Seems every one is saying that rice hulls break down.
That’s a truth.
But no one is saying how long it takes to break down.
From what I’ve researched it takes over a year for the rice hills to break down.
That’s enough time for 4-5 grow cycles (autos) for me.
I’m going to do a 70-30 mix coco/ rice hills for a sip container.
Roughly 1 year to fully decompose is the general consensus from what I've seen throughout the years. Seems to be true from various journals I've seen that incorporate hulls into the mix.
I'd personally consider going 40% on the hulls and be comfortable doing no-till in those for about a year. That way, even if a lot of the hulls decompose, you'll still have a good amount by the time you hit that 1 year mark and dump/recycle the mix.
More than one way to skin a cat, so to speak. Lava rocks, pumice, and rice hulls all have unique pros about them that are absent with perlite. However, my argument has always been to use what is most easily available to you in terms of both location and affordability. Most places, perlite will be the most readily available and affordable.
Rice hulls are easily found at competitive prices if you live near breweries and/or homebrew stores. Lava rocks are pricey at hardware stores for what you get, but if you live near landscaping businesses, you may find lava rocks are both more readily available and cheaper than perlite. The same is true of pumice.
As with everything organic, what is local, affordable, and readily available will vary by region.
I've found for most people, $20 for 4 cuft of perlite is tough to beat in terms of price and local availability. If a hydro store is trying to charge more than $25 for a 4 cuft bag of perlite, stop giving them your business and go elsewhere because they're fucking you.
One can be plenty successful regardless of the aeration input they decide to use.
Regards.
