is dehydrated alfalfa meal ok to use as a soil amendment? I'm using it as a replacement for blood meal in my mix.
As far as I know all alfalfa meal is dehydrated. When you mix your soil up! Wet it well, and give it a month or so to break down. If you use a lot of alfalfa meal it could heat up a mix for a short while, so turn it over a couple times while your waiting out the month. It will outshine blood meal in your mix, hands down, and don't be afraid to water it in occasionally, or use it as foliar spray. I was out of town for a few days recently, and my vegging plants suffered some burning as they ran low on water and as they grew into my lights. When I got home I had to cut down some main stems 6-8 inches, pull yellow leaves and what not. To fix this I soaked a 1/4 cup of alfalfa meal in two gallons of water. I took about ten ounces of this mix, diluted it further with water, added liquid silica and a tiny amount of humic acid for a foliar spray, and watered the rest in as a drench. For the next two days I sprayed this three times per day. In two days I had vigarous new growth, now it's been a week and other than a handful of partially yellowed leaves you would never know I had problems. I think it is the best growth enhancer and general plant tonic I know of.......MIW
It's fine. But as a 1to1 replacement, wellllllllllll First, let me say, my 3 'must haves' are alfalfa meal, kelp meal and EWC. That being said, alfalfa by itself is a bit light on N, but plenty heavy on the growth enhancers that MIW mentions. NOW, I use soybean meal (~3x the N), at 2-3x soy to alfalfa. Like 2-3cups soy+1cup alfalfa mixed together and then added @1-1 1/2 cups/cf of mix. Before I located the soybean meal, I used blood meal for the extra N. So, don't toss the blood meal. LOL But, there is a great deal of 'chili making' going on with this. Meaning, you're going to need to play around with amounts to dial it in for you. Wet
I bought a hundred lb bag of soybean meal so I'm inching to use it. I am a bit leary of using it on MJ though. It's NPK is 7-2-2 so N heavy, and most of the nitrogen is of the ammonia variety. I know that MJ plants can only take in so much ammonia based N, then it starts burning root hairs and you get a mystery illness until new root hairs form. I take it you use it on cannabis? If so, how long? IOW your take on this is that it's pretty safe? MIW
I do a blend, like LD mentions, but almost the opposite. IIRC he uses 2parts alfalfa to 1 part soy (by volume) and then adds 1 1/2 cup of this to 1cf of mix. I use 2-3 parts soy to 1 part alfalfa and add 1 1/2 cups to a cf of mix. It's fine (so far), on cannabis, but I'm still experimenting. I mix 2cf at a time in the wheelbarrow and vary the ratios and watch what happens. So far, my indica strain likes the 2to1 soy/alfalfa (heavy feeder). The veggies seem to prefer a more 1to1 or 2to1 alfalfa/soy. I swear it's almost like feeding kids. Think I'll just get a bag of Garden tone and say, "You'll eat it and LIKE it"! LOL Wet
" First, let me say, my 3 'must haves' are alfalfa meal, kelp meal and EWC." Thats probably the best advice any aspiring organic gardener could get! Gimme those 3 items and a bag of peat and I'll make any hydro garden look silly *lol* Cool beans on the soy bean meal guys. MIW, you're stoked on that #100lb sack! Great worm food too! Jerry.
dont use too much. too much alfalfa meal can cause your soil to run hot - temperature wise and nutrient wise! i personally prefer to make teas out of my alfalfa.....a botanical tea or ferment. make sure your alfalfa is non-GMO!!!!! -OSUB
I think it was microbeman that posted feeding his worms alfalfa meal caused them to "melt". So I doubt soybean meal would be any better for worms and might be worse. I would feel better about feeding compost that had these guys in a composted form. I did throw a little soybean meal in a mostly composted compost pile. It heated the pile faster than even alfalfa......MIW
MIW, I sprinkle (small) handfulls ON TOP of my worm food/compost. I've found that as long as you don't bury it yer ok. I'd have to assume that this goes the same for soybeans. My number one choice for ANY worm food, tho, is to compost it all first! I find that with about anything the worms prefer it all composted before it hits the bins. I still love the deal you got on the #100 lb sack - except for the lifting it part! Jerry
I agree that using Alfalfa meal moderately in a soil mix is wise. I limit it to 1% max. It is very high in nitrates and as it has been stated you can also add it later as a tea. I too prefer it to blood meal. I do not use blood meal nor bone meal unless I know the origin. As Denny says....mad cow disease.... I've never heard of alfalfa meal that was not dehydrated
thank you all very much! I think I will add the alfalfa in tea form later since it's easier to add more N than it is to dilute the N from a soil mix. thank you all again!