Fox Farm Ocean Forest is generally regarded as the best soil. It can be rough on seedlings and clones early on, but that depends on the strain. I've grown BC Big Bud straight in FFOF soil with no problems. You typically don't want soil that has time-release nutrients in it. Avoid soil bags that say "No feeding for 3 months!" or the like. Don't bring soil in from outdoors, it usually has pests and all sorts of crap along with it. ~Experimentalist
are the soils at wal-mart, lowes, home depot, etc acceptable? I'm germinating between paper towels, rooting in peat moss pods and then planting the pods in the next soil which will be in the final 5gal pots. Are there any from those stores that will work well or that I should avoid (other than the time release stuff )?
You'll have to go check yourself at the stores man. I picked upsome Miracle Gro Organic that is pretty good it seems. No time release nutes, perfect! I think it was like $8 for 1.5 cu feet. ~Experimentalist
pro mix bx or hp (black bag) or sunshine mix #4 (black bag) are the only soils i would EVER use. the reason being you dont have to ajust your ph at all.
even the store bought shit seems its got pests in it, one thing i didnt do that you bet your ass im going to do next grow no matter what soil i use or where i get it from or how seeled the package is im boiling it in water before using it.... just a thought.
You should re-think that thought. Cooking your soil is not a good idea. Get your soil from a reputable source and it wont have any bugs in it. ~Experimentalist
no shit, alright, i wont then...thats probably good too anyway cause it would have been one hellava mess, lol. i just bought two more big bags of home-depot soil for my next transplant for flowering stage, do you have any suggestions for getting rid of bug eggs and such before i use it.. instead of cooking my soil
I've honestly never had that problem with any bag of soil I've ever bought over ten years. I could see bugs getting into it if you left the bag outdoors, or mixed it with already infested soil, etc. Check out the "Organic Insecticide" threads over in the Organic Growers forum here. ~Experimentalist
There are very few soils you have to adjust the PH with. Fox Farm Ocean Forest & Happy Frog, even MG soils do not need to be adjusted. PH is controlled more by the PH of the water than the soil. Depends on what you buy, I have skimped due to limited finances on very cheap generic bags of potting soil and they have had oddball weeds sprout up, were full of knats and other pests, and it is usually very heavy hard soil w/ rocks and pieces of wood and such, very poor stuff. I believe you get what you pay for, and if you are going to cut costs a little, go w/ the MG stuff, I have never had a problem with it. Just stay away from the generic soils, they are cheap for a reason. less
the soils i named above do not need and water ph ajustment or nothing just add your hutes to the water and you good to go.
I've said this before but just buy a bag of FFOF and mix it up with your bare hands and you will understand why they can charge ~20 a bag for it. You feel like you're about to plant a garden for a king.
I used Promix BX for years and it's okay but I bought my first bag of Ocean Forest today so we'll see how it goes... I have used cheaper soil for outdoor from Lowes called Jungle Growth and it's ok but you have to add shit to it to make it good. Ocean Forest better be the absolute shit for what it costs!
Trust me brother its the best.Like the man said mix it up with your hands and you will definetly see why.
Really? And that works for you, b/c I have never seen soil that could take the seriously changing PH's of most water. So you are telling me that these soils can be watered w/ water that is 7.5-8.0 along w/ nutes and they are fine.....I would like to see some grow journals to prove that you have done this b/c I have never ever seen a soil that you can just add any PH to and it works fine. when the water is too high or too low, it will cause problems, I do not care what kind of soil you use. So show me some hard documented evidence of this. Yes, Fox Farm soils are of the best quality I have seen, and I have used many soils and mixed up many batches of soils using my own additives, Fox Farm Ocean Forest and Happy Frog are both of excellent quality. after over 30 yrs of growing indoors and out, Fox Farm is the best stuff I have used and it works well in both environments. less
I tried using Kellogg patio plus too hot for seedlings!!!!!!!!!!! I did get some fungas gnats .. seems OK for the price but definitly a bit hot.. im looking to upgrade soon
or peat NO nutes black gold is what Im going to try next RETAIL OUTLETS http://www.sungro.com/retail_locator.php IVE READ A LOT OF FOLKS ARE USING LIKE 50/50 soil and peat moss mix ..some add dolomite lime .. HTH
I have been doing this for over 15 years and it works fine. you DO NOT NEED TO MEASURE ANY PH. just let your water sit out for 24 hours to let all the clorine evaporate, add you nutes, and water. the soil can easilly maintain good ph for 3 months of veg and 3 months of flowering. Here is another person talking about por mix and if you do not trust his word, you dont trust anyones word. www.happygirl.ca/closet400W/index.htm its about half way down this is what he sais. In other words, so long as you use Promix you do not have to understand anything about PH .. or EC or PPM. In fact all you need to know is that when the plants go dry, you need to add some food to the bucket of cold tap water and feed your plants. Fairly easy I think