Hi Grasscity!!! I'm gearing up to start growing again, and I'm back for some of that sweet grasscity lovin'. I was using soil and an Earth Juice based concoction back then, with mixed results. Earth Juice is a tricky #@%&; so I struggled at first, but once I got the hang of bubbling my solution my babies flourished. Life got in the way, and I got way to busy to grow for a few years, but that itch never left. Once you've grown anything from seed to harvest....it changes you. So I'm making another run, because it's been too damn long since I've seen my babies. The main idea going into this grow is hassle-free. I'll be doing two auto northern lights, under LED, with a soil I made from scratch, water, and a tea once or twice a month. The LED I purchased is the Mars II 700w, which is probably way over-kill for a two plant grow, but w/e it was on sale. It'll be my first LED grow, and I'm looking forward to not having heat issues in summer, or a constant fear that my fan will fail and the 400w hps ignites the dresser. The soil I'm working on I've dubbed "Franken-soil." A few years ago I bought a couple of bags of FFOF for my grows. Old soil and rootballs were tossed into the soil bin, and my excess teas were also dumped into it for good measure. When I stopped growing, this soil sat in the same closed bin for years. It's warm inside when I open it, and it smells like the forest in spring. There's a decent amount, maybe 15 gallons give or take, so I'm going to beef it up with a mixture I've had cooking for a few days. 3 gal EWC 2 gal coco coir 2.5 cups of a mixture of bone meal, blood meal, kelp meal, seabird guano 2 cups rock phosphate 1 cup garden lime .5 cup azomite .5 cup greensand couple tbsp leonardite couple tbsp epsom salt sprinkles of white widow mycorrhizal powder left from years ago couple handfuls of oats still waiting on stupid mail: .5 cup alfalfa meal .5 cup neem meal .5 cup crustacean meal more coco perlite The mixture as it stands is a few days old and already has visible life overtaking the oats. I'll probably mix this with half of the pre-existing soil, and leave the other half for seedlings. I thought this was going to cost way more, but at the scale I bought everything, I ended up with more than enough material to grow for years and I've only spent about $150, and almost everything was free shipping. Think there's anything lacking? To me it actually feels like I went a little overboard. I made a practice tea from a little guano and a little ewc with some really old earth juice catalyst and brix, and it's bubbling out of control. Making teas might be my favorite part of the whole process. Will be trying out various teas through the entire grow, what recipes do you use? I'll post more about my dresser and light later...thanks Grasscity.
YAY! Perlite and more coco arrived today. Mixed them in and all of a sudden the stuff looks like soil. I'm think I'll be up and running in a couple of weeks. Will be working on dialing in Dresser 2.0. Originally I had a loud hydrofarm fan doing all the work in a cool tube system with a carbon filter on the end. Not the best way to do it I learned when I ended up with heat issues in summer. This time I decided to go LED, which will hopefully alleviate any fan noise and heat issues. The hydrofarm fan is coming out, I'm looking for something quiet to replace it with. Any suggestions GC??
Hi Beanus! Sounds like you've got some serious soil working there. Should be interesting to see what you get out of it. I'm subbing up to watch. I'm about to start three Northern Storm Auto's tomorrow. Just finished up my grow space today and have three 5 gallon smart pots sitting in a SIP tray wicking up moisture. I've got a 600W dual HID setup with a huge filter (300cfm) and a 440cfm fan. What size fan is it? Can you run it at a lower speed? Mine is running about half speed and I can't even hear it. Then too I have it suspended on bungee cords under the landing of a staircase. (See the thread in my sig.) Good luck with the Franensoil!
I'm so glad you posted. I was reading a little about noob's SIP method, and it seems like a life saver for busy folk like myself. Def gonna have to check out your grow. I forget the cfm of the fan, but it's a 4in hydrofarm fan, bungee hung, and even when dimmed all the way down it hums louder than I'd like. I'll experiment with sound dampening the unit, and maybe adding a muffler of some sort to the exhaust. I might also be able to get away with a good computer fan...that would be ideal.
Computer fans don't move a lot of air. Then too you don't have that much air to exchange. But what about smells?
Last time I used the method below for building my own carbon filter, and it was great. Opening the box was like getting punched in the face, but closed you couldn't smell a thing. It was just loud. Still have everything I need to make it again. http://forum.grasscity.com/do-yourself/513635-best-diy-ez-walmart-carbon-filter-micro-grows-zen-style.html
I poured a bunch of worm/guano tea into both soil bins yesterday. Haven't check the big bin, but in the small bin there's wispy strands of a blue-greyish fungus growing on the oats I threw in the new soil mix. I'm wondering if I should add more oats now... I only put in a couple of handfuls because I wasnt sure if it would do the trick, but I'll be damned. It's going to be sitting around for a while still, and I know the fungi need to attach themselves to something... I guess what I'm wondering is how much visible growth should I be looking for in and on the soil? Is it possible to have too much of a good thing in this case? Is there any risk of introducing non-beneficial species by adding things like rice, oats etc...? I'm sorry if it's all easily searchable info to find, but the questions come to me as I write, sort of like thinking out loud. I'll gladly take a nudge in the right direction to go find the answers myself.
Howdy neighbor, looks like you're off to a good start with your soil mix. It's been my experience that "stuff" growing in my mix while it's cooking, is a GOOD thing.(kinda proves it's alive) If you can find 'em, 4" industrial cabinet/case fans keep small cabs well vented without much noise,they sound kinda like a small desk fan. If yer wanting to make things a little easier, ya REALLY should check out smart pots & sips, I'm beginning to think they're indoor organics' best friend, if ya remember to add extra aeriation to your mix. oh, and I'ma pull up a seat & watch if'n ya don't mind....
Howdy! Not to gloat, but I'm extremely proud of my little white fuzzies. Proof of concept, if you will. Today I added a cup of alfalfa meal, a cup of neem meal, and a cup of crustacean meal. Thats it for additives now. It's way overkill, but I really just want to be able to use water only. I'm all about trying the smart pot sip method. Low maintenance is the name of the game for me, and the fact that theyre so great for the microbes is super bonus. In other news...My led light showed up....and its too big for the box by a fraction of an inch. FOREHEAD SMACK!!! To be honest; I dont really want to grow in that cramped space again, so this might be my subconscious telling me to get a grow tent. It'd be nice to grow 4-5 big girls at once, instead of one or two heavily lst'd bushes. The dresser can be a veg box....this is something I should smoke about later. Thanks for the fan suggestion, I'll check 'em out. Peace GC
ARGH!!! I was so busy with work I neglected to check my soil for a few days, and of course I nearly ruined everything. Prior to the near disaster, I realized that I had way more soil than I had measured amendments for, so I added a little more of the meals and rock dusts. I let the soil cook in a rubbermaid with the lid offset to allow air in, but it wasn't enough. The heat from the microherd farts created moisture in the container. It sat like that for days, and when I finally checked it...it was anaerobic. I laid it out in two pop-up veggie planters, and its been slowly drying out for a couple of days. The foul, ammonia smell has subsided thankfully. I'm really pissed I let that happen, bad stoner! Thankfully the gig is over, and I'm back to real life. If science is real, then the ammonification process most likely burned off a good portion of the nitrogen reserves, or however it works... We'll see what happens I guess. Most likely gonna let it go almost completely dry, and then re-moisten with a compost tea. Another valuable lesson learned the hard way. In other news, I'm lost in a land of grow tents. There are so many brands/sizes/shapes/etc...I can't choose. Is going cheap a mistake? Do you get what you pay for with tents? Thanks GC