Indoor organic grow

[RobbieGanjaSeed]

i've just a had a real hard bite on the arse and am not going to be able to get the dough together to make the system I wanted for this grow. I'm as broke as I've ever been in my life.

 

i do have some great gear to make some organic mix though. I used to be kinda "hippy" when I was younger and livelier and only ever used organic mixes for many years, so it's nothing too daunting. it'll allcome back to me alright.

 

I have some great worm castings I've had slowly maturing now for 4 years and I'd place their humus rating at near (if not compeltely) 100%. I'll just get some vermiculte, and mix some good quality bag soil in from the shop, this humus and some worm castings if I need more..The worm farm needs re-doing about now anyways.

 

But what I wanted to ask is if anyone has any revelations about charcoal?

I haven't ever actually used in straight up in a pot, always thrown it in compost heaps and it's always come out fantastic, but just wondering about it "raw".

it's jst that I cleaned the bar-b0q out the other day and have a fair bit handy right now. I can toss it in the compost or maybe put some in these pots.

 

the syetm will have to wait for the next grow unfortunately.

 

Anyone got any enlightenment on this charcoal?

 

cheers

rob

[DownUnderDoper]

In poor quality, sandy soils, adding charcoal will increase the carbon available to microbial life in the sub-soil, which in turn will allow any organic matter to be processed more quickly and therefore taken into root systems more readily.

 

The intentional use of charcoal as a soil improver seems to date back to Amazonian villages a thousand years ago.. do a search on "Terra Preta" if you're interested.

 

I have heard of using charcoal 'lumps' directly in a vermicasting/soil mix as an aerating medium instead of using perlite, being pourous charcoal will also hold onto some moisture.

 

As you've found, adding charcoal to a compost heap will get the microbial action going and improve composting times, especially if you crush/grind some of it first and mix it through, the ground part will spread ready to use carbon and the 'lumps' will help with aeration & moisture retention.. IMO this is probably the best use for it.

 

I would advise caution if you were thinking of adding any directly to your worm farm as it could cause things to heat up too much from the extra microbial action, which could kill your worms.

 

You should also note that ash as opposed to charcoal has a fairly high Ph (around 8-9) and can be used as a liminig agent to raise the Ph of overly acid soils. If you don't want the liming quality, just rinse the ash out of the charcoal before using.

 

DUD

[mull]

Good show DUD man am I glad I posted after you this time...

my cats breath smells like catfood

 

Hey Robbie, I only use redgum and ironbark potash. No rubbish or plastics. Hava little 'smoking ceremony' and make it.. Kday.. in the times of no fire restrictions of course.

I sprinkle it around the drip lines of outdoor plants and fruit trees. Maybe a good liquid fert in flower for your indoor. Praps sprinkled on top of your medium and watered in as a bloom booster. Good luck with it

[67Special]

Faark!

I've always used a bit of ash (from the fireplace) in the compost, but I totally overlooked the value of charcoal

 

Thanks for that DUD ...and you too robbie, for asking the question

 

Sorry to hear about your financial dramas mate, but I'm keen to learn more about organic indoor growing.

I've only grown inside once, in soil, but I hope to experiment with organic hydro of some sort.

 

Would the charcoal break down too much to be used as the sole medium in a hydro setup?

 

 

Hey Mulla, I'm havin a bit of a smokin ceremony right now but I don't seem to be generating worthwhile amounts of ash

 

 

[RobbieGanjaSeed]

67 special, thanks for careing, but things aren't so bad. I mean I don't have 2 cents to rub tiogether at present, but I'm not in Dufour or Bangladesh.. I should be more grateful, and not speak of such things. Just basing why I need to go on the cheap with this grow really..

 

And thanks for the good word on the charcoal downunder. I wasn't thinking of putting it in the worm farm though, just the compost. Well, it's more of a rot pile to be honest than compost heap as such, which could rather much do with some charcoal (BTW it happens to all be ironbark. It's out of the bar-B-Q) in it. It's never been much successful for me to get a real compost heap going in a rented suburban house.

 

I have the compost going always, but it's more just to deal with my own waste responsibly than to make good soil these days. The worm farm, and the humus I made for good soil though.

