My first grow was in Aurora roots greenfield blend with added perlite. The veg went great with just water, no complaints here. Flowering was a disaster with the nutes, but its why I'm organic now so it was worth it. I would recommend mixing soil yourself for cheaper but I would definitely use Aurora again if it was given to me free. All the soil I've used since has been free, other than amendments of course. BeZ...V
I have used roots in the past on quite a few grows. Out of the bag it is pretty great for store bought. Even compared to some of my first couple mixes it was pretty great but once I got the right soil 'recipes' there was no comparison, my mix was outperforming roots quite easily so I decide to play around with the roots mix some to see if I could get it to perform as well as my mix. What I did was add pumice, some glacial rock dust, about 2 cups a cu ft if I remember right, alfalfa meal, neem meal, a little of a friends compost and ewc and some composted chicken manure. As far as the amendments I think it was about a cup per cu ft, you could probably add a little more but I went on the lower end to make sure the mix wasn't too hot. I can't remember the exact amount of pumice I added but it was just enough to get a real nice drainage in the soil, to me it held water a little too well out of the bag. After that I let it cook for about 3wks then put it in 3 gallon pots. I did 5 remixed roots and 5 of my mix. The first few weeks the mix I use was doing marginally better but after about a month the roots caught right up and the finish was almost identical. It really surpassed all my expectations after I amended it, I mean I thought it was pretty good right out of the bag but just these simple additions made it a pretty amazing mix. I would definitely recommend playing around with small amounts of amendments if you use roots, the extra cost more than makes up for itself. I know some might think if you are doing all that why not just do a mix yourself, well because its easier all you really do is get a storage tote dump a bag in and mix small amounts, mixing my soil mix at home I need tarps, shovels etc... plus a lot more room to mix it all.
I had pH problems with this soil. which locked out my cal-mag. Id suggest preparing this soil with dolomite lime weeks before you plant anything into it. My problems starting appearing 2-3 weeks into Veg. the pH is very acidic so the lime helps buffer it up. other than that its good soil but its causing me problems on my first grow because I did not add the lime beforehand and now have to resort to foliar feeding the cal-mag. I went full organic but made one mistake and that was using tap water which probably killed alot of my microbes and such. not sure what i need to do to restore those microbes but im slowly trying to figure it all out
I keep reading that Roots is very acidic. Has everyone had this problem? I plan on using it outdoors with nothing but organic nutes, so my question is should i even worry about the ph since ill be all organic and in the ground with roots as my soil?
yeah any peat based soil is going to be acidic, including roots organic. If you plan on doing an outdoor grow I suggest building your own soil instead of using roots organic. I used it personally on my grow but it is not that good straight out the bag. YOU MUST ADD DOLOMITE LIME to it. I had many deficiencies because of that mostly calcium and magnesium. Anyway I hope this clears it up. Add some lime to it and youll be fine. Like I said, If you still have the resources, I suggest building your own soil. There are many stickies in the organic section that help you build soil by some of grass city's most experienced growers. GOOD LUCK!
[quote name='"longhorn1024"']yeah any peat based soil is going to be acidic, including roots organic. If you plan on doing an outdoor grow I suggest building your own soil instead of using roots organic. I used it personally on my grow but it is not that good straight out the bag. YOU MUST ADD DOLOMITE LIME to it. I had many deficiencies because of that mostly calcium and magnesium. Anyway I hope this clears it up. Add some lime to it and youll be fine. Like I said, If you still have the resources, I suggest building your own soil. There are many stickies in the organic section that help you build soil by some of grass city's most experienced growers. GOOD LUCK![/quote] Any rock dust will do, including chicken scratch. A lot of better options then that. Also acidity in soils is very misunderstood, I suggest reading some of Albercht work on the subject.
I would be careful about using non organic liquid ferts to an organic soil that's already supplemented..return the fox farm if you can and pick up roots organics line if you have to have liquid nutes. .I used fish emulsion in my veg for nitrogen and had no problems in veg
Aside from the 2 year bump of this thread, I'm shocked nobody had outbreaks of root aphids from Roots Organics. It was known around the Seattle area to my friends and I as 'Root-eating aphidganics'. A garden we had running for the co-op had TONS of problems with flyers and crawlers and it all came from the Roots Organics. Not the first nor the last story of horror I've heard come out of their gear. One of the biggest reasons for bags like Pro-mix and Roots to go sour once halfway through flowering unless amended or mixed like a proper soil-mix is that - A. The liming agent is short-acting and stops doing its job, couple that with people putting 'organic' nutrients into their soil that don't benefit the soil at all, you get acidic pretty quick, then you see people claiming 'cal-mag' lockout which is further compounded in said soil by adding, you guessed it, MORE CAL-MAG. B. They dry out very easily with no mulch or amending with a product that contains higher H2O retention qualities, or both. Your microbial life goes dead as a doornail in dry-outs, thus your loss of mitigation when it comes to PH in the 'soil', also couple that with the above, and you have a toxic, salted medium with no microlife, but most will blame it on the plant being 'hungry' until experience sends them on the right path. \nI used to grow with Pro-Mix, Roots and the like and I always had results that were good but not the best they could be. Then I saw the light...
Only Roots Organics product I use is the Big Worm castings. It's the only castings I can find locally in a bigger container than a quart. But I never have a problem with them. I use it in combination with a compost.
Roots is an option for me. Or promix HP , or a homemade super soil. Found a bail of pro mix on line for like 42 bucks. In gonna check my local dro store first tho. I'm DONE with these home depot "organic" soils that have jagged ass wood chips. (Ironically only "Walmart" type soil I'll mess with is perlite amended MG seed starter mix believe it or not!) Either as stated. Or as a base for a an even better potting mix. My buddy in Oregon, who runs n grows for a rather large dispensary in Portland, I believe.. He suggested promix. Him, this site, and a little experience has finally taught me you reep what you sow. Literally in this case.. Don't be afraid to invest in proper equipment. We both are culinary graduates as well. He told me to look at THIS like cooking.. Have to have your míse en pláce in order.. (Essentially meaning to have all your shit lined up ready to add immediately, all prepped conveniently and easy to access..) Literally means something like "everything in place " in french. Awesome idea.. I think I'm gonna give the pro mix a shot.. Roots organic maybe next time?
i agree, your food can only be as good as the ingredients you use. you can have the best recipe in the world but if you use crap materials its going to be crap. good ingredients can turn a mediocre recipe into something decent.
my local dro shop has pro-mix available to order. and Roots Organic in stock "original" kind.. coco based, seemingly organic, reliably reviewed.. might have to go with the RO unless promix can get here soon..