Organic matter in soil

C

cunningfox420

Member
I'm thinking about buying some bacteria and fungi and mixing them with potting soil with perlite, and using a guaranteed chemical nutrient combination. What do I need to account for when doing this? Also is there a rule of thumb(or a highly complicated uncertain 100page explanation, or something in between?) regarding how much bacteria/fungi to mix per liter or gallon of soil? Anything on the subject is welcome
 
tkowitha123

tkowitha123

Well-Known Member
From my understanding, (I'm sure if I'm wrong I'll be corrected) bene-bacteria don't really benefit from chemical nutes the chems are immediately able to be used by the plant via the root zone, essentially chemical nutes don't feed bacteria and fungi, just the plant. SoOoo if your gonna Inoculate your dirt with beneficial microbes, but not feed those microbes that feed the plant...but instead only feed the plant a majority of your microbe population will die off once the little bit of available food is consumed.

Somebody stop me if I'm wrong, but that is the way I understand it.
 
Dribbles

Dribbles

Member
tkowitha123 said:
From my understanding, (I'm sure if I'm wrong I'll be corrected) bene-bacteria don't really benefit from chemical nutes the chems are immediately able to be used by the plant via the root zone, essentially chemical nutes don't feed bacteria and fungi, just the plant. SoOoo if your gonna Inoculate your dirt with beneficial microbes, but not feed those microbes that feed the plant...but instead only feed the plant a majority of your microbe population will die off once the little bit of available food is consumed.

Somebody stop me if I'm wrong, but that is the way I understand it.
Click to expand...
Yes indeed!

Pure salts and chemicals aren't as yummy as rotting vegetation.
 
C

cunningfox420

Member
Cheers guys, this'll help. I never thought microbes and chemicals sounded like a good match but the guy at the local grow shop said it wasn't a problem. I'll get him ;)
 
C

cunningfox420

Member
Also, the reason i was going for this method is I want to have constant control the ovet the nutes, for learning purposes. So basically i don't want slow time-released feeding systems(yet). Right now microbes and tea sounding pretty good, thoughts?

Furthermore, any links or tips on how to measure how fast time-release nutes(mainly the NPK in basic potting soil) are absorbed? My knowledge on this is absolutely zero, so anything will help.
 
Dr. Who

Dr. Who

Well-Known Member
Brother, I wonder why no one caught this....
Why bother adding B/F when you can BUY organic soil all ready to grow in, complete with all the B/F you want/need.
Potter's Gold
Dr. Earth's POTting soil
google complete amended organic potting soil for more.....
I used to make my own "super soil" but age and ache's along with time have me buying Potters Gold and I could not be happier with it!

I don't care what fert you use, that's your choice. BUT, I would, at least weekly. Use a nice AACT tea to help the plant use what may be lurking in the soil left from synthetics use. This will also resupply the B's and the F's to your soil that the synth will have begun to kill off, and feed any that remain.......Applying a synthetic to amended soil will not "kill" the Bio's on contact, it takes time and repeated applications to fully "kill" them off.

As far as salts go, any synthetic with the N based in UREA will be "salty"....There are synthetic makers out there that do not use urea as it's base for N. those are much more pure and don't "clog up" the soil, turning it into a "brick" anywhere near as fast as the urea! Canna and hesi come to mind.....I find Hesi to be the cleanest running synth I have used.

Search AACT here on this site for the hows to make it.....use it!

Ok more, The nutrients supplied in a good premade amended potting soil will last about 30 days before needing to be amended (adding organic nutrition back to the soil). depending on what and how this is done, it can last another 30 days.

"anything will help" - READ THIS
Teaming with Microbes The Organic Gardener's Guide to the Soil Food Web.
Get it here
http://www.amazon.com/Teaming-Microbes-Organic-Gardeners-Revised/dp/1604691131
It's worth the price! You will learn what you ask for on an easy to understand level!
 
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