10 gallon smart pots and soil mixture question

jixan

Active Member
Good morning all, I just ordered a couple 10 gallon smart pots for an outdoor grow and would love to hear from some folks about what soil mixture they have used in the past successfully with an outdoor organic grow.

Thanks, can't wait to hear everyone's input.
jixan
 

Vindicated

Well-Known Member
I'd just run over to Lowes or Home Depot, pick up a bag of Kellogg Patio Plus potting soil. It should run you about $5 bucks a bag, has kelp, bat guano, worm castings, and all sort of good stuff. FoxFarm and Roots Organic is another option, but you'll be looking to pay $16 to $18 if you go that route. All three are great potting mixes for mature plants.

If your starting from seed I'd buy a seed starting mix first then transplant when they're 3-4 weeks old. Fox Farm Light Warrior is good and goes for around $15-$20 per 1 cubic foot bag. Miracle Gro Seed Starting Mix is another option at $3 for an 8qt bag.
 

Kb's seeds

Active Member
i wouldnt go with miracle grow, if ur startin from seed u should start with either light warrior or happy frog potting soil, since ur containers are only 10gal u have the option of adding better quality bagged soil instead of using a soil yards base mix, what id reconmend is mixing fox farm ocean forest with garden & bloome harvest supreme, most places will have the ocean forest for under $15 and the harvest supreme is usually under $10 (i pay $7.99 per 2cu.ft. bag) also go down to osh hardware or home depot and get a bag of perlite, mix ur soils together and cut mix with perlite at ratio of 1/3 perlite to 2/3 soil mix, the harvest supreme already has mycorrhizae in it but if wanna add sum extra it wont hurt, try plant success granular mycorrhizae 3-1-2 or earthjuice biozeus soil microbes powder, since this is a all organic mix ur gona wanna make sure ur water is de-chlorinated, all drinkin water (city, tap water) has chlorine or chlorimine in it, chlorine is a bacteriacide and will kill of the microbes in ur soil, microbes are the most crucial thing is a organic grow so to kill them off is all bad, check with ur cities water report, find out if they add chlorine or chlorimine, if its only chlorine then u can let ur water sit for 24 hrs to let the chlorine evaperate out off the water, but if its chlorimine u will need to get a water filter, r/0 systems work best and u can get one online for under 200 bucks, another option is to buy filtered water from a grocery story, the big glacier water machines are commerical r/o machines, so u can do that until u can get a filter and its not to expensive, usally 25cents a gallon, but ya brotha there ya go just get those soils and mix em and water with de-chlorinated water! when it comes time to flower go buy a bag of happy frog bulb food 3-8-8 and add it as a top dress and water it in, other than that get a bottle of un-sulphured molasses and feed with it during flowering every other feeding up until middle of september, then jus plain water, for molasses mix 1tsp per gal of water (or if makin a compost tea i add 1tbsp per gal of water) has to be un-sulphured molasses tho cause if not the molasses will have a bad effect on ur microbes, serioulsy bud try this organic recipe out its pretty simple, u jus gota keep ur microbes happy, try not to use to many liquid nutes (id reconmend using fox farm big bloom only if u buy a liquid nute) in this soil mix all the nutrients ur plant will need will be in the soil, the microbes break em down for the plant to eat, u feed the soil and the soil feeds the plant, so the biggest thing to remeber is to use a good water source, keep ur microbes happy and they will keep ur plant happy
 

semor90

Active Member
Checkout super soil.I bought the amendments on eBay for 45$,2 bags of soil for 36$, 10lbs worm casting 15$.'let it sit a month. Cheapest way to go IMO. Only costed 96$.
 

jixan

Active Member
I'd just run over to Lowes or Home Depot, pick up a bag of Kellogg Patio Plus potting soil. It should run you about $5 bucks a bag, has kelp, bat guano, worm castings, and all sort of good stuff. FoxFarm and Roots Organic is another option, but you'll be looking to pay $16 to $18 if you go that route. All three are great potting mixes for mature plants.

