts cheap to premium with a little preparation and time and energises the old spent medium. Of course, adding %50 perlite when vegging, %33 when potting for flower.
i second this. i've used fox farm's organic products with great success. the ocean forest soil is great, your plants will love it.
There is much better than fox farms. For my organic mix I prefer sunshine mix and other added dry ferts fed with guano tea / liquid karma / and kelp extract . though you can still make pretty dank weed with fox farms.
Pro Mix is my choice of soil because it is sterilized.I add what nutrients I want and sometimes mix in some compost.
1 Bale sunshine mix #2 or promix (3.8 cu ft) 8 cups Bone Meal - phosphorus source 4 cups Blood Meal - nitrogen source 1 1/3 cups Epsom salts - magnesium source 3-4 cups dolomite lime -calcium source & pH buffering 1 tsp fritted trace elements 4 cups kelp meal. 9kg (25 lbs) bag pure worm castings Super Soil Mix Original recipe - as it was given to me 1 Bale sunshine mix #2 or promix 2 L Bone Meal - phosphorus source 1L Blood Meal - nitrogen source 1 1/3 cups Epsom salts - magnesium source 3-4 cups dolmite lime -calcium source & pH buffering 1 tsp fritted trace elements 1/2 - 1 bag chicken manure (steer, mushroom, etc) - nitrogen & trace elements - Mix thoroughly, moisten, and let sit 1-2 weeks before use. Revised recipe - after several failures due to bad manure sources, I now use the following recipe. Results have been excellent and the clones seem to take off right away instead of having a slow growing settling in period. 1 Bale sunshine mix #2 or promix (3.8 cu ft) 8 cups Bone Meal - phosphorus source 4 cups Blood Meal - nitrogen source 1 1/3 cups Epsom salts - magnesium source 3-4 cups dolmite lime -calcium source & pH buffering 1 tsp fritted trace elements 4 cups kelp meal. 9kg (25 lbs) bag pure worm castings - Mix thoroughly, moisten, and let sit 1-2 weeks before use. Substitutions - The original recipe was a success, but I simply needed to experiment. In addition, sometimes not all ingredients were always available. Therefore, here are some possible additions and/or substitutions. Descriptions to follow Blood & Bone Meal - when trying to cut costs Kelp Meal - contains over 62 trace minerals. Good supplement for manure or for reducing the manure content to speed up availability of soil. Worm castings - excellent source of micro nutrients
Fox Farms is a good out of the package mix, but I've been using Dr. Earth potting soil with their tomato veg fert for the veg stage and the bud and blom booster for the flowering stage. For such an easy soil preparation, kudos to Dr. Earth for producing the healthiest highest yielding plants I've grown. Check them out if you're interested. Their ingredients contain beneficial microbes that break down the organic matter from the soil (forest humus, bark fines, sphagnum peat moss, perlite) into nutrients while (ecto/endo micorrhizae)increase the reach of the roots for nutrients. The fertilizer also contains fish bone meal, feather meal, kelp meal, alfalfa meal, soft rock phosphate, fish meal, mined potassium sulfate, humic acid, and seaweed extract which provides all macro and micronutrients necessary for healthy development of great big fragrant nugs.