 

I make this gear that's simply a stolen idea from the old buried cow horn concept. I used to grow everything by bio-dynamics when I wasn't a bloody cripple and lived in the bush, but I never got into the majic cow horn crap.

Instead of burying crap in a cow horn for a year with majic spells, I take well worked over wrom castings (which usually were cow crap to begin with), and then place them in a dark, cool, airy box. I use a styraphoam box with a tight fitting lid.

A few worms hatch out and mull around progressively (regressively?) getting smaller over the years, as the food quality diminishes for them, but the bacterial action takes over, and micro-animals.

After about a year it begins to take on the most wonderful condition, and just a spoon full in 20 litres of water sparks any plant up like majic.

It's not at all hard to see how the old timers saw spiritual majic in this, I mean it's unmaginable what it does for plants if you havent had the pleasure of growing bio-dynamically, and specifically with the cow horn concept..

 

I imagine everyone knows, but as I said, they use to say some majic spells, cram some crap in cow horns, bury it and dig it up again 1 2months later. It was used as a tonic in gardens.

When I first saw it on a Tv special many years ago I almost died laughing, cause the clown explaining all this went into how cosmic prayers did this that or the other. They made some wild connection of the crap comming out of one end, and being loaded back intot he other (the horn) and given to "mother earther to reconcile etc etc.. But as I discovered, worm castings (made of cow crap or what not instead...and not a cow horn, but a styraphoam box..did the same job.

 

After yers of just stuffing around with millions of worms, and initially discovering this working by accidently fogetting some castings I had placed in a broccoli box under the house, found it has solid foundation. it just doesn't need to be so emotional.

 

I have about ten litres of that still left (all my gardening in every aspect has dwindlled away since getting sick and heavy meds). I had 20 litres, but the only bloody rain we've had in a year or something ended up getting in and drenching the gear in one of the ten litre boxes, which in time would have worked out ok, repairing itself, but I ended up diluting it and putting on some plants around the garden.

 

If anyone's into organics, give this a whirl one day if you haven't already. Well, one year really. The one I have left, (that I'll use for this crop) is 4 years old.

 

cheers

rob

 

I'll post a couple pics of the gear. The one little box of stuff is probably initially 40 or more bags of cow crap (and a few bags of elephant shit. It wasn't anywhere near as good as I had hoped, but they were feeding the poor bugger on dead straw), could well be more. Just condensed first by worms, then micro aminals..

It's very heavy gear, as humus is. Using too much would be way to heavy. That's why I reckon I'll use vermiculite at about 50%, shop bought (good quality) bag soil to the other 50%, with this gear mix through; just being careful to not let it get too heavy anywhere. This is where I was going to add a few chunks of charcoal, but I'm convinced now to not bother.

Ought to work ok, and be ready with bottled nutes if need be.

 

I reckon I'll toss the charcoal in the rot pile as sugested. It'll help speed things up a bit there, and maybe take some of the powerful feng shui out of it. It's getting pretty "spiritual" around it with this heat.

 

cheers

[RobbieGanjaSeed]

Here's what happens if it gets wet. totally destroys the littel structure it has. So if you're going to make this stuff (and I really reckon the organic ones among us should try it), be sure to keep it dry.

 

The lid on this box had a crack in it and the rain just soaked in. Notice how moist the good gear is inthe above post, that stuff hasn't had water actually applie to it in any way, shape ot form since it was a worm farm food 4 years ago. Slightly longer infact. So it doesn't need wetting.

 

just load the castings into the box and "file away" in a dark, dry, cool spot.

 

cheers

rob.

 

PS the plants that I poured this onto went mad still of course. It wasn't "ruined" as such, it just couldn't be incorporated into a soil mix easily.

Also, this is as deep a container you'd want to try this in, this may be getting too deep too. It had to be aerobic, too deep and it'll just be a mud pile. So be acareful to not try and be "economical" and put it all in one "basket" so to speak.

 

Maybe the idea of the cow horns was to keep it in small enough amounts to continue to allow air to be involved through it. The majicians reckoned (they'd bury many cow horns of this all in the one hole. As many as they could, at the begining of winter), and use just tea spoon type quantities on each plant. you can see why.

 

cheers