If your starting from seed I'd buy a seed starting mix first then transplant when they're 3-4 weeks old. Fox Farm Light Warrior is good and goes for around $15-$20 per 1 cubic foot bag. Miracle Gro Seed Starting Mix is another option at $3 for an 8qt bag.
Hmm, decisions decisions. I have a bag of vermiculite at the house already so I might give Kellogg Patio Plus a try and throw in a good dosing of vermiculite. Seems like a good price point for all the ingredients. Thanks for all the responses. If anyone else has any insight I would love to hear it.

Thanks,
jixan
 

jixan

Active Member
i wouldnt go with miracle grow, if ur startin from seed u should start with either light warrior or happy frog potting soil, since ur containers are only 10gal u have the option of adding better quality bagged soil instead of using a soil yards base mix, what id reconmend is mixing fox farm ocean forest with garden & bloome harvest supreme, most places will have the ocean forest for under $15 and the harvest supreme is usually under $10 (i pay $7.99 per 2cu.ft. bag) also go down to osh hardware or home depot and get a bag of perlite, mix ur soils together and cut mix with perlite at ratio of 1/3 perlite to 2/3 soil mix, the harvest supreme already has mycorrhizae in it but if wanna add sum extra it wont hurt, try plant success granular mycorrhizae 3-1-2 or earthjuice biozeus soil microbes powder, since this is a all organic mix ur gona wanna make sure ur water is de-chlorinated, all drinkin water (city, tap water) has chlorine or chlorimine in it, chlorine is a bacteriacide and will kill of the microbes in ur soil, microbes are the most crucial thing is a organic grow so to kill them off is all bad, check with ur cities water report, find out if they add chlorine or chlorimine, if its only chlorine then u can let ur water sit for 24 hrs to let the chlorine evaperate out off the water, but if its chlorimine u will need to get a water filter, r/0 systems work best and u can get one online for under 200 bucks, another option is to buy filtered water from a grocery story, the big glacier water machines are commerical r/o machines, so u can do that until u can get a filter and its not to expensive, usally 25cents a gallon, but ya brotha there ya go just get those soils and mix em and water with de-chlorinated water! when it comes time to flower go buy a bag of happy frog bulb food 3-8-8 and add it as a top dress and water it in, other than that get a bottle of un-sulphured molasses and feed with it during flowering every other feeding up until middle of september, then jus plain water, for molasses mix 1tsp per gal of water (or if makin a compost tea i add 1tbsp per gal of water) has to be un-sulphured molasses tho cause if not the molasses will have a bad effect on ur microbes, serioulsy bud try this organic recipe out its pretty simple, u jus gota keep ur microbes happy, try not to use to many liquid nutes (id reconmend using fox farm big bloom only if u buy a liquid nute) in this soil mix all the nutrients ur plant will need will be in the soil, the microbes break em down for the plant to eat, u feed the soil and the soil feeds the plant, so the biggest thing to remeber is to use a good water source, keep ur microbes happy and they will keep ur plant happy
Thanks for such a descriptive response. I just mixed my own soil for a Square Foot Garden I installed which consisted of following:

1/3 Peet Moss
1/3 Vermiculite
1/3 Compost (Cotton Burr - Cow Manure - Worm Castings - Mushroom Compost)

Do you think that will cut the mustard? It seems well enough rounded for the grow. What do you think?
 

jixan

Active Member
Mel's mix is pretty solid. I grew some pretty nice Indicas and Sativas in his mix in my 4x4 SFG.
YES! Another square footer among us! Well, that might have just made up my mind for me Mel's Mix, I'm coming back. Sweet!

Thanks Vindicated!
jixan
 

Kb's seeds

Active Member
Thanks for such a descriptive response. I just mixed my own soil for a Square Foot Garden I installed which consisted of following:

1/3 Peet Moss
1/3 Vermiculite
1/3 Compost (Cotton Burr - Cow Manure - Worm Castings - Mushroom Compost)

Do you think that will cut the mustard? It seems well enough rounded for the grow. What do you think?

sounds good except ur missing perlite, vermiculite holds moisture, add sum extra perlite to ur mix to give it good aeration, the microbes in ur compost need oxygen and so do the roots so adding perlite will help add sum aeration, other than that sounds good brotha
 
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