Kanzeon said:

A quick edit to the bloom booster:

100g water
100g molasses
300g liquid kelp extract
100g fishbone meal
45g banana peel powder

Heated to a simmer for 2 minutes, then blended in a high speed blender with:

75g mineralized phosphate
10g hardwood ash
5g epsom salt
5g micronized sulfur

Increase to 2-3 mL/L. Makes about 1.25 liters.

It looked like the carrageenan/agar in the kelp extract and the gelatin in the fish bone meal absorbed water when boiled, which actually works perfectly because I was looking for a hydrocolloid to aid with wetting. Now I won't need to add xanthan gum.

I also knocked out a batch of soil last night, sans humic and fulvic acid blend for the '88G13HP's on the way. It's funny, it's something that I enjoy doing, but I procrastinate every time it needs to be done.

10 gallons Perlite
3 gallons Coco
2.5 gallons peat, rinsed with hot tap water and then boiling water
2.5 gallons EWC
1 cup oyster shell flour
1.75 cups 4-4-4
2 cups dolomite lime
1 teaspoon micronized sulfur

Tried Canna Coco for the first time and immediately liked it better than the other compressed brand that I'd been using. It rehydrated faster, wasn't nearly as dirty after rehydrating, and broke apart easier. Still poured hot water over it though, just to be safe.

I'm hoping that with some treatment, this can be used as a renewable living soil. The boiling water seems to get rid of any pests that may have hung around since the last grow. Since the soil, the bloom booster, and the veg nutes are all pH neutral, it should hopefully be relatively plug and play after plants get chopped, assuming I don't get invaded by bugs.

So after stalking Dirtbag's thread, I went looking for info on Triacontanol () says that there's a range between .001g per L and 0.5g per liter in which it is effective, and then any more than that starts hindering growth.

It also gives the ratio of 15g dried alfalfa per liter of water to make the extraction, and notes that tea made from stalks and roots has less of an inhibitory effect at high doses than tea made from the leaves or reproductive organs.

Seems like a nice middle ground there is .01g/L, so that's what I'll go with to start. Since a 5 gallon bucket is roughly 18 liters, I'll start off by adding 1 gram alfalfa extract to that and .15g/L to the epsom salt/sulfur foliar that gets used every other week during the full cycle.

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Dirtbag said:

The thing I like about Canna Coco specifically is that its RHP certified. Which means it's been throughly inspected for quality control in assuring its sodium free, and has the correct air to water holding capacity and is pest free.
Big growers and greenhouses buy RHP certified shit because you can just use it right away with no fucking around worrying about unstable ec/ph or bugs. It works like it should straight from the bag.

Check it out;

Why RHP certification

With the RHP quality mark you promise security, safety and insight in quality.

www.rhp.nl

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MIMedGrower said:

Does canna have a parent company? Canna gardening is not listed in the 70 companies. Maybe i cant read dutch?

I wish there were companies i could get peat mix from on the list but i dont see any that do business here.

The differences in the 2 bales of pro mix bought only 6 months apart has me concerned.

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Dirtbag said:

They must. Canna bags have the big RHP seal on them and they freely advertise as being the first RHP certified coco on the market.

And yeah I totally get the frustration with promix. It's super inconsistent. You should see what happens when you use 40 bags at a time lol. Plants are all over the place for the first couple weeks.

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Kanzeon said:

Damn, I liked it better without even knowing all that! I was just happy that the blocks split easily and are the perfect size for my soil mix.

TBH, I don't know how y'all grow/grew in Promix. I know it's a small sample size, but I've regretted both times I bought it because of the thrips and fungus gnats that came with it. I don't know if you were using it when the root aphids struck, but it wouldn't surprise me if it was the culprit.

This bag of peat comes with a Promix ad plastered on the side of it, so I should have known that there would probably be unwelcome guests. Whatever, boiling water seems to have done the trick.

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MIMedGrower said:

The aphids and gnats most likely came from a cold wet stored bag of mothers earth groundswell from an out of business grow warehouse. I didnt know at the time. I was met at another location to buy the bags.

I have not seen bugs from pro mix yet.

How do they survive a sealed bale? The groundswell was an ocean forest copy and had perforations in the bag for air.

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Dirtbag said:

Not sure but they do, I'm guessing its eggs hatching. I've seen a friends sealed grow room with a few bales of promix and within a couple weeks it was a fungus gnat convention. Certainly had plenty of problems with it coming with bugs myself. It's literally referred to as aphid and gnat mix here now. Almost everyone I know has jumped over to either proterra, coco or wool around here.

No doubt poor storage somewhere along the route plays a part, but we've had bug issues in promix even using full pallets worth still in the wrap.

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MIMedGrower said:

I believe it. And many say the same about ocean forest but i never even saw more than one gnat in my room until i got that mothers earth stuff. And it was definitely storage related.

I got my best yields ever from those bags. Lol.

And then a year of half yields from bugs. :-(

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Dirtbag said:

Imagine if everything was perfect all the time...lol, oh the times we would have hahaha.

I had a really fun one recently when I discovered I was sucking thousands of flying bugs in through my AC... Had to seal it off and bomb everything with pyrethrin daily for a week. Keeping a close eye on it., but it's always somethin...

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Moshmen said:

I think all this talk about pests and bugs is drawing them in ! Lmao got them little fuckers too! - only bought 4 bales of promix so far and fungus flyers in everyone! I still like it over my dirt, but you guys are really steering me towards coco in the future

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Kanzeon said:

View attachment 1023037

Just a nice little update on the flower room. Great times.

Chopped both Silverfields, they're in the freezer now to be made into hash tomorrow.

AK-47, the long, lanky multi-topped lady, is going to get cut in a couple days, right at 9.5 weeks. That'll be made into- you guessed it- hash. Then come Motherlode Kush, both Siberian Hazes, and Double Black (which I'm not running again).

I might be starting to get to the point where I let myself be proud of the progress of this grow. Maybe.

Also, I've noticed that the seedlings grow much, much faster in those 2x2x4" pots when their water/food is poured into the container the pots are in, instead of through the soil. One day I'd like to set up a flood and drain fertigation system in there, but that's a long way off at this point.

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Kanzeon said:

So a half gram dab of 45-110 micron hash of Silverfields has my entire body numb right now, and with every breath the universe expands and contracts while myriad realities unveil themselves before me in glorious splendor.

There's a heightened sensation of my body, not dissimilar to a low dose of acid. As a matter of fact, I've been typing this with my eyes closed for about half of this post because that seems to be the way they want to be. Though right now I'm looking at @Milson 's avatar and hearing it echo like I'm in a fucking stadium. Aaaaaaaaaand here come the giggles!

Hoo boy. Good shit. ☄🌪

Getting a 45 micron bag was huge, because the 22 is still draining hours later so it'll be relatively impure. When I can get up again, I'll take some pics as it gets separated and pressed.

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