Best SOIL for hosting MOTHERS

[LEBDOG]

I have a seed based grow which I am looking to progress in to mothering. (see link below)



I don't have much experience at all with SOIL and would like to know the best SOIL I can use to host mother plants?

The mothers will live under a 4x22w T5 (6500k) fixture or even expand to 2 fixtures if plant area mandates this. I plant to use only the GH 3 Micro, Grow & Bloom as nutes. The plants will only get RO water...

Thanks in advance. I can really use some direction here as I have no bearing with regard to this...

 

[Red Reign]

FFOF with about 25% chunky perlite is pretty much foolproof.

 

[Greyskull]

ffof/fflw 2:1 is nice
i have used sunshine organic planting mix and have been happy with that, too

 

[GroHi]

Check out coco coir... you might like it over the soil. Peace.

 

[LEBDOG]

I have a friend who uses 25% Vermiculite, 25% Perlite and 50% Soil. Now he uses this mix for dripping and since I will be hand watering these mothers, I am wondering if I will need to have a mixture which may do better at retaining a little more moisture than this friend. I am still researching and appreciate all your advice...

I am looking at the FFOF/FFLW 2:1 most intently right now, specifically 'cause I'm not dripping the plants, I don't know if I need to use vermic or perlite? This FFOF/FFLW is 2 parts FFOF and 2 part FFLW correct? This appears that it will most similarly resemble the OSH soil I started my testing with about 7 weeks ago...

Thanks all for your input and advice! Here is a link (for those interested) to the Grow Log I started to document my trials:


My last HOG mother was potted in OSH Soil with 3 weeks for fertz just cause I didn't know better, want to do the research or even care much. This was a test plant for me in Soil, running on the same nuts at my Hydroton plants. Actually the Soil and Hydroton performed great with identical nuts.

I just won't do this too much as the Soil leaves gunk in my nutes... I have never seen anyone else run Soil and Hydroton simultaneously before (1 ran 1 soil plant with 8 hydroton), is there a real specific reason for this?

 

[zoeronerer]

if u want it to retain just use soil...used to use black gold and gh in the 90's never had a problem.....i like guano dressing and water for my mommas sometimes compost tea .....thats it....soil or coco if in coco i add a cal mag source usually natural...........20 gallon pots . hand water . spray azitrol once a week. or use requiem from jh biotech for bugs....inspect for bugs /problems twice a week. the heart of any grow op is in the veg and mother rooms not the flower.....who cares how good it does if u lag on harvests......or they have bugs.......or u run cuts from someone else they are always off somehow....................(. )( .) good luck ....

 

[THECALI.KID]

i grown in soil for 10 years now the first 3 years was hydro so i have about 13 1/2 years of growing i have used bio bizz and fox farm happy grow The Cali. Kid

 

[KindSmoker]

Been using ProMix BX mixed with 15% Fox Farm chunky perlite and 10% worm castings,works like a charm. On another note,keep an eye out for a new product coming out that has been designed by a VERY smart man with a long history in plant science to be used strictly on mother plants,the stuff WORKS,has some very strange ingredients never used in another plant nutirent that cause clones taken from these mothers to be very fast rooting and vigorous.

 

[PRODUCT]

go to the best nursery supply store in van nuys and you will find

FOX FARMS
HAPPY FROG FOR $13!!

FOX FARMS
OCEANS FOREST FOR $14!!

bought 7 bags of the frog for $100 bucks

I would make the dj short mix but fuck that.. i'd need a cement mixer and a whole lot of elbowngrease

ocean forest is 1.5cf while frog is 2

guess the forest is higher in quality?


anyways.. your good on nutrients for only the first few weeks.. first things I would add right away, remember always in weak doses at first are:

B vitamins
seaweed
base nutrient of your choice...(example iguana juice)
bacteria

then some fungi
enzymes
rhizosphere colonizer
trace minerals

other things you can add are worm castings.. very little
silica

 

[billy liar]

DON'T use coco if you plan on keeping a mother for a long time (ime). It doesnt hold up the chemical composition for long enough to allow free and easy nute uptake, you will be struggling to keep mother healthy making cloning difficult and often unsuccessful. I dont know much about keeping them in soil but i have learned that regular root trimming is necessary. I have kept lots of mothers and have found hydro to be the best method by far, especially if using a chiller to control nute temps. you can slow down growth simply by lowering temps. then speed up growth when u need to. this info does come from my experience as i have run perpetual sogs that require thousands of cuts.
hope this helps
peace
BL

 

[GroHi]

BL, the opposite is the reason I suggested the coir... you can keep healthy sized mums in 7" pots for 6 months or longer... this is when they become so big that I just start them over with replacement. So, no root pruning or transplanting AND no mixing of multiple soil amendments. The coir doesn't break down & as long as you top-feed with adequate run-off, no need to flush and/or have pH issues.

