How much soil are you mixing up, and what ingredients are you looking for? This thread may be some help to you... http://forum.grasscity.com/organic-growing/1277064-sourcing-organic-soil-mix-components.html?view=findpost&p=21750017&hl=sourcing+organic+soil+mix+components
base soil EWC Fish Boe Meal High Phosphorus Bat Guano Blood Meal Bone Meal Oyste Shell Kelp Meal Alfalfa Meal Dolomite Lime Azomite powdered Humic Acid
i had linked that and given a nice thought out post for him.....then the forum monster ate my post and didn't spit it out. I think how "cheap" something is depends on your grow size. If its a small grow, you can probably do what I did. Im a amazon prime member and just ordered the neem, alfalfa and neem from there. You can probably cut costs when/if you locally source stuff....like compost/EWC, aeration and rock dust. Go to a countertop place and try and get granite dust for free/or cheap from them...just make sure it is pure rock dust, and not a rock dust mixed with resins or any other chemicals. Check a local quarry for lava rock...I got a good amount(way more than needed) for $3 bucks!
i think he means how much finished soil mix are you looking to make? Just making the same amount as the OP? Or making a shitload for an outdoor grow. its my understanding you can get alfalfa, and maybe a couple others iirc, from a local feed store. So that can help if your mixing a shitload.
Several parts can be sourced locally.. It did take some time to run down the local amendments.. Peat moss = Lowes http://www.lowes.com/pd_383916-1803-383916_0__?productId=3745337&Ntt= Composted chicken manure = Lowes http://www.lowes.com/pd_328094-11628-3214_0__?productId=3240886&Ntt= Perlite = Home Depot http://www.homedepot.com/p/Vigoro-2-cu-ft-Perlite-Soil-Amendment-100521091/205655210 Compost = home depot http://www.homedepot.com/b/Outdoors-Garden-Center-Landscaping-Soil-Soil-Amendments-Soil-Amendments/N-5yc1vZbx7h/Ntk-Extended/Ntt-ecoscraps?Ntx=mode+matchpartialmax&NCNI-5 Alfalfa pellets = Best price is in 50 pound sacks from a feed and tack store.. 2nd best will be rabbit chow from a pet store buildasoil.com can provide many of the rest of the items your searching for.. HTH.. BNW
You've actually found EcoScraps to be a viable humic/micro-organism source for container soil building? Everything else considered, this stuff can actually be used as the 1/3 compost component of the mix in the OP?
hey gc, i have some plants planted outdoors, they are planted in my old soil mix (MIX 1) from my last grow which seemed to do pretty decent, no cal mag problems or anything... i also made a 1/3 compost 1/3 peat 1/3 perlite mix (MIX 2), (added lime and a handfull of granite dust) and did half MIX 1 and half MIX 2.... i am having what looks to be cal/mg problems and i think its because i didnt crush the lime before i added it to MIX 2? im thinkin since its pellets itll take a couple weeks longer so im thinkin to combat this i would top dress with hardwood ash at a rate of 1/4 cup per 7.5 cubic feet of soil and make a ring around the outside of the plants... you think this will make my ph good until the lime kicks in? or will this over do it you think? also considering adding liquid organic cal mag for the meantime, or would low ph make it so that they couldnt uptake it? idk im confused oh and MIX 2 had no "cook" time i just threw it together a few days ago and used it
While the quality was low on 2 bags of the 3 dozen or so I've bought overall it's quite acceptable for an off the shelf compost.. I ripped open more bags of crap then I care to remember in my search for a useable compost and even with this I'd say tear open the corner of a bag before buying.. Being city dweller my local choices were slim and none so I was pleasantly surprised to find this being of as good a quality as it is.. It actually is composted scrap veggies for the most part.. So much of what I looked at was ground trees with zero composting time.. Bagged and city compost offerings alike it's all just chopped trees.. 99% of everything sold at HD or Lowes is the same shit over and over.. Rip it open and pure bark chips fall out or shredded trees with large chunks of wood still present.. Not to rant but... Calm.. Toke.. Toke.. BNW
What does "cal/mag problems" look like?? The pelletized limestone (Dolomite lime?) will take a very long time to "break down", I would say more than a year. Its a good soil amendment so its ok, I use it, just don't expect anything to happen is short order even if you grind it up. I would never add in any liquid cal/mag whatever into my organic soils, its some sort of chemical fertilizer that will kill off the beneficial micro-organisms. What I would do is top dress with EWC and add in some crab meal and another form of limestone dust be it limestone dust or gypsum, what have you, and some malted barely.
The pelletized lime is limestone dust/pulverized lime formed into pellets using a quick dissolving binder, usually clay. The flour is released with the first watering. Easy to check out, take a tsp or so and drop it into a clear glass with some water in it. You'll see just how it works in a few minutes. The water will turn brown from the dissolved clay and the released lime will be on the bottom of the glass. All this is done for ease of application and to cut down on dust during application. If anyone has applied pulverized lime in even the lightest breeze, you'll know exactly what I'm talking about. Wet
rock dust is very fine particles of rock. the best ones for our purposes are basalt, granite and glacial (in that order), but any fines of ground up rock should work to some degree i suppose. azomite is a clay, not rock, so you cannot sub one for the other. i think 4-6 cups of rock dust per CF of finished soil is the recommended dose.
I put the Dolomite pellets in soil mix for long haul no-til and powder in for this grow?? Top dress no-til under mulch with more powder for next run? I've been doing well with that ^^^ approach.
Any ONE of the three is fine, whatever is cheapest for you to source locally. I've never noticed enough benefit to justify shipping rocks. Azomite, perhaps, but not rocks. I use granite because it's $5 for a 5gal bucket. You supply the bucket and shovel. BTW, that 4-6 cups/cf amount made my mix like concrete and was a disaster drainage wise. I now only use 2cups/cf max and usually less. Works fine. Wet