Love what your throwing down here @shady ! Sounds like some happy plants to me! Very similar to my routine start them off right and you won’t have deficiencies IMO . Here in the near future I may add more fungal food to my compost prior to using it in teas to try and tip the scales to a more even balanced tea.
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Yeah, once the soil is up to speed, and your cover crop and worms are working, after a grow or two, it pretty much runs itself, I think the worms are the key to the soil working fast, l supplement with mycorrhizal when, potting up the plants, sometimes add it to tea, not sure it works in tea but it doesn’t do any harm lol. My first batch of EM1 has about 2 weeks left and I am going to try the Korean version soon as well.
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Ya I’m hoping to kill it this year in the raised beds there looking pretty good this year!
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Honestly, I top dress the entire container with 1/2" of quality EWC. Usually sorts out everything.
@Shadey has some good advice too, but I always have plenty of castings.
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Every time I put a new plant in, about a liter of EWC goes in as well. I mix it 50/50 with peat moss for my seedlings and clones to root up in. So they do get some added. My worms make plenty in the pots, when I stick my fingers in the pots, underneath the top inch, it all feels nice, loose and grainy just like the worm casts in the bag.
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Been using Coco for some time and since I am going to “go outside” I want to switch to no till. I have three large pots that I am going to use, so I have a few questions…
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what is the best recipe for soil? I have seen some that have all kinds of stuff added and, though I know you really never have to get any more, it seems like you have to sell everything you own to get it all. How can you get it for the least amount of money?
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What do I need to feed them after? I know Reiko goes crazy with his teas but what can you use that you would never have to go to the store for? What could you do if there were no more stores?
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@WMoon518 “Q1 : what is the best recipe for soil? I have seen some that have all kinds of stuff added and, though I know you really never have to get any more, it seems like you have to sell everything you own to get it all. How can you get it for the least amount of money?”
@WMoon518 Q2: “What do I need to feed them after? I know Reiko goes crazy with his teas but what can you use that you would never have to go to the store for? What could you do if there were no more stores?”
Q1: This is the article I got my recipe from. I recommend reading the first several pages when you get the time, but the recipe is on page 1. https://forum.grasscity.com/threads/no-till-gardening-revisited.1400505/
The beauty of no-till is the savings over time. You will no longer be needing to be bottle after bottle of nutrients. You just need to get through the initial investment, and can get more as you go. If there is an ingredient you can’t afford, do some research and substitute with an organic material that is more accessible in your area. The key ingredients I use to feed the soil that in turn feeds the plants, can be bought at the natural food store, and brew stores, for pennies on the dollar in some cases.
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Also, keep in mind try sourcing your products locally, at brew stores, feed stores, nurseries etc. Think outside of the box and come talk to us we can try and help. But don’t buy on amazon stuff like malted barley. Talk about a rip off.
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Grow some comfrey, and make FPJ. Brew stores sell Malted Barley and rice hulls. Rice hulls for aerating, and malted barley for feeding enzymes. If you are near coconut trees, use coconut water, or if you can access them. Use crop cover plants that are not invasive, for a live mulch layer, that regenerates nitrogen in the soil. Start a worm farm and compost with macro and micro nutrients in mind.
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Are you talking about barley malt?
I saw, after posting here, @ReikoX posted a recipe that is water only. It actually looks pretty good and isn’t that expensive.
To figure out how much I need, do I just figure out the cubic footage of the pots, or is there some special formula, like a cu ft of soil isn’t really a cu ft? And how much really is a “gallon” of soil?
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Used to brew my own beer, so I am familiar. I would probably try a feed store near by first for some of the stuff. The few brew stores around here seem to want to charge a premium for stuff, which is why I stopped when I moved back. I miss TX… every thing was cheaper!!!
BTW - what is FPJ?
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It’s Malted Barley. What you want to do here is buy 6-row or 2-row Malted Barley. A pound will last a while unless you are growing a ton of large plants. You use this to make a PMB, Powdered Malted Barley top dressing. You can top dress with this every 2 weeks or so, and water in, even better if you water in with fulvic and aloe vera.
Im not the best for measurements. I just eyeball it.
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FPJ is Fermented Plant Juice. I have yet to really experiment in this realm, but definitely some food for thought. I am growing comfrey sourced from www.sebringcbd.com from OG @Sebring.
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Was thinking about getting some from him to work my planting beds for next year for veggies (won’t be able to plant this year) and I want to do some sweet tators. I think @ReikoX ferments barley for a tea as well. The powder sounds easier, though, couldn’t you just use barley malt powder, if you could get it cheaply, instead of grinding up the barley?
Am also going to use clover as a cover.
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Stay away from soaking barley, unless @reikox has a tried and true recipe, in which I will take a look and see when I get the chance. Also, you want to grind it the day you top dress. Its like grinding up cannabis for a fresh joint. It is much better this way. You will be losing out on a lot going the pre milled route.
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Couldn’t have said it better myself!
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If your talking about the sprayed dry malt ? NO! That would be just a Hugh ball of clumpy sugar just go to your local home brew store buy a pound or two of base grain and grind on site a lot of shops have that option
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No, no,no! I do not ferment barley. I’ve soaked barley for up to 4 hours before, bit find it easiest to just grind it and top dress. You want unmilled grain, the enzymes begin to degrade after you mill it.
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