I have been recycling the same soil mix for about 3 years adding very little new peat moss over that time. I ran into cal mag deficiencies and probably added too much lime and amendments to try to cover it. What it ended up doing is killing the roots on my clones and stunting my growth with heavy heavy soil. What i decided to do is start fresh, and it has made a great difference and transformation in everything. My question is what to do with all this used soil. I have filled in some holes in the yard, maybe spread some around the yard? maybe some in my worm bin? maybe mix a little back in to the new soil(scared to even attempt this). Any ideas are welcome
This is what i want to do with it, just was worried it might affect the worms, it really did a number on the roots of my plants although they did stay alive. There is a lot of good stuff in the dirt though, espoma biotone, bone, blood, kelp, azomite. I really think the problem was too much lime plus the dirt just looks spent, its been through a lot of grows
*I* really don't think it was the limes fault, but what I HAVE found out the hard way is that the peat breaks down too much after ~3 years and no amount of perlite or anything else seems to help it. Your experience sounds just like mine. Nothing grew right, especially the container veggies and any rooted clones that went into it. I dumped it on top of the soil garden after everything died back for the winter and seeded it with some fresh castings full of cocoons. Seemed to work great the following spring. Everything else did fine with fresh mix. Wet
This sounds about right, the dirt is just always heavy n kinda rocky, even after days of no watering they still feel heavy although it looks dry and even when a plant does get some root mass it is super thin, yields are way down in flower and there is hardly any stretch. I have been incorporating it into the new mix very lightly (1/8 - 1/16) and will be adding it sparingly into my worm bin over time. Hate to waste 30 gallons of soil