Nice work BlueJ. Am I right in assuming "better harvests than before" is both a quantitative and qualitative statement? Also does before refer to before going veganic or the first few experimental veganic rounds? Danks
Quantity of AAA buds has increased (but also getting to know your strains can help in knowing how far up to trim bud sites, also, my sour bubble cut now gives golf ball nugs top to bottom, literally, on a 30" plant there are buds 1" from the soil as big as the main colas, sour bubble doesn't do huge colas to begin with but it's great to get 100% top quality nuggage top to bottom, only thing in the trim bag is sugar leaf material), previous runs would have small small buds lower down, still quality, but i'm getting noticeably larger buds further down / away from the light. Plants remain healthy and deficiency free till chop & I was worried at how green this particular strain remains but just a week cure gives a smooth & potent smoke.
My entire grow is easily 99% vegan still, I've only added bone meal to the mix (switching to fish bone meal / crab meal) and topdress with 2TBSP budswel @ transition to flower (when the bag runs out i probably will drop the guano alltogether). These first two runs with bone meal I've noticed an increase in individual calyx size/swelling, stem size/strength & less purple/red stems & veins, for me these are too important to not use bone meal but also the reason I am switching specifically to fish bone/crab shell meal.
But yes I'm referring to both my initial experimenting with veganics (i should really call it fumbling in the dark LOL) and my dialed in runs, but I only became dialed in once I started adding compost/EWC/TEAS and I honestly didn't stick with strict veganics for too long because I don't see any reason not to mimic a full natural cycle of reuse, make sense?
My gardening mantra is quickly becoming:
1. REUSE SOIL
2. RECHARGE SOIL (add compost/EWC in equal parts with a drainage/aeration item i.e. rice hulls / lava rock / perlite / vermiculite for a total ratio of 5:2 old soil:compost/aeration)
3. AMEND SOIL (plant meals: kelp, alfalfa, neem etc. minerals/clays: azomite, greensand, gypsum, langbeinite, bentonite etc. bone/animal meals: (fish)bone, crabshell
4. COMPOST/EWC TEAS
and a 5th one I will be heavily concentrating on as I've seen the beneficts quickly from alfalfa teas (or simply adding alfalfa to your compost tea) and aloe
5. BOTANICAL TEAS
Which may deserve a new thread on the benefits of NETTLES, ALOE, YUCCA, COMFREY, ALFALFA, YARROW and many others, especially considering this is a soil mix thread
Alrighty fellow organic geeks, it's late and i went on a tangent....OH but I was thinking it would be nice to give a little background & nutritional value on each item in the mix and why I/we use it, a sort of quick reference to the ingredients, and add it right to the first post.
SOUR BUBBLE day 42 LIVING ORGANIC RECYCLED SOIL