Hi fellow organic growers. I live near a beach, which all year long, spits out seaweed. There are practically kilos of dry seaweed on the beach, stinking it up and making it look ugly. I was thinking of going to clean that stuff up, but I was thinking, is there a way to use it for my grows? I'm doing hydro mostly, so I'm not sure how that would work. Maybe grind it into fine powder? Mind you that the seaweed is probably full of salt.
If you're doing hydro you'd probably be best off leaving out most things organic IMO. It's just gonna slime things up for you. Other than that you'd best wash the stuff off at least three seperate times and when that's complete put it in the compost bin. Otherwise, you're asking for nothing but trouble using beach gathered seaweed in a soil grow and definitely asking for doom using it in a hydro grow. That said, if you want to use kelp (kelp is not "seaweed on the beach" by the way) Maxicrop makes a powdered kelp product using the north atlantic variety of Ascophyllum Nodostrum which is the majikal kelp product us organic types like to use. Most of us organophites use the granular version of kelp but Maxicrop does have the soluble powder available and it's cheap enough to just go buy it. Be careful using organic products iof any type n a hydro grow or you will witness algae bloom in your resovoir without proper maintenance. Instead, just use 1/4 strength of recommended dosage of whatever bottled stuff you're using and let 'em ride. Just an opine. Good luck!
Thanks for the advice, much appreciated. Let's say I throw it in the compost bin. Is it gonna make a difference or I'll just be washing that crap for no reason?
Seaweed is probably as good as it gets as a compost pile ingredient. Like ol' Possum said, rinse it thoroughly. Maybe if you have a wheelbarrow? you could fill it up with seaweed and water, stir it around well and dump it, doing this a few times. That should get rid of the salt just fine. Seaweed is probably the greatest nutrient accumulator out there, storing almost every element out there out of the ocean water, plus a myriad of organic compounds like PGR'S - plant growth regulators. Adding seaweed to your compost pile is the perfect way to make sure that your compost has everything needed for plant growth in it. Deficiencies? Not with seaweed in your compost! You've got a gold mine - use it! J