Any Organic Purists in Arizona?

[thecoolman]

Neem is good.

I hear this stuff is better-

spinosad


What do you think?


​http://www.amazon.com/DEADBUG-BREW-CONCENTRATE-1-Quart/dp/B001VJ83LW/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1384227768&sr=8-3&keywords=captain+jacks+deadbug+brew

Spinosad kicks ass on thrips-the best there is it is good on caterpillars etc also and doesnt kill off the beneficial bugs if you use them safe to use also. Monterey makes a version as well.
For all the talk of neem which is good so many times it only temporarily controls the situation certainly not what I would use if I had something very serious. Fortunately I don't get many pests in a sealed hydro room.
I think what turned me off somewhat with soil in az is the lack of good top soil to blend in-alternatively store bought products including non bricked coco very often come with built in pests fungas gnats, aphids etc...and I am just not a huge fan of heavily acidic peat based mixes requiring lime to temporarily control the ph-sunshine 4 etc. I do love the idea of worms and making old school compost though.

 

[1337hacker]

Hey treep long time no see. I had a couple good runs at 1.5 a light in an organic mix I reused a few times.. There were strains that did very well and certain strains that didn't do so well (cal mag whores) . EWC was my biggest cost in the project as a good layer of EWC would cost me in the 60-100 dollar range depending on how deep I wanted to amend it with.

I'm back to the Bog / 3LB advice I picked up 12 years ago on Overgrow, it's so simple and gives great results.. Pureblend pro soil, Fox Farm Big Bloom, and Molasses... strain dependent but getting near that 2-2.5 range per light w/ c02 and spending 200-300 dollars in ingredients on 2 4x8 tables. Here's a little wifi grenade I recently trimmed up

 

[1337hacker]

Check this out man. I know your are diehard chemical grower that's and great for you.

1) I never throw away my media. Investment can be high depending on how much media your making and the quality of compost or if you get it free or not.
2) My media consist of natural amendments that YES there is work up front mixing and making soil as I do it from peat based brick. After you put it all together in its done.
3) Large containers with the proper HIGH quality organic amendments should ensure an proper CEC and then the microbes does all the work for you.
4) Using the same pot meaning treating like it a soil bed of sort cuts labor and again with a living soil the microbes acculate what the plant needs unlike chemical chelation.
5) Every cycle it keeps getting better just a like any biofarmers land. A little top dress here and there with some plants you can grow yourself and vermicompost which eat your scraps.

This is called sustainable bio farming and catching on very quickly. Europe is light years ahead of us but then again we aren't that old of a country, just a really greedy one.

Just about every grocery store now has natural and organic food offerings so it's not hype or fade. People are waking up and with the internet the truth is spreading.

My health and pocket book made me a believer in my approach to gardening and that's when I decieded to really dig deep into dirt and bust all the cannalore out there and I here. How can we call bud medical full of chems? I don't get it.

This method could become free if you're witty enough.

I remember catching a blurb from a container gardening book that stressed how easily phosphorus leaches from soils and how a well established root system responds to a hydro type feeding in soil (basically throwing out the 6.0 - 6.5 soil ph paradigm) I've always been wary of feeding low ppm water to my plants to prevent the leaching of nutrients from the plant and medium.

 

[Azoned]

I control [notice my wording...not kill] thrips by spraying my plants down with water. Just hosing them down...again, I am outdoors
and because of the cool nights here...never seen a mite...outside. Indoors, yes! Worms...I manually eject them and I have a healthy number of mantids, spiders, wasps to keep most of the pest under control.
...and some strain ARE more prone to pests. I had a StrawberryCough/JockHorror cross that the hoppers loved...ignored the neighboring plants for this strain. So, pest resistance is in the cards. Something I wish to pursue with my pollen chuckin...I wont go so far as to call it "Breeding".

 

[headtreep]

If all of you are concerned about organic what your thoughts on the blood
and bone meal that is typically scraped off the slaughterhouse floor
and is full of hormones antibiotics and other poisons?
Do you use a certified organic source or have you ever considered alternatives
such as bat guano, certified pesticide free seed meal, green sand, rock phosphates etc etc
Also my understanding is there is a huge quality difference in worm castings
and there added benefit is partly dependent on what they are fed.
any thoughts?

PS- Yes Headtreep I have thought about mixing my own salts as of now
fertilizer is one of the cheaper aspects of my set up but I would like to
tweak the formula a bit and savings would for sure be a added benefit.
I need to find a good fertilizer PC program I heard hydro buddy is ok.
I would then tailor the formula around my lab tested leaf samples as well as results. I suppose I could talk to the lab down at peters fertilizer and see if they will
give me a recipe tailored to my NPK and micro requirements. Dr Cari Peters
has been very helpful in the past.

Coolman is right.

