so i have been growing in organic soil since i started. i am no expert by any means, but i have a good enough grasp of it to be considered dangerous. coming to forums and seeing other people’s systems and setups and the internal brain wheels start rolling. lots of “what if i tried this or that” type questions.
i am NOT ready to dive into hydroponics… yet… as i am pretty sure this can’t be done with organics (feel free to correct me if i am wrong). a project for a later date when abuela’s strain hunt is over and i can start growing for myself.
however, after seeing how QUICKLY plants grow in the soilless medium in comparison to soil certainly makes one take notice. but this begs the question, can soilless be done organic? can you amend the medium with dry (organic) soil amendments just like you can with soil? will they break down the same way and feed the plants the same way despite not being in “dirt”?
my guess is yes, but would rather get some feedback before dicking up my setup to make room for “experiments”.
anyone here doing soilless organic?
I’ve gone back and forth on this and I’m in the camp of go organic with automated watering. And oversized pots. That’s what I did because we have a ton of inputs naturally so we don’t have to pay for much. If we went coco/hydro we’d have to buy everything and that just wasn’t attractive to me.
I’d say once you add enough organic soil amendments to inert medium, it becomes just organic soil… maybe it would need beneficial microbes and bacteria added, but over time I expect they’d develop on their own. What’s the difference between soilless and soil, other than needing to add synthetic nutes to soilless because it doesn’t break down organics to nutrients on its own?
Chalk plus sulfuric acid plus nitric acid = calcium nitrate. Not organic. Complete waste of energy to process. Attracts nitrate feeding fungus.
Chalk plus vinegar = calcium acetate. Organic. Doesn’t attract pathogens. Doesn’t waste energy, but doesn’t provide nitrogen. Provides carbon to plant.
Chalk plus glycine = calcium glycinate. Organic. Ca 200 times more available than calcium acetate. Provides the most efficient form of nitrogen to the plant. Does not attract pathogens. Same for any other glycinate. The only foliar sprays that have ever worked with Cannabis leaves.
I guess no one will use the best option (amino chelated) in hydro because it stains your res and smells like leathery synthetic carmel. I get much better growth in potting mix than any hydro grower using calnit.
If you want to go organic and soilless, check out aquaponics. Other than some cheated iron - and 1 other thing that I can’t remember right now and my dogs are laying on me so I can’t move to look at the bottle in my tent - the only thing you’re putting into your system, is fish food.
You can use synthetic nutes in organic soil, but it’s not recommended usually and I don’t know exactly how they interact. Some people say it kills off the microbes. Might be an interesting test, I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone try it. If the microbes don’t die as a result, you might need to be careful about feeding full doses of the synthetics because there’d be nutrients coming from the organic matter as well, and it might cause lockout.
i have looked at that. to me it seems more of a large scale operation… something for a hothouse/greenhouse.
i like the concept, but for space and $$$ its not in the cards anytime soon.
i have the gear to do a DWC, but have not used it (yet) as i’m still focused on the strain hunt. once i get that completed and can start growing for me, i WILL be experimenting with that.
i have mistakenly poured some synthetics on my organics and yes, there are consequences. lots of nute burns and other toxicity problems. flush flush flush.
organic soil can be a pain, but i find it’s pretty forgiving when you f*ck something up. flush it and it bounces back a few days later.
i was wondering if doing the compost teas would activate inert dry amendments in the soilless medium… bi-monthly feedings with teas to active the microbes and bacterium?
seems like it would work.
You don’t need a ton of room, this is in my 4x4. It can be laid out a lot better than I have, I’m currently trying to create a layout that would give me a little over double my current grow bed
No, really though. Coco coir is about as close as soilless can get to being soil. That, or peat, but I feel like coco is a bit more forgiving than peat.
I’ve personally done several organic soil mixes lots based on Subcool’s Super soil and some based on Coots mix and every strain in those methods loved compost teas, those were among my absolute best runs ever.
But without teas, I still got nice smoke but seemed to be running out of gas so to speak by week 6 on a 9-10 weeker and yield suffered compared to fed teas every few weeks give or take as needed.
I have added synthetics in a pinch to a rich organic soil mix like those I mentioned and always hit issues with pH, EC, lockout or similar.
Now I’m in coco and I’m seeing that every medium and method definitely has its pros and cons. Coco seems to be more forgiving than soil with synthetics and pro mix style peat soilless. Not too hard to correct issues and mistakes in my experiences.
Soil with synthetics is much tougher for me from what I’ve tried over the years, but that might be some people’s preference, ultimately it definitely depends on personal experience, your environment and genetics as well I’d think. @Til_Valhalla
well my plan was to use this as my base medium mix:
coco, perlite, vermiculite
amendments would be added to initial “soil” and then top dressed monthly:
worm castings, azomite, langbenenite, insect frass, dolemite lime, epsom salts, dr.earth 4-6-3 and dr.earth 3-9-4
weekly liquid soluble ferts would be:
alaska fish fert 5-1-1 and alaska bloom 0-11-11
bi-monthly compost tea booster:
worm castings and molasses
will it work with the coco? will the amendments break down in the coco?
the dr.earth amendments have bacterium, and fungal innoculants already in them. will those work in the coco?
i have been using a modified coot recipe. modifications due to sun/heat in my AO.
i am not familiar with subcool’s super soil. is it on this forum?
i have gone apesh*t with the teas and similarly not used them at all. i agree, the teas are helpful to keep the soil web rockin’. and the plants really love it.
however, i think the alaska ferts are pretty good for that too and offer some of the same benefits (though not on as grand a scale) so you can sort of “get away with it” so to speak.
for me, the teas are not always convenient to make on a proper schedule. i usually only make them as an interim booster between monthly top dressings. get the soil web charged to munch up the last scraps of previous feeding and all ready to go and hungry for the next top dress. seems to work pretty well.
Ever since ive been growing Frankenstein i have been supplementing with synthetic nutes in my Organic soil with Foxfarm Big Grow.When Frankie has her annual Nitrogen Shit fit and goes yellow i dose accordingly and add a small top dress and wait till it breaks down, with the Grow big and she calms down.Havent seen too much if any microbial problems during the dosing but then again i back off as soon as she bounces back and the top dress kicks in after 2 weeks and she starts eating that.Im not fully committed to using synthetics the whole grow.In fact if it werent for the Frankie nitrogen tantrum id probably not even use it I switched to Dr earth dry amendments and ive had the same bottle of fox farm big grow for 4 years now
The big grow is synthetic Nitrogen.As far as the compost Teas ive used them and frankie still just likes to have a fit every now and then.The nitrogen shit fit is a normal thing with Frankie everyone seems to run into it sometime down the road
