legaleyes13
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Is the gypsum for pH control or for Ca?This is gonna be no till.
Base
1/3 compost
1/3 peat
1/3 aeration
I making 9 cubic of base mix, then adding these amendments.
per cubic foot:
1/2 cup kelp
1/2 cup crab meal
1/2 cup neem meal
1/2 cup fish meal
1/2 fish bone meal
1/2 cup gypsum
1 cup biochar
4 cups rock dust mix (glacial, azomite)
I'll add a little alfalfa.
I'm really only worried about the fish meal and the fish bone meal. I don't really know how much of those 2 to add, so I'm hoping a 1/2 cup per cubic foot will be fine.
Thanks in advance for any of your help. I really appreciate it.
Is the gypsum for pH control or for Ca?
I would look into adding in some dolomite lime @1/2- 1cup per cubic foot for pH control. There is a thread here on organic soil mixes. I will say that if you are unsure of amounts to add , be careful!, my first batch of soil was too heavy on N and it took a full run to realize it. Best of luck.
What's the aeration ur using?.. looks good u might half to water in some nitrogen. .looks a little slacking on that side
That's a solid soil mix. I've used basically the same without the bio char and plants finished great. The addition of bio char as long as its activated, it will finish that mix off perfectly. I would not add high N guano I would top dress worm casting enriched with 1 TBS per gal then top mulch with bio dynamic acclimators(stinging nettle, comfrey) heavy over that. Water with silica and humic acid every watering. Cycle in some SST and ACT and you will be golden.
Where did you get that mix if you don't mind me asking?
Gypsum will not adjust or shift pH, it's neutral. Epsom salts will wash out with a quickness so you're going to need to address that further into the season. If your source water is hard, then generally you can safely leave out the DL in my experience, especially since you're using crab meal, its Ca is a good bit of CaCO3 (the shell of said crab). Rock dusts can be a good source of Mg, and one amendment I like is Sul-Po-Mag. Look into fish hydrolysate (fuck... is that right? hydrolized fish, I use the dry granular stuff) and believe it or not one of my favorite most easiest amendments to toss into a mix are alfalfa pellets. Not meal--pellets for animal feed. I try to always get organic, but I'm not always able to. They break up very quickly, and then you've got finely chopped alfalfa ready there for the microbes and plants to use.The gypsum is for calcium and ph. No real reason why I went with gypsum over dolo lime, I just kinda did. If I'm low on mag, I'll just add some epsom salt to my tea recipe.
Thanks for the suggestion.
I sourced them from a bunch of different places. Any item in particular you want to know about?
And why no guano?
I was asking where the recipe came from? Not where the actual amendments came from. The reason I ask is that's the rols crews mix with each individual adding diversity from the local environment.
No guano for multiple reasons. One its not needed. And the second is the many many unethical practices the use of bat guano has led to since humans started harvesting it in the 1800s. I will go into it but I fear it would hijack your thread. I can throw down 30 cited reasons to not use bat guano.
For the mineral mix I like using 2-4 parts glacial rock to 1 part gypsum and 1 part oyster shell that will replace lime in the mix. I add 4-6c per cubic foot depending on amendments used. I usually add 4c that mix with a half cup of basal. And I only amend with kelp,crab and neem meal at a half cup per cubic foot. Some will say its a light mix but treated properly it is a well balanced mix that is plenty powerful. Top dressing and mulching is the gravy that brings it all together. Feed the micro web not the plant.
I would also avoid sul/po/mag as well the 0-0-22 ratio is not good for micro life mixed globally especially. Add a tsp or two per gallon of castings you top dress with as well as the tsp-TBS of kelp per gal castings.
My ROLS mix is nearly identical minus fish meal, plus fishbone meal, oyster shell, and about 20-30% EWC... And I would stay away from lime per @Seamaiden's advice.
Have had excellent results! Good vibes to you and your soil ;)
Yeah, this is a ROLS recipe. I MIGHT have a difficult time sourcing fresh worm castings (good chance I won't, but who knows). And when you say a tsp per gallon, you mean a tsp per gallon of soil?
Even at light rates? I've done well using it as an alternative to the 'quick fix' of MgSO4. I've also seen kelp grossly overused, fortunately I've avoided that problem myself, but have gone to stuff like Sul-Po-Mag because it is bereft of the secondary plant metabolites that come with kelp.
I don't disagree with you about the bat guano. I've been harvesting my own insect frass as I keep a colony of mealworms for my chickens. Love it!
Just yesterday I brought 9 identical plants inside to flower.
I was asking the same questions you are, and had all these clones, so I'm half way through the trial.
The results thus far are surprising in their lack of differentiation.
View attachment 420872
https://www.thcfarmer.com/community/threads/six-super-soil-variants-run-side-by-side.63549/
I'm hesitant to start drawing conclusions with nine weeks of flowering to go, but it's hard not to notice that the only common element in all nine formulations is the inoculations in Down To Earth compost and worm castings.
Is growing good pot in dirt really all about the microbes?
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