I have some left over food grade DE, peat, lava rock, kelp meal, fish meal, alfalfa, compost, ewc, crab shell, straw, neem meal, minerals, and some random milled botanicals. If I had some worms right now I'd run that through the bin and use but I don't so I'm going to make a potting mix with small amounts of those and allow it to cure for a long period of time and see where that takes me.

It's a little more heavy than my normal mix but I'm trying to find my personal happy medium that's cheap (I have it already bought in bulk) and will make that biomass thrive.

When time comes I will look into plant databases to find native AZ species to further my enhance my garden amendements and then run REAL tests.

 

[headtreep]

Hydra is new to this coolman and seems to be misinformed as I never mention blood or bone. It starts with quality vermicompost that were fed proper and fuck all the rest.

 

[headtreep]

I remember catching a blurb from a container gardening book that stressed how easily phosphorus leaches from soils and how a well established root system responds to a hydro type feeding in soil (basically throwing out the 6.0 - 6.5 soil ph paradigm) I've always been wary of feeding low ppm water to my plants to prevent the leaching of nutrients from the plant and medium.

I do irrigate my soil with low ppm water 2 stage (RO) with only the best results. The quality of water we have in the city is horrible as my family is in the water industry so they know.

I dont pay attention to NPK as I focus of building humus.

 

[headtreep]

Hey treep long time no see. I had a couple good runs at 1.5 a light in an organic mix I reused a few times.. There were strains that did very well and certain strains that didn't do so well (cal mag whores) . EWC was my biggest cost in the project as a good layer of EWC would cost me in the 60-100 dollar range depending on how deep I wanted to amend it with.

I'm back to the Bog / 3LB advice I picked up 12 years ago on Overgrow, it's so simple and gives great results.. Pureblend pro soil, Fox Farm Big Bloom, and Molasses... strain dependent but getting near that 2-2.5 range per light w/ c02 and spending 200-300 dollars in ingredients on 2 4x8 tables. Here's a little wifi grenade I recently trimmed up

View attachment 2891457

Hey hows goes it and nice to see you sir. Nice nuggie. You know I'm gonna disagree with this post. Back to commercial products ugghhh. Whatever works for you man. I'm not trying start a war it's just this thread is for those who don't mess with bag crap. 3LB is just as bad as Super soil that I once advocated.

That's simply what it is, crap. That's a throw away soil imo not a long term living investment. That's where my mind and this thread is directed. LIVING SOIL. 3LB is just as bad as Super soil that I once advocated. Both are dieing soils imo and full of animal crap.

PS Bat Gauno is a joke and made to rape newbs for their $$. Just like insect frass lol.

next myth to bust......

 

[headtreep]

Now onto the spinosad vs neem

I use neem as part of my IPM program 1x per week. Neem is for prevention as where spinosad would be used for outbreaks or past issues. Spinosad is a bacteria and doesn't have the benefits of neem as far as plant health is concern. Neem is a all in one solution.

I'm willing to bet if you ingested neem, like I do, your health could improve. It detoxes like no other and oral care alone neem provides alone is outstanding. I started to consume the same "potions" that I use to irrigate my root zone for my healing and now preventative.

If you use neem proper with silica 1x per week you should have little to no issues. Beneficial soil bugs and stickies are great too.

 

[headtreep]

I could go on and on about the benefits of neem but I'm hungry and tired.

 

[Hÿdra]

so is blood and bone NOT organic? OR is it bad for the type of soil im trying to make?

Or is it just gross that they scrape it off floors??

 

[Hÿdra]

i can use neem meal in place of the bloodmeal correct?
and rock phosphate for the bone meal?

 

[Hÿdra]

• 1 tablespoon neem meal per gallon or 1/2 cup per cubic foot of soil mix
  2 tablespoons rock phosephate per gallon or 1 cup per cubic foot of soil mix
  1-tablespoon kelp meal per gallon or 1/2 cup per cubic foot of soil mix​
  
  +alfalfa meal at 1 Tbls spoon per galln?

Will that work for dry ferts in the soil?

 

[thecoolman]

I didn't realize all the healing properties checked it out a bit..thanks for the good info.
I understand Neem is a great preventative. I on certain occasions just want more say if I am getting in a cali clone maybe- avid, orthene, forbid (definitely none of them organic).

Personally I have never used bat guano. I heard it was a great organic though. Whats wrong with it?
salt content, price, disease filled? In the east I did always prefer a rich wormy mulch and now if needed and going organic would probably consider organic cotton seed meal as an additional N source if needed.

I am intrigued by the fact you replant in the same pot as the root ball- how much time do you
give it to break down 1st, and do you always let the worms do the work or do you add a nitrogen source to help compost it.

