sharing my modified subcool super soil recipe

sidewing said:

well, the original recipe on page one is a smaller batch i believe. only 2 bags of soil. i think the subcool is 8 bags? cant remember..

but here is the latest revised version that i was running:



I've done a lot of learning about plants, salts, and various other things related to growing. so here's my opinion as of today.

epsom salt, which is magnesium sulfate, (a completely water soluble form of just magnesium and sulfur), is not needed in the soil mix.

you're using a complete base soil in roots original... epsom salt being completely water soluble is available immediately and does nothing at all for long term release. the base soil alone has enough magnesium and sulfur and no more is needed.. if some was needed down the road it would be long gone from the epsom salt added in the mix by the time that time came.

I don't even think the potassium sulfate is needed honestly.. now, TODAY, knowing what I know now, I'd run something like this:
1 bag roots organic, 1 cup fish bone meal, 1 cup bat guano (high p, such as happy frog, or any high p guano that is fine texture, not pellets), 1 cup blood meal, and 1 cup of azomite... then just give them a microbial tea once a week brewed with EWC, Alaska Humus (ancient forest), like a large pinch of each is good. and a little sucanat (like 1 tsp per 2 gallons of water).

that's what I'd use. it'll get the job done.

but to simply answer your question about epsom salt.. magnesium and sulfur addition isnt really doing anything at the beginning of flower.. it'd be most beneficial if at all at the end of flower. both magnesium and sulfur help improve flavor, but you can easily throw off the nutrient ratio balance using a fully soluble raw salt such as epsom salt. and that'd be counter productive.

I think subcool's mix he based it off someone elses.. and I think he just sort of did a gumbo mix of ingredients that a lot of people use, and it worked for him so that's what he uses.. it doesn't mean that everything is necessary..

in my opinion roots original ALONE, can carry the plant at least through the first month of flower in a large 7gal pot. adding a little extra that breaks down slowly will carry it the rest..

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sidewing said:

How early is the yellowing happening?
You can top dress with more mix half way through or use a bigger pot.
What ingredients are you using to brew your tea? I found molasses to induce some early yellowing.
Now a days I've been running my raw salt hydro formula in dwc. So I go full strength all the way through.

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sidewing said:

How early is the yellowing happening?
You can top dress with more mix half way through or use a bigger pot.
What ingredients are you using to brew your tea? I found molasses to induce some early yellowing.
Now a days I've been running my raw salt hydro formula in dwc. So I go full strength all the way through.

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sidewing said:

I don't log on this site. I keep a journal on another private sure that is invite only and I don't believe I have permission to invite. But I have a thread on here called "hydrobuddy" where I put the recipe I use in there.

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sidewing said:

The white stuff is fine just mix the soil briefly before use. If you're gonna use tea just use an aact tea. In dwc I brew with ro water, a tablespoon of ewc, tablespoon of Alaska humus, and a tablespoon of sucanat (dehydrated molasses).. Usually brew with a couple gallons of water and I dump the extra onto my mother soil plants in veg. I keep my mother plants in soil because in dwc things can go wrong really fast if something happens.. I've had plants die in 36 hours. Soil is more forgiving and typically rapid death does not occur.

The raw salts are considered natural. It's hard to get a lot of things certified organic.. The main difference is soil amendments typically need to be broken down by bacteria in soil before they become available to the plant.. Raw salts are typically water soluble and fully readily available in their current form..
So essentially as far as the plant is concerned it's the same thing, it's just salts work immediately because they're in their broken down form.. Amendments need to be broken down.. But once their broken down, it's the same chemical makeup as the salt, the plant doesn't see a difference in the two. As long as your salt source is pure, it can actually be considered cleaner than organic soil..
I just like dwc because Its cleaner and easier to maintain because I don't have to lug and mix heavy bags of soil which hurt my back condition. Plus you're controlling everything that is going into the plant at the precise amounts that you want.

I don't log on this site. I keep a journal on another private sure that is invite only and I don't believe I have permission to invite. But I have a thread on here called "hydrobuddy" where I put the recipe I use in there.

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banker said:

sidewing:
My SS has been cooking for 2 weeks and there are flies all over it. They don't look like Fungus Gnats,
they are yellowish and black with wings much smaller then their bodies. Do you know what they are and how to get rid of them. Once again thank you for all your help.

Banker

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whitey78 said:

I dont know if its been said or not but I use nemetodes on the regular when I'm mixing soil, especially with a new batch seeing all soil is usually blessed from where ever its been made, warehoused, and stored on retail store floors where they usually have half dead plants showing off their lights/tents/growing systems that are also usually covered in bugs along with whatever other growers track into the grow stores and/or nurseries with them.. so they usually come loaded with some kind of bugs... but the nemetodes seem to help the situation... If I get any kind of break out its usually right after a transplant and within a week they're no longer around once the adults die because the neme's kill the eggs or larvae before they fly... in my case anyhow, everyone has different issues... I dont know exactly what kind of bugs your talking about but most soil born bugs will succumb to the nemetodes as well as whats brought in with good compost and vermicompost...

