Recycled Organic Living Soil (ROLS) and No Till Thread

Big Perm

Well-Known Member
Three 600w lamps? HPS? I'm just using regular household LED light bulbs. I used to use HPS with DWC. Now I've gone full circle and now organic with Dollar Store bulbs. Hahaha!

My current grow, light bulbs... 4 plants in a 5X5 tent, no-till organic. That was a week ago. I'll be taking more pics this weekend. Buds are much bigger now.

Nice! What week is that?
 

jHands

Active Member
Having some issues in this living soil. Base soil mix was equal parts EWC, pumice, cspm amended coot style. It sat outside for 30 days under a tarp in below ideal temperature (45 degree average). When I brought it into my 4x8 bed in my sealed room, my co2 wasn’t kicking on because the soil was offgassing so much co2 into my room. I don’t believe it’s “cooked” long enough. Got the co2 issues under control and the plants came back to life with some vigorous dark green growth temporarily, but now are all forming black tips with gold/metallic burn. One half of the bed took longer to start showing symptoms. Wondering if this is nitrogen toxicity due to the soil being too hot? And if so, how long will it take the soil to calm down? Will these plants survive or should I just bank on a failure?
 

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hillbill

Well-Known Member
Having some issues in this living soil. Base soil mix was equal parts EWC, pumice, cspm amended coot style. It sat outside for 30 days under a tarp in below ideal temperature (45 degree average). When I brought it into my 4x8 bed in my sealed room, my co2 wasn’t kicking on because the soil was offgassing so much co2 into my room. I don’t believe it’s “cooked” long enough. Got the co2 issues under control and the plants came back to life with some vigorous dark green growth temporarily, but now are all forming black tips with gold/metallic burn. One half of the bed took longer to start showing symptoms. Wondering if this is nitrogen toxicity due to the soil being too hot? And if so, how long will it take the soil to calm down? Will these plants survive or should I just bank on a failure?
1/3 EWC can make a mix very soupy and keep the roots from absorbing oxygen. They do not have coarser fibers that give body and lift to other composts.
 

jHands

Active Member
1/3 EWC can make a mix very soupy and keep the roots from absorbing oxygen. They do not have coarser fibers that give body and lift to other composts.
Are you leaning towards root rot? I have quite a bit of pumice in this mix. Mostly small to medium with a few bags of larger mixed in.

I was really leaning towards Nute Burn and nitrogen toxicity due to how the girls came back to life vigorously, got super dark green, then started to burn.
 

CanadianDank

Well-Known Member
Honestly man at that temp I doubt much breakdown occurred over those thirty days, your basically in a freshly mixed soil. And now with the different rates at which your amendments breakdown and become available you have an improperly balanced soil and your pH will be out of whack.
I am no pro in this at all and I'm a newb to living soil so take this with a grain of salt
If it were me I'd probably water with a compost tea, mulch the beds and cross my fingers.
Hopefully someone else will be able to offer more insight.
If you have the means, start new seeds as a backup.

@jHands
 

ShLUbY

Well-Known Member
Honestly man at that temp I doubt much breakdown occurred over those thirty days, your basically in a freshly mixed soil. And now with the different rates at which your amendments breakdown and become available you have an improperly balanced soil and your pH will be out of whack.
I am no pro in this at all and I'm a newb to living soil so take this with a grain of salt
If it were me I'd probably water with a compost tea, mulch the beds and cross my fingers.
Hopefully someone else will be able to offer more insight.
If you have the means, start new seeds as a backup.

@jHands
adding compost tea will only exacerbate the issue. the populations are already exploding, so no need to add more haha. need to soil to reach a microbial equilibrium, aka carrying capacity, for things to settle down. but i agree with your speculation about the pH and the availability of nutrition. to my knowledge, he's planning on adding a cover crop, or has already broadcast seeds to do so.

with so many variables at play, it's really had to dial in on the exact cause.

lesson is... don't compost soil in cold weather temperatures :D
 

Devildenis69

Well-Known Member
I had some very similar scenario to yours, some dank plants at the beginning of flowering and around +35 the same burn on leafs and some redder stems than yours

I figured its a micro def of some sort, so I skipped my fish bone input (high P), got some azomite (micro) & gypsum (drainage) and will go well over 50 % aeration, this mix is cooking, so cant say if I am on the right track

Anyway I am curious about other members input

Good luck and respect wet/dry cycles
 

hillbill

Well-Known Member
Had a somethingflower in my Bee Balm in partial to mostly shade and went tight till October harvest of a few small buds.
 

hillbill

Well-Known Member
Three 600w lamps? HPS? I'm just using regular household LED light bulbs. I used to use HPS with DWC. Now I've gone full circle and now organic with Dollar Store bulbs. Hahaha!

