I'm pretty sure the <snerk> was just Lumper poking fun at himself for spewing some of "nerdy" science beta. I'm sure he was not knocking the use of humic and fulvic acids, which he recommends using in some of his other posts.
I'll drink .....cough cough..... I mean toke to that...nice bump from my pal patriofarmer, I'm gonna give you some rep if I've spread enough around bro. We should start a tribute thread to this great guy that has enlightened so many........ peace chunk EDIT.....damn, I gotta spread some more but just know you got it coming!
LD, Perhaps you could post an updated version of your soil/seed meal mix. I know you have incorporated additional seed meals along with the various marine meals, and I'm sure the folks here would be obliged. Glad to have you sharing with us again, chunk
No problem!!!!! All of the seed meals are organic and where appropriate they are non-GMO sources. All of these are sourced from an organic farm store in Portland and they've been in business for over 72 years. Not a bad track record. 3x alfalfa meal 3x linseed/flaxseed meal 1x soybean meal 1x canoa/rape seed meal 1x sunflower meal (this had to be sourced from an organic dairy as it seems that sunflower meal is used to increase milk production. Don't bother - LOL) 1x organic fish meal (nitrogen) 1x organic fish bone meal (phosphorus) .5x kelp meal .5x neem seed meal .5x crustacean NOTE: The addition of neem seed meal is two-fold. One is that it has a very strong 'N' profile as well as high-profile in the 'K' profile and specifically with regard to micro-nutrients - almost on par with alfalfa and kelp meal. The main reason for using neem seed meal along with crustacean meal ('chitin' content) is to provide systemic defenses against insect and anaerobic molds (powdery mildew). The addition of both of these products insures that you will not have gnats or other insects flying around. Chitin extracted is sold under the trade-name of Chitosan (something like that). This mix isn't cast in stone. I realize that I'm in the uber-minority about the use of bat/bird guanos in general but you could certainly add that to the mix. Same with fertilizers derived from slaughterhouses - philosophically I will not use bone and/or blood meal - again I'm in the minority Those products might be something that others would want to add. Same with feather meal - lots of folks use that product. Having visited a commercial chicken processing plant several years ago I'll pass on that product as well. Even with this mix, I only add about 2 cups to 1 c.f. of my potting soil mix. I depend on the quality of humus to be the driving source. The potting soil is pretty much the same - I start with Sunshine Growers Organic Mix as the base. It comes in 2.8 c.f. loose bags - not the compressed bales like the Sunshine #4 Mix - no big deal just explaining the difference in pack sizes. This mix is 40% organic coconut coir, 30% organic peat moss, 10% each of perlite, pumice & vermiculite and is PH adjusted at the packing facility and the mix is treated with a wetting agent - organic yucca extract. I currently pay $19.00 for this bag. Next up is the organic humus component. After doing a ton of experimenting with various products easily sourced around these parts as the expression goes, I settled on a mix that includes equal parts (by volume) of homegrown earthworm castings, Marwest Compost (an organic compost from Scio, Oregon that is loaded with microbial activity - it's $8.00 for 1.5 c.f.) and Alaska Humus. This one is pretty expensive by my standards (I'm really, really cheap/thrifty) and it's running $24.00 per c.f. from the good folks at the Soil Food Web in Corvallis. I mix all of the humus products together and set that aside. Into the Craigslist cement mixer goes 1 c.f. of the humus mix and the appropriate amount of the fertilizer mix, mineral mix and 8 cups of bokashi bran. I let this run for 15 minutes or so to insure that the amendments are thoroughly mixed with the humus. The Sunshine Mix is pretty much inert for the sake of this discussion. Next in is a bag of the Sunshine Mix and about 1/2 pail of organic rice hulls to get up to 3 c.f. - let that run for 15-20 minutes and there's 4 c.f. of potting soil that costs far less than FFOF, Botanicare, Roots Organic, etc. It can be a 'water only' growing paradigm - though I've been known to thrown in some kelp meal teas, some humic and fulvic acids, FPE (fermented plant extracts) and EM-1. Just to keep things interesting and probably little else. And I always add liquid silicon every application of teas, water, foliar sprays, etc. I cannot stress enough how much you can change your plants using liquid silicon. I was skeptical at first but I was wrong. Very wrong. Almost all of the actual work is on the front-end - the rest simply involves keeping them hydrated and systemic use of neem seed products along with kelp products as a foliar application to insure the health of the microbe colonies on the branches and leaves. HTH LD
