Hi, I was going to attempt to recreate the making of some soil I've made before and was hoping you could help me decide on when my soil is ready to plant in; I typically begin by mixing up 2 bags of vermifire 1 1/2-2 bags of humbolt 2 bags of horse/cow manure 1bag of chicken manure 6 cubic feet of peat and 2-4cubic feet of perlite and 1cubic feet of worm castings and a 10cup box of dr earths bat castings and 20 cups glacial rock dust and bio live, after about four weeks I mix a bag of kelp meal, fish bone meal, and all purpose fertilizer into my compost along with another box of bat castings. After manure fungus has grown on my pile for a few weeks after the above I typically see a solid white fungus and much trenching and or balling of compost able material and am confused as to when I should add worm castings and whether till thick and sluiced or till right before, I also am not sure when I can plant in my compost... Maybe someone here can help me sort things out P.s. i am also unsure as to how much perlite and bagged soil and amendment is missing
Hey lasagnaman, I think yer making it a little harder on herself than you need to brother.. a good "general rule of thumb" is to have you base mix be divided into thirds, i.e.: 1/3 compost, 1/3 aeration, and 1/3 peat. I don't use bagged soils as I make everything from scratch, but try to figure out how much of what is in the bags you bought, and then go from there. You want to have an average of 4 cups of rock dusts per cubic foot. Glacial rock is awesome, but if you could incorporate some different kinds of rock dusts it'd be even better! Check out rockdustlocal.com for a huge selection. You also can add anywhere from 1 1/2 cups to upwards of 6-7 cups of nutrients(total, not individually) per cubic foot of soil, tho I usually stay to around 2-3. Since yer using pre-amended bagged soils I would probably stick to around 2 cups per cubic foot, less is more here. You can mix all your nutes together and just add a couple cups of that mix, I would add twice as much as kelp in comparison to the amounts of the other nutes. Yer worm castings are a type of compost in itself, so add those along EVERYTHING else you want in you soil in the beginning, THEN let sit for at least 4 weeks before you plant in it, longer is always better tho! The reason you want to add everything in the beginning is cuz you need to give the microbial army in your worm castings and compost time to break down and convert all of the added nutrients into usable available nutrition for your plants. Look at the sticky that Jerry did on composting, lots of great info there, and elsewhere on this forum! Good luck and let us know how it goes! -5sF-
Thanks for the help, also,I was planning on planting directly into the solid white fungusand compost after a special cottonwood root extraction and such, and was wondering if you knew when would be best for planting and whether more than 42cups per ~27.5-30.2 cubic feet of bio live is bad for soil compaction
Remember this when determining if compost is of finished quality such that it can be added to a growing container without concern of harming the plant which will be grown in it: Attempt to germinate a quick germinating vegetable seed such as radish. If the seeds germinate and start growing healthy with no issues then the compost is ready. If the seeds do not germinate or the seedlings become sickly after germination the compost is not ready for prime time container gardening. Simple enough and problem solved.
I rebalanced everything so that there's a bit more peat humbolt perlite and amendment n such in new ratios (for better feel) and am going to buy a package of cfl grow lights to test out organic hydroponic dwc systems and different (similar) manure and Ewc (and fish?), bat guano, organic hydroponics, guano top dressed pot/trough systems (ill also be using clip on cfl's with larger bulbs than I normally purchase) I'll be planting with bag seed from a white widow hybrid that apparently Hermied and an unknown afghani like strain with amazing bud that I had wished was denser; the white widow was apparently grown outdoors with light organic soil and nutes and the afghani looked to have been grown indoors with very well placed cfls and supplemental lighting with blacklike coco or blacklike humbolt with a dwc bucket/resavore system or heavy organic nutes in some other way
I set up two "walls" for a grow room that is fit to ceiling and am awaiting better transportation so that I can get a mylarlike material for "walling" inside the box. My box will have an eight foot height, a (roughly) eight-ten foot length and a five foot width and I currently have three extension cords, one junction for multiple lights to be plugged in, wiring for lsting, two bags of humbolt, two boxes of guano l, a 4ft two bulb light fixture with one broken light, and 1500$ for growroom need (so far ) any advice? Especially advice on DIY light support??? I really need to find a way to support 16-32 (roughly) long cfl and large cfl(clip on) lights quickly (maybe I could make something out of cardboard???) P.s. I'll also be looking for DIY dwc bucket setups (and airpump setups) while I make a box for my compost (my compost will be composted in pot and topped off by an extra tarp created compost before planting occurs) P.s.s. I plan on using the humbolt gh advance nutrients and flora products alone with micronutrient/mineral additives as means of finding the best nutrient line for my set up and ability(ill also have to select the correct medium per nutrient I plan on using :/) Wish me luck :/ (scrog? =D)
I would also love any advice as to humbolt soil recipes for five gallon bucket dwc systems (dont forget to tell me which nutrient line you used lol) A happy frog (or fox farms ocean forest) set up would also be much appreciated
By the way, my goal is to find a better compost for outdoor growing and indoor dwc growing near and within my house, and figure out how best to flower with cfls (and LEDs?) indoors