 

[pharma farmer]

I'm back to the Bog / 3LB advice I picked up 12 years ago on Overgrow. Here's a little wifi grenade I recently trimmed up

View attachment 2891457

I learned a lot back then too. Overgrow is what got me into hydro. Those DIY bubble buckets were fun for a while, till the roots kept clogging up my drain lines.


I ended up having my best indoor success feeding GH chem to waste on coco, with a few plants in organic soil mix.

You can't beat hydro/chems when vegging big plants, pheno hunting, or working a mama for cuts.

And, from my experience, most people can't tell the difference between properly grown and flushed buds, or bud grown in organic soil.

But-

With sites like this

http://www.kelp4less.com/

I'd def be mixing up some custom soil mixes, and foliar feeds also, if I had the means...

 

[1337hacker]

Hey hows goes it and nice to see you sir. Nice nuggie. You know I'm gonna disagree with this post. Back to commercial products ugghhh. Whatever works for you man. I'm not trying start a war it's just this thread is for those who don't mess with bag crap. 3LB is just as bad as Super soil that I once advocated.

That's simply what it is, crap. That's a throw away soil imo not a long term living investment. That's where my mind and this thread is directed. LIVING SOIL. 3LB is just as bad as Super soil that I once advocated. Both are dieing soils imo and full of animal crap.

PS Bat Gauno is a joke and made to rape newbs for their $$. Just like insect frass lol.

next myth to bust......

This thread started talking about serious weight... Never seen anyone pull 2 + in rols, maybe you can bust that myth with a pic. I learned bogs recipe in less than 1 typed message post and it still sticks with me til this day. I don't get whats not to like about the 3lb, they actually grew quantity and quality, most organic growers discount quantity but the 3lb could do 2-3 a light and didnt bother with that bullshit excusenof compromise. Never seen an rols grower do 2-3 a light but maybe I am wrong and missing something. Best rols I have seen is the rev and I have that book right now... he isnt much more than a closet grower and spending much more effort than I do on his little 600 w grows.

 

[1337hacker]

I do irrigate my soil with low ppm water 2 stage (RO) with only the best results. The quality of water we have in the city is horrible as my family is in the water industry so they know.

I dont pay attention to NPK as I focus of building humus.

So you don't pay attention to NPK content of your soil.. and you don't care about elements leaching(like P) or haven't explained how you prevent it...

Then why are you asserting that the proper CEC will be maintained in the soil if you don't know what is actually in it? Are you saying that every strain will grow perfectly in this mix without any additions or change in watering?

Also, many soil growers who reuse soil for an extended period of time send samples out to get soil tests to assure their soils have all the proper ratios of nutrients. There is not other good way to determine if your soil has everything needed for the upcoming grow. If you have a soil too low in P your bud size sure will let you know.

 

[thecoolman]

There really is many different recipes and additives for organic gardening often it is a matter of availability.
This may be helpful. http://oces.okstate.edu/cleveland/horticulture/N-P-K rates of various organic fertil
http://extension.oregonstate.edu/lane/sites/default/files/documents/lc437organicfertilizersvaluesrev.pdf

I would use a bit more rock phosphate maybe 4 tablespoons since it releases very very slowly in comparison to the others. Also note that alphalpa meal is high in N and K but not P (phosphorous)
The alphalfa has unique properties and also contains a PGR that adds lots of crystals and increased growth.

 

[headtreep]

so is blood and bone NOT organic? OR is it bad for the type of soil im trying to make?

Or is it just gross that they scrape it off floors??

I don't eat meat unless it's grass fed organic but lately I can't even handle that anymore. The stuff sold for agriculture is bottom of the barrel and is most likely from conventional slaughter houses and think about it for sec. Most of the meat we eat in the grocery store the animals are treated and fed pretty shitty. GMOs that a whole other dirty thing to watch for.

Avoid blood and animal bone meals. Avoid cottonseed meals and soybean meals. These are full of pesticides and mostly likely GMO. Stick with things like alfalfa which can be sourced very easily in AZ from organic farms. Neem cake/meal can replace blood. As mentioned earlier, crabshell, kelp, vermicompost, minerals, leafmold/and or peat and avoid perlite at all costs it floats and brings nothing to the table as far microbe habitation. Pumice, lava rock, rice hulls, DE, are better aeration amendments.

Hydra I have posted my mix many times all over so please do look it up. Redundancy blows bro.

 

[headtreep]

So you don't pay attention to NPK content of your soil.. and you don't care about elements leaching(like P) or haven't explained how you prevent it...

Then why are you asserting that the proper CEC will be maintained in the soil if you don't know what is actually in it? Are you saying that every strain will grow perfectly in this mix without any additions or change in watering?

Also, many soil growers who reuse soil for an extended period of time send samples out to get soil tests to assure their soils have all the proper ratios of nutrients. There is not other good way to determine if your soil has everything needed for the upcoming grow. If you have a soil too low in P your bud size sure will let you know.

I get my compost tested