Organic soil grower here! Dr earth is my go to for sure! This stuff is excellent as a quick and easy soil amend. Looking at the ingredients u have a pretty solid “meal” package of the basics for nutrition along with a nice boost of microbes and mycorrizae. I usually mix in 1 cup for 10 gallons of soil of the general tomato blend in between my grows along with the same ratio of fireplace ash
So as u can see comparing the two, both first ingredients are fishbone meal and bone meal, then following 3 are feather meal, alfalfa meal and potassium sulfate in diff orders. The general veggie gets the fish meal and the bloom does not, same with rock phosphate and both finish off with kelp meal and kelp flour. Looking up most build a soil recipes for cannabis it’s usually gonna hit on those main ingredients with a few extras they didn’t add like bat guano and blood meal which Dr earth also carries
Now throw in some worm castings to finish it off and you got a pretty solid soil to work with.
Now here’s the technical part that I feel is worth mentioning getting away from bottle nutes going organic. All these dry amendments may contain nutrition but they WILL NOT be soluable to the plant, that takes time and microbes. Alot of the times reamending the organic soil it’s usually suggested to build the soil and let it “cook” for minimum of a month for things to start happening and breaking down and microbe cultures to wake up to start going to work, very important to keep the soil wet during that time as well.
Here’s where methods can easily veer off from each other, me personally I do actively aerated compost teas every 2 weeks for my “feedings”, others may build the soil and water only or some may follow the bag instructions letting it steep in water overnight then give to the plants and others may top dress, all just delivery preference at that point of what they feel works best. My reasoning for actively aerated compost teas is building abundant microbe cultures to have a party in my soil while delivering immediate soluable nutrition from the tea amendments bubbling overnight
Since it’s been brought up, I may as well touch on it too…
Molasses is excellent in the grow process if used correctly. But it’s important to remember Molasses DOES NOT feed your plants in any shape or form. The molasses can provide the sugars for microbes to feed on to make their cultures abundant and that microbe by product is what makes those plants happy and fed. Typically molasses is best used in compost teas as something for the microbes to feed on and multiply building healthy cultures but can’t say I’d recommend just watering into the soil. Veg and flower teas call for 3/4 tbsp per gallon( end tea get diluted 1:1 as well) and finishing tea backs off to 1/2 tbsp per gallon
Building a soil is easy and much cheaper, main fundamentals are food(compost,worm castings and fert package like Dr earth), water retention(peat moss or coir[I favor coir cuz it soaks water right away without the hydrofoil splashback of peat]), and drainage/aeration(perlite or lava rock), look on the bag of most potting soil and those are the main 3 parts u will usually see.
1 cu ft equal 6.4 gallons and my soil building recipe is
.7 cu ft Scotts humus and manure $3
1 cu ft mushroom compost $2.50
1 cu ft lava rock ( or perlite) $10
.5 cu ft worm castings (make my own)
5 gallon coir ($6)
2 1/2 cup Dr earth veggie( about $5)
2 cup fireplace ash (free)
So for less than 30 bucks u got about 25 gallon of soil without the peat hydrofoil.
Current price of fox farm OF at my local nursery is 24.99 for 1.5 cubic foot( about 10 gallons)
Biggest issues I usually see with bagged soil is either peat moss based that makes watering times hell or with the home Depot and Lowes soils there’s just way to much wood chips then the obviously staying away from anything that says “feeds for 6-9 months”
You just got a crash course in soil biology and what’s needed to build ur own, make the most of it
If your doing autos 3-5 gallon is exactly where u need to be, only ever encountered 1 auto that needed a 10 gallon and that was Bruce banner 3 but now I’m to a point that 3 gallon is my standard for em, prob could go 5 gallon but haven’t really notice much difference on the end result and why use more soil if the plant didn’t need it, def wouldn’t go as small as a 2 gallon though. Spring time I tested what sizes were best with 1, 2,3, 5, 7, and 10 gallons, 3-5 was right on the mark
Microbes don’t do to well without water. I just used recharge every other watering all the way through to keep bringing new microbes. I’m in 5gallons now and it’s much easier just watering once or twice a week.
For photos 3 gallon is only gonna support that plant for about 4-6 weeks of veg(long enough to sex) , I’ve noticed much longer with that and roots start to run out of room or try to grow through the bottoms of my grow bags, with organics I wouldn’t attempt to finish anything in less than a 10 gallon
Then if you’ve got something that feeds heavy you’ll want some liquid fish fertilizer or something along those lines cause that dry stuff takes a minute to break down into something usable. (You can make teas with the dry amendments too which works fine ime)
They go back to a dormant state. Water is life, as long as the soil stays wet they will stay alive/awake and functioning. They get dry it’s like hitting the pause button on your soil. Some will argue they may die off and need a recharge but I’d disagree, seasons change and microbes don’t just disappear because of it, they are there. It’s just the right conditions they are gonna be most active putting in the work
That’s where I’m a huge fan of the compost teas, if u got a heavy feeder on your hand then have a heavy hand dumping tea in her. La confidential and sfv og my last run was def my hungry hungry plants and got twice as much
Personally never have, I follow the revs tlo recipes though with a few minor tweaks to it. Never had to test pH of my soil or teas and organics is usually better about having its own pH buffer from what I’ve noticed of the intial recipe wasn’t just blasted with things like lime or sulphur
I want to do a tea but I have small 5 liter recipient,so it’s a little more than One gallon.Is It possible to do It there?Also,Is It a MUST to buy a cheap pump and areate It? @AzSeaindooin420
Damn really. I’m actually in 2 gallons n have a bunch of beastly plants 30days in flower now. I only feed the flower fuel 1 -32-34 for pk bump and molasses.
I use those hydrofarm green saucers n just water good once a day so far. The runoff runs into the saucer n plant sucks it back dry but daily so far been good on the 2-3 gallons.
I have been considering moving up to 3 gallon… It seems like a good size for what im trying to do.
The guy I follow runs autos in 5 gallon and 1 gallons pots in his 2x2, figured I would try it with the 2 instead first. I have a whole garage full of pots im sure I have a couple 3-5gal somewhere
So its a bad idea to run a photo in 3 gal with this setup for 4-6 weeks veg then flip?
I use the teas even on my veggie gardens. As far as I’m concerned I could never make to much, if there is excess it gets thrown on my veggies. Very minimum u can make is 1 gallon which after diluted makes a total of 2 gallon. Finished tea is usable for only 4 hours after the brew. With the amount of amendments it takes being so minimal wouldn’t be a big deal if some went to waste but more than likely u have something green and growing in your yard u can throw the leftover on
Well there’s compost tea and actively aerated compost tea. I’m personally looking for success with aerobic microbes which come from actively aerating my teas, others may go for anaerobic just letting everything steep in a bucket but in my head I don’t care for the stagnant nature of it and feel it can encourage bad microbes or molds. I use a vivosun 1750gph 102w air pump with 12 outlets split off at the end for a total of 24 air stones and a tea labs 5 gallon tea bag
Here’s the recipes I follow with the major difference being I blend up fresh aloe leaves for the base of my veg and flower teas, finishing is 100% by his
Your using salt nutes, I’m talking about 100% organics. When ur force feeding your plants like that u can get away with smaller pots l, roots don’t need to go far to look for nutrition…