I've been using your liquid silicon/neem mix as well as adding the liquid silicon to my waterings and I finally have gotten the upper hand on the spider mites. To tell the truth, the leaves are the texture of beef jerky, and rich and green as well. Silicon strengthens plant tissue/cell structure and makes the plants resistant to molds and fungus as well as insects. I am using Dyna Grow Pro-Tekt at your suggestion, (1/4tsp per Ga) for watering, and the same dose in my Hudson Sprayer for the neem treatments. The liquid silicon also acts as a surfactant/wetting agent. Thanks for updating your soil mix LD.....and for all the specifics. Cheers, chunk
Hey Lump, I'm currently using this expanded slate product called permatil for aeration in my soil mix. I'm gonna keep reusing this batch for a few more cycles but when the times comes to mix a new batch I wouldn't mind using pumice instead. I guess I've pretty much decided not to add anymore perlite than what already comes packages in the Sunshine mix I used. My predicament is that all of the pumice refiners/miners are on the west coast (to my knowledge) and the cost to ship is more than the pumice itself even for a 2 cubic foot bag. Do you know of any distributors in the southeast or some pumice products that may be distributed down here? Thanks again! M_c
Music City The 'permatil' product is as close to pumice that you can get. It appears to be a great product - far better than perlite and probably pretty close to pumice. Good find indeed! This is a fantastic product, IMHO. HTH LD
MizzaFishKilla The Dyna-Gro product line is found at every nursery/garden store in Portland - even at Ace Hardware, Safeway, Fred Meyers, etc. The orchid growers live and die by their products. It's kinda weird. If you had to do a mail order, Amazon.com sells a quart for around $13.00 per quart which is enough for about a year and probably more. The suggested rate of usage is 1/4 - 1/2 tsp. per gallon. I go with the lower number so the math works out like this.................... 1 oz. = 6 tsp. 1 oz. = 24 gallons 24 gallons x 32 = 768 gallons 768 gallons @ 13.00 = $.017 per gallons. Let's get wild and say that it's $.02 per gallon to allow for spillage. That definitely shouldn't break anyone's bank I wouldn't think. There are other liquid silicon products out there are diluted with higher prices - AN Rhino Skin, Botanicare Silica Blast, et al. All are made from potassium silicate and will contain the (in)famous 'soluble potash' (K20) and a liquid form of silicon (SiO2). The numbers on Dyna-Gro Pro-TeKt is 3.7% soluble potash and 7.8% liquid silicon. Compare those numbers and specifically the rate of usage with other products containing the very same base ingredient. HTH LD
Thanks LD. Another tasty tidbit of information. That's an inexpensive amendment that sounds like it gets great results. I'll be getting some!
Yes - mix 1/2 tsp. of both Dyna-Gro Neem Seed Oil with Dyna-Gro Pro-TeKt to 1 quart of water. Drench, drench, drench the leaves, branches and stalks 2x per week to preclude spider mites and powdery mildew. HTH LD
V.W. I'm reluctant to give you advice in this area because I grow bagweed seeds and don't have the professional genetics/strains offered by the various seed companies. I'm a loser in that regard. Having said that I would recommend that you apply your foliar applications on the advice of others as it relates to the flower cycle. Then again, if you've done your work correctly in the 'veg cycle' then you shouldn't be having issues with mites in the flower cycle. That's been my limited experience in growing out sub-standard genetics anyway. YMMV HTH LD
No worries. I had to let someone take my plants off my hand(worst idea in the world)and when I got them back they had a ton of powder mold. They are a week into the 12/12 and I have sprayed them twice with the half neem half silcone and have seen tremendous results but would like to get one or two more in before flowers develop.
V.W. Some folks have found using milk effective in fighting PM. Cinnamon oil is another one. Nothing is absolute in battling PM - mixing it up using different approaches has been the best plan of attack in my experience. I spray my plants into the middle of the 3rd week and haven't had any problems. And I live in one of the worst areas of the US for PM - it's just amazing. HTH LD