My current grow, light bulbs... 4 plants in a 5X5 tent, no-till organic. That was a week ago. I'll be taking more pics this weekend. Buds are much bigger now.

Awesome.... might want to check under cabinet led 24” strips at Walmart. Use them myself for shop!
 

Northwood

Well-Known Member
Awesome.... might want to check under cabinet led 24” strips at Walmart. Use them myself for shop!
Very funny guys. But 1.2 grams per watt with living organic no-till isn't too bad. Yes, very experienced growers with the newest diodes can do 1.6 grams per watt in flower. But as a Canadian it would have cost me thousands of dollars to light up my 5X5 tent with that technology. For my legal 4 plant limit in Canada the objective was to demonstrate how we can grow at least 1 kilogram (2.2 pounds for you) from 25 square feet for just $200 CDN in Dollar Store or Walmart light bulbs or whatever. And there it is. https://www.rollitup.org/t/my-budget-5x5-setup.982183/

Frankly I'm surprised to see such attitudes on the organic no-till thread, but considering recent politics in certain countries, nothing surprises me anymore. I get it, but it doesn't mean I have to accept it.
 

ShLUbY

Well-Known Member
Very funny guys. But 1.2 grams per watt with living organic no-till isn't too bad. Yes, very experienced growers with the newest diodes can do 1.6 grams per watt in flower. But as a Canadian it would have cost me thousands of dollars to light up my 5X5 tent with that technology. For my legal 4 plant limit in Canada the objective was to demonstrate how we can grow at least 1 kilogram (2.2 pounds for you) from 25 square feet for just $200 CDN in Dollar Store or Walmart light bulbs or whatever. And there it is. https://www.rollitup.org/t/my-budget-5x5-setup.982183/

Frankly I'm surprised to see such attitudes on the organic no-till thread, but considering recent politics in certain countries, nothing surprises me anymore. I get it, but it doesn't mean I have to accept it.
i dont think he meant anything by it man. dont take it to heart :)

WHY don't you have that link in your signiture!?!?! I would have been there weeks ago!

Cheers.
 

ACitizenofColorado

Well-Known Member
Very funny guys. But 1.2 grams per watt with living organic no-till isn't too bad. Yes, very experienced growers with the newest diodes can do 1.6 grams per watt in flower. But as a Canadian it would have cost me thousands of dollars to light up my 5X5 tent with that technology. For my legal 4 plant limit in Canada the objective was to demonstrate how we can grow at least 1 kilogram (2.2 pounds for you) from 25 square feet for just $200 CDN in Dollar Store or Walmart light bulbs or whatever. And there it is. https://www.rollitup.org/t/my-budget-5x5-setup.982183/

Frankly I'm surprised to see such attitudes on the organic no-till thread, but considering recent politics in certain countries, nothing surprises me anymore. I get it, but it doesn't mean I have to accept it.
Care to flesh out what you mean by certain politics in certain countries?

No point being vague. Speak clearly or acknowledge you have nothing to say.
 

Northwood

Well-Known Member
Care to flesh out what you mean by certain politics in certain countries?

No point being vague. Speak clearly or acknowledge you have nothing to say.
I have nothing to say except take it easy. Do a dab or vape something. I'm sure Theresa May will get everything right one of these days. Best of luck to you!
 

Northwood

Well-Known Member
i dont think he meant anything by it man. dont take it to heart :)

WHY don't you have that link in your signiture!?!?! I would have been there weeks ago!

Cheers.
Yeah maybe I should put it in there. I'm still a bit new here.

I'm changing up my next grow. I have a giant 4 foot round fabric pot that I'll grow all 4 plants in. So unfortunately it means I'll be breaking up my current soil (with all root balls included of course), and building from scratch again. We'll be using the tent mostly for growing out spring vegetable seedlings soon, so it will give the soil some time to "cook" and also for a preliminary cover crop. I'm still in the middle of harvest of my current crop, but I'm really looking forward to trying out the new system. I'm going to need a lot more worm castings. I have 3 nested bins going now, and the 3 on the bottom are finished...the 2nd level bins are "almost" ready - maybe a month away. So hopefully that's enough.
 
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