Help with making mix

[BlackBean]

i dont know if the soil I made is junk or if I'm doing something else wrong. Thinking about cookin up a new batch. Spent slot of money on amendments and don't want to waste the batch that I made but I don't know what else to do. List of what I have and please just help me with what I have I don't want to put anymore money into this until I start seeing positive results.

Peat
EWC
Compost and manure
Blood Meal
Bone meal
Kelp meal
Alfalfa meal
Perlite
Pulverized lime
Oyster shell granular
Espa tomatoe tone
Fish fertilizer

Please any help will be much appreciated. Still a noob but used to be decent at growing so this is extremely frustrating. TIA

 

[BlackBean]

The only thing I was thinking of buying was like some black gold or something just to have something premixed to get me through this round if need be while my own mix is cooking.

 

[Stiickygreen]

Are you trying to use that mix alone to grow in? Most "Super soil" is only used in the bottom 1/3 of the container. If you are trying to start out in it and that's all that's in there...it's far too HOT.

I personally don't use/like/recommend pre-mixes to anyone. It's a great thing if it's a guerilla grow in the woods you cannot check on...but I see LOTS of frustration and trouble from folks who think it's the answer to all and that if they use it..things will be easy-peasy and trouble-free. Unfortunately...once it's in there...it's in there and the plant simply has to ride it out. If something is off....or you have a certain strain that just doesn't like/need that combo...things aren't going to go well at all.

And why so small? Was this a test for the soil or something else?

Either way....I'd go the FFOF or Black gold route and would simply top dress in the amendments my plant indicated to me that she needs. Nothing you have will go to waste...you just may have to spread out it's use or re-examine how to use such soils properly.

best of luck!

 

[freemanjack]

i dont know if the soil I made is junk or if I'm doing something else wrong. Thinking about cookin up a new batch. Spent slot of money on amendments and don't want to waste the batch that I made but I don't know what else to do. List of what I have and please just help me with what I have I don't want to put anymore money into this until I start seeing positive results.

Peat
EWC
Compost and manure
Blood Meal
Bone meal
Kelp meal
Alfalfa meal
Perlite
Pulverized lime
Oyster shell granular
Espa tomatoe tone
Fish fertilizer

Please any help will be much appreciated. Still a noob but used to be decent at growing so this is extremely frustrating. TIA

Ok, well half the problem that has arisen with the idea you can 'mix' a soil, this is where much goes wrong with soil grows. To explain, soil is not a 'medium' it is a stratified layer cake with very specific zones, a sub soil of alluvial (clay/sand) deposits many feet deep with some stones/rocks then the loam that farmers are so enamoured of (but fail to understand the mechanisms that support it naturally) this is a mixture of composted plant matter and fine alluvial components, above this is the composting tilth of a few inches and in nature all topped off by groundcover plant species and a thick mulch of leaf detritus. Each of these strata have very specific life forms that both distribute them and maintain their complex biomes. Their is no 'one size fits all mix' hence all those expensive amendments. You can with time and dedication reproduce the natural growing conditions the worlds finest weed grows in but time is the key here. If you need a functional soil medium, quickly that will work, I use a 2/3rds regular store bought good quality compost 1/3rd store bought topsoil and add microscopic amounts of bonemeal and fish blood and bone (teaspoons to the 50gal mix) a little perlite and vermiculite and mix well, this mix will be neutral enough to put seedlings/rooted cuts in immediately and does fine with more mature plants needing potting on. Some broken clay pots or clay hydro pellets in the bottom of the pot with a little of the raw topsoil on it will provide a mineral 'sink' you plants can reach into if they need anything and never have bare soil at the top, always mulch with neutral mulch, straw, wood bark (not woodchips too acidic) or your old dead leaves. when it comes to harvest cut the plant stem at the top of the soil, carefully excavate the main support radial roots snipping them off from the rootball then remove the rootball trying not to disturb the soil strata, ease out a hole big enough to fit your next plant in and drop it in with a tiny sprinkle of fish blood and bone (a mere peppering) and some micro-rhyzomal fungi spores if you have them (not essential) Bingo bango, you got great plant health, zero 'plant food' to buy and awesome quality weed coz it got all its micro-nutrients from all those mixed microbes. Only thing I do other than that is to give em a tiny amount (about a pound a year on 6 big girls) of pelletised chicken shit and mulch with the castings from my wormery.

 

[Diabolical666]

OP you will get 100 different replies because everyone has their own super soil technique and they will all claim its the best recipe. Go light on your super soil and yes get a base soil.

 

[BlackBean]

I started the seeds on in a equal parts Peat/EWC/Perlite in 2"x2" pots. I only water when they were one dry and they still seemed to grow very slow. I used bubbled tap water that is decent. Someone said I was drowning them and that I should up pot. So I transplanted them into 1gal containers with my mixed soil. I have only misted the top layer of soil since transplant almost a week ago. And have see no growth since. These are also Auto flowers that's why you see some signs of bud.

 

[1kemosabe]

Can I first ask what you are trying to achieve? Your plants are in full flower mode and verry small,, is this a micro grow?

