Howdy everyone! This is the start of my organic no till living soil adventures. I will be running a 3x3 raised bed in a 4x4 tent and also a 2x4 raised bed jammed into a 2x4 tent.
The 3x3 bed is full of Build A Soil’s Take and Bake living soil kit. The 2x4 bed will have a living soil mix I made myself on the cheap. Interested to see the differences in the soils between the 1st-3rd cycles in the beds.
Soil for 2x4 bed:
4 cu ft Black Gold peat moss (measured out after being broke up/fluffed)
1 cu ft Brute Worm Castings
1 cu ft Coast Of Maine lobster compost
2 cu ft Pumice, hand crushed black lava rock and perlite
<1 cu ft Rice Hulls
18-20 cups of Build A Soils Craft Blend (Their re-amend ratio)
2 gallons of biochar that I charged up myself with a compost tea made up of 2 types of compost, worm castings, alfalfa mean, kelp meal, fishbone meal, ground coconut chips, organic aloe leaf powder, a little craft blend and molasses. After brewing I added some Rootwise microbe complete into the tea right before I added the biochar to soak.
After all the soil was mixed up in a 100 gallon grassroots pot, I topped it with Build A Soils Kashi Blend and watered 3.5 gallons of water into it and it is sitting there cooking/prepping away for a bit.
I am usually a hater of mushrooms, but I cut these off and cooked them up for my wife and they were DAMN good! Just some oil, butter and fresh garlic, wooo buddy I was surprised indeed.
I just planted 4 plants into the bed a few days ago. Sadly the plants had a rough life and had been overwatered and in crappy soil when young. A few had to be pulled but the rest I got to survive. It has been a battle with them that’s for sure. Hoping they will take into the bed and start getting back into good health. Some are a little more unhappy than the others, but I have hope for them here in the next week.
Back left is Galaxy
Back right is Roze Cookies
Front right is Afgoo
Front left is Blood Lotus I got from @Slick1 (Sorry bud, I am not doing this seed the most justice at the moment but there is still hope!)
Indeed I will. The 3x3 will be straight build a soil style, but the 2x4 bed will be a bit more of a test bench/experimentation bed for trying things on.
I’m considering something very similar .
Next grow I’m comparing a Grassroots 5 Gal with the moisture lock against regular. I think I want to try a bed when I expand.
Very nice! Ya if you expand/upgrade your grow, I would be trying to get that soil volume as high as possible indeed. Just depends on where your grow space is and if you would be able to keep larger volumes of soil in the same place for a long period of time.
It seems we have some signs of recovery. I just watered the bed earlier with some water, rootwise and cheap organic aloe leaf powder. The back 2 (Galaxy and Roze Cookies) have been recovering faster than the front 2 (Blood Lotus and Afgoo).
Even though I had some bare spots, the cover crop is pumping along. When I put these plants into the bed, I saved the top layer of dirt I pulled out and stuffed it in some little pots so some seedlings could get planted into a nice fun and healthy environment with some little cover crop friends around to chat with while they grow up. Ill post a pic of them later.
but there is still hope!)
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