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jstro420 said:

QUOTE="budman678, post: 7785168, member: 419637"]FFOF usually has gnats....sux. im fucking with gnats right now

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ey78 said:

I dont know about it choking out oxygen but over doing it with molasses will put to much magnesium into the mix... Then combine that with a cal/mag product, lime.... you get the point, you wanna stop any and all cal/mag, molasses etc... by the time your 2 weeks from estimated finish, if possible the last sugar application around day 45... I've never heard the thing about it causing lack of O2... but I imagine way way over doing it may cause some headaches.. as long as you stay within the 1TBS per gallon of water range and put a watering without it between uses, you'll be fine... You can apply compost teas every time but its not practical and from what I've read its not gonna provide them with anything more or whatever... I suggest taking it easy with the teas once you start getting into weeks 2-3-4 in 12/12 and stick with the watering only if you are using suggested pot fill amounts..... What I did by using 50% in the pot and applying teas was cause the food to last much longer and is definitely not what you want... This current round of girls I have going I had just enough SS to maybe put an inch of SS on the bottom of each pot so I used compost teas every 3rd watering and when they started fading a little to hard, every other watering which kept them from fading a little to early, 1 still faded a little to quick and my yield is gonna hurt from it but it will be primo smoke thats for sure, but having to much is even worse honestly I say after my last round where I used to much... Having them go to long is gonna make the smoke taste like shit, and more than likely you'll be into weeks 10 and 11 on an 8 week strain before you finally say screw it and chop them anyway which is literally what I did last time.. Once the end of life nanner factory's went to work I chopped even though they werent "done"...

Hygrozyme.... Its ok... I cant say its something I would spend that kind of $ on anymore... I'd have to see some actual data to prove it does something aside from the "secret sauce" label on it, I know it does something because if you keep applying it past week 6 in 12/12 your plants will never finish so it does assist in breaking down whatever it breaks down... But can it justify $35 a liter... not really, I dont think so.. I have used it in the past, I actually used a bottle not to long ago but I didnt really see anything special going on to warrant continued use of it... My roots seem to look the same when they're dead if I used it or not... I'd say if your serious about using it, and I said this to someone here yesterday, do a side by side with it... see if you can see a difference on 2 plants from clone that otherwise are the same... that'll tell you everything... theres actually a pretty decent home grower article on THCfarmer (I think his name was "bayarea") where a commercial soil grower did some testing with a whole slew of bottled organic nutrients with and without hygrozyme, down to stem weight and circumference etc..... however I have yet to see anything done with supersoil or any just add water type of growing and hygrozyme.... I think most growers are thinking that the point of going to a "just add water" type of grow is to kinda leave the bottled shit alone..

Endo/ecto products like oregonism xl are getting wasted if you are putting it in your teas from the beginning, you can get some use out of it if you put it in your tea right before applying it but myco products arent gonna survive without live roots to attach to... mycorrhizae is the relationship between fungi and roots by definition. I'm not sure if oregonism is soluble, if it is I'd suggest putting it in water and applying it rather than putting it in a tea where its probably gonna become food.... Its like burning $ if you are brewing it in a tea and it only needs to be applied once at transplant and once or twice more throughout the life cycle of a plant...

OG mix... I just meant subs original/most recent mix... Nothing special thats all. I've just got into the supersoil myself my past few go rounds and I have not tried any others, for now I just wanna get a base down and work with a few of the same strains for a bit slowly working in a couple here and there... Since I've started growing, my methods and all that have been in constant change, when your constantly adjusting without a baseline, your never gonna know whats better, worse, or just the same... Thats how I feel anyhow, or how I started to feel as of recently...

As far as the strapped being cheaper... I have no idea but I'm thinking along the lines of it being whipped senseless with some water to thin it out... Its a sugar and derived from black strap molasses, thats the only info on the label... I havent had any of my teas go anaerobic on me yet which is what happens when there isnt enough sugar to keep the good bene's reproducing, once the sugars run out the bad bene's start eating the good ones and the tea will start to smell like sewage... and you'll know if you apply one thats for sure.. But if it doesnt smell sweet or earthy, and starts to get a shitty stink to it, throw it out...

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banker said:

I got rid of all my gnats in my SS while it was cooking by putting a dish with apple cider vinegar and
a little dish washing soap. it was amazing the flies went right to it and died. The larva which are super small came out of the soil and right into the vinegar killed them dead. there were thousands upon thousands of larva. By eye they look like tiny hairs in the vinegar but if you look at them through a digital microscope you can see them clearly. You might try the vinegar and soap on the floor in a dish and spray a small amount right on the soil for the larva. Hope this helps it worked for me.

I'm on my first grow now using OF and def got gnats I figured its cause I'm a noob and been over watering have since been treating soil with DE food grade of course and mosquito bits and gnats are slowly dying off but def dit some damage to my girls

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ta2drvost: 9300824 said:

Here are a few from last weekend.

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alien mushroomhead said:

Thanks bro. I have also heard greensand takes a while to break down. I would still think it must have some benefit along the way. Why else would Roots Organic put it in their soil?

I read neem meal has small bit of NPK, all the micros and some trace elements. Helps roots and foliage. Supposed to help against root rot, powdery mildew, gnats and more. I would be happy if it just helped with the gnats.

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• 2 large bags - roots natural and organic soil large bag (1.5)
• 1.5 cu - EB Earth Worm Castings
• 16 red cups (about 1kg) – organic rice hulls
• 420g fish bone meal (down to earth 3-16-0)
• 420g bat guano (happy frog 0-5-0)
• 420g blood meal (down to earth 12-0-0)
• 100g neem seed meal (down to earth)
• 80g potassium sulfate (0-0-50)

• 200g ancient forest alaska humus (general organics)
• 200g xtreme mycorrhizal granules
• 200g azomite

• 100g sea kelp (algamin 1-0-2)
• 70g dolomite lime (30% cal 3% mg or 75/12)
• 50g alfalfa meal (down to earth 2.5-1-1)

• 20g humic acid powder (down to earth)
• 8g Epsom salt