I have grown quite large plants with Pete, perlite and Epsoma garden tone from start to finish. keeping mind the hotter soil is on the outside and on the lower of the pot.

 

[BlackBean]

Can I first ask what you are trying to achieve? Your plants are in full flower mode and verry small,, is this a micro grow?

I have grown quite large plants with Pete, perlite and Epsoma garden tone from start to finish. keeping mind the hotter soil is on the outside and on the lower of the pot.

Yes it's a closet grow. 2x3x3.5ft. I have an extraction fan intake and two hanging fans blowing. I use a marshydro300 led. Temps from 77-85 tops. Humidifier that's romes around the 60% mark. My goal is to be as efficient as possible with the size of this setup.

 

[BlackBean]

So are these girls doomed? I do have another seed sprouted since these weren't doing well. It was a freebie seed from a bank. It's a fem but not an auto. She is in a4" pot with seedling mix only a few days outta the seed. Should I just concentrate on her or is there a chance these two will pull through

 

[freemanjack]

So are these girls doomed? I do have another seed sprouted since these weren't doing well. It was a freebie seed from a bank. It's a fem but not an auto. She is in a4" pot with seedling mix only a few days outta the seed. Should I just concentrate on her or is there a chance these two will pull through

There is always hope, as an orchardman we would routinely rip mature apple trees out the ground with a fork truck and stick em in another site, by the following year they looked as if they had always been there. It looks like yer soil is way too hot and wtf is all those white clumps? wotever, its waaay too much, gently lift the plants from the soil, looks a bit compacted so tease em out with a small plastic fork or chopsticks or summat or carefully tip em out and break up the soil around the roots, repot them in some of your seedling compost in an appropriate size pot, let em recover a little then replace them into the larger pots with a vastly diluted version of your current mix, looks to need a lot more humus (more compost) to me.

 

[freemanjack]

Don't take my word on my method, check the evidence!!!

Lawton is a feckin hero!

 

[BlackBean]

Also didn't know I needed to layer or dilute t

There is always hope, as an orchardman we would routinely rip mature apple trees out the ground with a fork truck and stick em in another site, by the following year they looked as if they had always been there. It looks like yer soil is way too hot and wtf is all those white clumps? wotever, its waaay too much, gently lift the plants from the soil, looks a bit compacted so tease em out with a small plastic fork or chopsticks or summat or carefully tip em out and break up the soil around the roots, repot them in some of your seedling compost in an appropriate size pot, let em recover a little then replace them into the larger pots with a vastly diluted version of your current mix, looks to need a lot more humus (more compost) to me.

The white clumps are perlite. I can follow your advice but what should I dilute the mix with? Just straight peat or or premix

 

[freemanjack]

Or Dr Elaine Ingham my favourite soilologist...

 

[freemanjack]

Also didn't know I needed to layer or dilute t


The white clumps are perlite. I can follow your advice but what should I dilute the mix with? Just straight peat or or premix

garden centre compost cheap as chips will entirely suffice, peat compost is still very hot.

 

[BlackBean]

I don't have time right now as I'm at work but I love watching good information videos. Thank you for yoour responses and knowledge. So next step when I get home is to repot the girl into seed mix til they recover.

 

[BlackBean]

I have some cheap compost and manure bag stuff that I bought from my local depot store but its commercial. Will this be ok. Or should I get just straight compost

 

[freemanjack]

I have some cheap compost and manure bag stuff that I bought from my local depot store but its commercial. Will this be ok. Or should I get just straight compost

is all too hot, still being digested by very acidic microbes, best avoided imho. Get some regular assed compost in.

 

[BlackBean]

is all too hot, still being digested by very acidic microbes, best avoided imho. Get some regular assed compost in.

Perfect thank you again for breakin it down for me. When I get home I'll make the changes you suggested. I will follow the the t what someone tells me st this point cause everytime I try to do my "own" thing something goes wrong so I want to follow a baseline see result then make my changes from there if needed. One last question do you suggest mixing the compost and my mix together or just put s light layer toward the bottom of the pot. Also I do have some dr. Earth myco mix that I can use

 

[freemanjack]

Perfect thank you again for breakin it down for me. When I get home I'll make the changes you suggested. I will follow the the t what someone tells me st this point cause everytime I try to do my "own" thing something goes wrong so I want to follow a baseline see result then make my changes from there if needed. One last question do you suggest mixing the compost and my mix together or just put s light layer toward the bottom of the pot. Also I do have some dr. Earth myco mix that I can use

for the repotting now, just a peppering of yer myco's direct on the roots, but use the straight compost, those girls need a bit of neutral medium to recover, then perhaps your mix as is at about an inch deep bottom of the pot, a little 1-3 mix of it with the 3 being compost and the 1 being your mix for the next few inches then just straight compost topping out.

 

[1kemosabe]

Don't re ppt those. They are in full flower mode and it is an utoflower so you won't have time for the plant to recover from the stress, it will only make things worse.

Water those lil gals and start a new one.

I would recommend going to the a utoflower section and read up a bitn