My First Soil Grow: Transkei Outdoor 2020

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HeidisGrace

HeidisGrace

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Initially I had plans to continue with a hobby breeding project. Unfortunately my seed stock is MIA, so that puts paid to that.
This 2020 outdoor season I will grow exclusively Transkei landrace seeds. It's a lovely high and it's good meds for me, for pain and PTSD. I enjoy a creative, euphoric high.
My grow space is limited and we don't know what is happening with the proposed legislation for legal home growing for personal use, so I will probably do 6 plants. They will go into the ground, which is rich bay-side mountain soil, that I will augment with organic ingredients. I need to do a lot of research on this still. I can potentially use alfalfa pellets, Lactobacillus, worm castings, bokashi leachate and kelp tea. I want to keep it simple and cheap. Winter is our rainy season, so I will water in the dry months from the borehole.
My first three seeds have popped and are in soil, in polystyrene cups with holes in the bottoms. I have named them. Molly was first to pop at 2 days, followed by Holly who popped first on day three, and then Polly who popped last.
I'm excited for my new grow and I hope that people will read my journal and advise me.
 
My first soil grow transkei outdoor 2020
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HeidisGrace

HeidisGrace

22
13
Sounds like a great plan! One cheap organic option is soil conditioner. You find it for about 12 bucks for 3 cubic feet. It is usually a mix of composted bark, chicken manure, rock dust and worm castings, and its designed for mixing into native soil.

Here is an example
Hey, thanks for popping in and the advice. I am in RSA and a local search turns up products with different mixtures from the Bumper Crop one. I am winging it here, but I am guessing that I don't necessarily need rock dust because I am growing on the mountainside, so I imagine the necessary rock minerals will be in the soil naturally. I wonder if the alfalfa pellets would be a reasonable replacement for the composted bark. I can always buy some chicken manure and worm castings to mix with whatever else goes in it. I believe Bokashi is great and the Lactobacillus is easy to make. I have those on hand already, so I'd like to use these amendments if possible. I think the alfalfa has to cook for a month or something like that, before it can be mixed in?I wonder what would happen if I made a superjuice of Bokashi leachate, Kelp juice and Lactobacillus, and alternated feeds with superjuice and manure + castings solution. The soil is nice and loamy and dark, so maybe I can get away with just the liquid fertilizers I have in mind, rather than mixing biomass into the soil. I don't like the idea of disturbing the roots with unnecessary mixing.
 
HeidisGrace

HeidisGrace

22
13
LOS
After some research I have decided on the following:

I am going to trust that the mountain has made a magical organic fynbos soil, rich in whatever the plants will need. I will possibly add some bokashi bran when I plant, but I need more info. I will inoculate with mycorrhizae harvested from further up the mountain in fynbos roots. I will feed with solutions that contain kelp juice, Lactobacillus, castings and chicken manure, as well as a sprout tea (containing alfalfa), and monitor that. If I need more I will come back to the drawing board for nutes. That soil is dark and loamy and so far it has held water so well that my sprouts have only needed a tablespoon of water each in the styro cups (holes in bottoms to drain) in 3 days. I think that given the fact that the gardens are in a retaining wall on the mountain slope, the rock underneath the soil will be a source of moisture from mountain run-off too. The same water from a borehole will do the rest.

Update on the gals - all three have popped cotyledons. Seeds popped tails two days into germination and 4 days later the cotyledons are out.
 
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HeidisGrace

HeidisGrace

22
13
Today I dug some holes. The ground is very rocky. In the hole I filled about half of it with vermicompost and a couple of handfuls of alfalfa meal. The rest was the local soil, which is nice a loamy and I mixed that up. I started my LABS and I have bought a soil conditioner very similar sounding to the one you recommended, @tomatoesarecooltoo, which will be mixed in and also used as a top dressing. So that is my soil prepped. My first three plants are now a week old and are growing at a decent pace.
 
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HeidisGrace

HeidisGrace

22
13
My seedlings were getting too tall and spindly so I potted them and they are now out in the sun all day. I also added the soil conditioner called Elemental Blend into the holes I dug for them.

My Bacteria Juice is brewing and tomorrow I add organic full cream milk to sit for a week before it goes in the bucket with the molasses. I am hoping to get a couple more seeds sprouted this week or next, then that will be my bundle for the season.

I have no idea what to expect from these plants but I suspect they may want to become trees. I will be training them. I also have a purple varietal bag seed from a friend that I want to grow for it's ornamental features. We have no idea what it is because he didn't make a note when he saved them. His was very pretty.
 
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Milson

Milson

Milsonian
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My seedlings were getting too tall and spindly so I potted them and they are now out in the sun all day. I also added the soil conditioner called Elemental Blend into the holes I dug for them.

My Bacteria Juice is brewing and tomorrow I add organic full cream milk to sit for a week before it goes in the bucket with the molasses. I am hoping to get a couple more seeds sprouted this week or next, then that will be my bundle for the season.

I have no idea what to expect from these plants but I suspect they may want to become trees. I will be training them. I also have a purple varietal bag seed from a friend that I want to grow for it's ornamental features. We have no idea what it is because he didn't make a note when he saved them. His was very pretty.
They're beautiful. Look at those chunky little leaves!
 
HeidisGrace

HeidisGrace

22
13
They're beautiful. Look at those chunky little leaves!
Look at these kids now :) Molly (bottom) is 14 days, Holly (middle) 13.5 and Polly (top)13 days old.
I am working on my various juices and teas in preparation for feeding cycles to come in a couple of weeks. Loving the organic vibes.
 
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HeidisGrace

HeidisGrace

22
13
Today my three Transkei origin plants went into their specially prepared holes in the ground. Their roots look fabulous and they went in intact and now look as happy as can be. My mystery purple plant is in a pot and has healthy cotyledons. I have set three more seeds to germinate. They are special phenos from a homey. Two are Durban landrace origin plants with different landrace parentage and geographic origin. The third is a proper heirloom Transkei landrace seed. These three will also go into the ground when they are ready. Pictured here is my first ever batch of bacteria juice; then Holly, Molly and Polly in their new homes.

Alfalfa seeds (untreated) are ready for me to make my first batch of SST, but I will do that once the new seeds are in the ground too. For now I will just water the plants that are in the ground with tap water because the tank water is finished. They have plenty of living nutrition in their holes.
 
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