The only problem I've found is that the 7" pots can require waterings every 18hrs before drying up, which is very bad in coir, imho. So, if you went with 2gal-3gal pots, they would be great for a very long time. It's just easier, imho, as you are running it as a hydro medium. Peace.

 

[dlovejah]

FFOF with about 25% chunky perlite is pretty much foolproof.

.. Theres no Better Soil than FF OceanForest.. There are others that are just as good,(BlackGold), but nothing better.. Check out my Grows brother all grown in FF OF with some Perlite and dolomite Lime Sweet soil..... Peace dlj..:heart:damnhippie::420:

 

[LEBDOG]

Thank all for replying to this thread/question!

It's looks like the Fox Farm Soil is used by the majority of growers responding to this thread as well as in my research. It's seems there there's a preference between Happy Frog and Ocean Forest (Light Warrior slightly different), but that this with 25% perlite is looking like a pretty good way to go. I plan to host 6 mothers, 2 CVK (Chem Valley Kush), 2 ROG (Raskals OG) and 2 HOG (Hawaiian OG). I host 2 just to keep 1 for redundancy.

I really only need 4-6 cuttings every 3 months or so from each strain, but I appreciate knowing what others have done with proven success. I like to start with some baseline of general information and I feel this has been established already within this short few replies to this thread (FF Soil).

I also appreciate (PRODUCT) the nutes information as that's the next topic I will need to cover in depth. I have actually been feeding (as I write earlier) GH off the same drip system as my Hydro plants to my HOG with great results (ignorantly, I couldn't ask for better)...

 

[darookie2000]

.. Theres no Better Soil than FF OceanForest.. There are others that are just as good,(BlackGold), but nothing better.. Check out my Grows brother all grown in FF OF with some Perlite and dolomite Lime Sweet soil..... Peace dlj..:heart:damnhippie::420:

I have had mixed results with it, the quality has been inconsistent in the batches shipped around here. Most people still use it, but the issues I had with it before I realized about dolomite sent me searching for other mixes. I'm using Promix HP now and really liking it a lot. Even though, it's not technically soil, I have been much more impressed with the mix, it's not as messy, and it's pre-limed and already has enough perlite. The compacting issues with FFOF would be a pretty big problem for moms IMO.

The other issue that I have with FFOF is that all of the wood in it seems to suck up nitrogen and I get some fairly significant yellowing at about 3 weeks (I know it's time to feed then).

Roots organic might be another good soil option. I've heard great things about it, but I've only used their soilless mix at this point. It's hot, though, so you have to be a bit careful with young plants.

 

[LEBDOG]

Thanks rookie for the Promix suggestion. I will check this out tomorrow when I go grab another light and some more nutes at the hydro store. I like that it already has the lime and perlite.

 

[LEBDOG]

Well just to close out my part of this request, I picked up Sunshine Professional Mix#4 Aggregate, which is the West Coast Version of ProMix. I got a very good deal and think this was 1 bag containing everything I need to use my simple GH 3 Part basic nute schedule.

 

[darookie2000]

Well just to close out my part of this request, I picked up Sunshine Professional Mix#4 Aggregate, which is the West Coast Version of ProMix. I got a very good deal and think this was 1 bag containing everything I need to use my simple GH 3 Part basic nute schedule.

Great stuff also (I've heard from multiple sources). My local shop (which is on the West Coast ;)) carries both, but I just decided to try the promix first because I had heard good things about it too (plus they were out of sunshine mix). I think sunshine is pretty blank (no nutes), so you'll want to start feeding pretty early.

 

[bigyieldsonly]

if you want the moms to grow fast use coco they grow fast and retain water somewhat

 

[yezmar420]

I use Roots Organics Soil and love it..

 

[purpleberry]

Roots organic might be another good soil option. I've heard great things about it, but I've only used their soilless mix at this point. It's hot, though, so you have to be a bit careful with young plants.

I use roots and like it because you dont need to add perilite, and has alot of coco in it vrs peatmoss. Ive seen a few people say its hot, and I dont think it is all. If I pot up into it and feed water the first time Ill get yellow leaves by the next watering, so i feed the first time, and I feed everyother watering.
Ive seen small clones almost die going straight into FFOF