That's good advice, they have their shit together.
No worries mate I think I know what I'm getting
You won't find alfalfa meal anywhere here, but you can get a big ass bag of pellets from any horse feed store. Check to make sure there's no additives in there though, supplements are added to a lot of them.
The best dry ferts you can buy are crab, neem and kelp meals, and the links I gave you are the only place you can get em in the uk. You may find kelp elsewhere, but I can vouch for the quality of that particular product.
Cheers buddy
I listen to GreaseMonkey like he is a college professor! Dude has been teaching me for over a year. If you want the long explanation, check out his thread! Amended compost
I was using Espoma last year. I found it to be a little harsh. I really think that all of the N was soluble and didnt have much of slow release N. What I mean is that the leaves would fade and curl around week #5 and it would go down-hill fairly fast from there. I was using it because it was very close to TGA's super-soil. Yes, I started off being a weed nerd.
The only problem that I found on the "build a soil"website is that they say to use peat... I have not had problems with mine, but Grease said that peat likes to compact. I forgot to ask him about it, because I am using peat and expanded shale, but my stuff looks the best that it ever has... I have not finished my compost yet and my soil mix is based off of the 1/3... 1/3 soil, 1/3 compost, and 1/3 aeration. I mixed the soil and compost and let it age, added the aeration when I was ready to use it. It made it easier to store that way...
I was a little confused about peat. What are your thoughts about it in general. I saw that a lot of Cootz style methods are using peat.
peat is ok to use, don't get me wrong, but if you have a large part of your mix as peat it does lead to problems, the aforementioned soil tension, and also the tendency to go acidic over time, but all that being said peat is the best substrate to use given it's high CEC,
I do like peat man, I didn't mean to give you the wrong impression.
I'm in week 3 now, I'm not above adding some nutes, if they start struggling, I'll keep that in mind. Thanks for the info!
I found that a good top-dressing of worm castings really help. Do you have any leaf curl? I always got yellow and curled leaves in the end when I used Espoma and dolomite. I am not trying to say that you are doing anything wrong, but I feel like I have been down the exact road(espoma) that you are on. If you start having problems during the middle to the end of harvest, you might look into trading bone/blood meal for fish/fish bone meal. It is the cool thing about organics, you have options for a source of amendments.
Bio-live is a fertilizer, Azomite is a soil mineralizer, they are two completely different things. I'd suggest you getting some basalt or rock dust and adding it to your mix.I got tired of the price of Build-a-soil and they use Azomite, which contains aluminum. So, I found another product that was very comparable to Espoma's price. Bio-Live from Down to Earth. This stuff is 1/2 the price of Build a soil!!!
Fish Bone Meal, Fish Meal, Alfalfa Meal, Crab Meal, Shrimp Meal, Langbeinite, Humates, Kelp Meal, Mycorrhizal Fungi and Beneficial Bacteria
is now.. thanks for the tip ...SUV .....lol
im with monkey on this one,compost and manure,goes a long ways,im sure you check around you can find folk setting leaves and grass clipping in bags for the city to roll by and pickup,throw in a big ole pile and add your veggie and fruit scraps in it,turn every other week,be surprised what you come ip with,leave that same pile for a year you will come out to soil that looks like ewc,all free friend
fact is everything cost friend,point to take is when you build it right,you dont have to do it again in quite some time,so if it turns out to a 400 dollar build ,so be it,them nutes you dont want to use are 100 min to get threw a grow,do the math of that 100 every 4 months,versus the 400 for 5 years minimum out of your soil before amending,keep the bioligy in check and feed them beannies what they want,and there is no amending