On a mish to find a good prepackaged soil

[Carbcon]

Get the magic worm castings.

 

Mixing them with anything will improve it.

 

I'm not using them long but can already see a difference with nute hungry giant Russian sunflowers.

 

Top dressed a pot with castings the other day, sunflower a few weeks old in old Searles that grew a giant Russian last year. Stuck a seed in without touching it and predictably it grew but grew shit.

Top dressed 50mm of castings and peat and watered it in and it's flying now.

 

Transplanted 3 Russians last night into a casting, peat mix and they showed no signs of slowing down. Straight into 30+ and no worries.

 

What works with some flowers and veges doesn't always translate to good canna growth.

 

I'm no expert, and there are people that know waaaay more than me about this on this site.

 

I do know this though, after a full year of trying everything I could get my hands on, if I could go back in time, 2 things I'd buy.

 

Good worm castings.

Good spaghnum peat moss.

 

I've gone further and made maybe over complicated mixes recently that may or may not be too hot but they will sort themselves out.

 

It's good your checking out whats available in your area Gaz. I really like this kind of experiment.

[Chrystal]

Yeah i want to go soil for the reason its simple i may still go back to coco but i am a bit over mixing the nutes every second day and i always end up with cheap gear to measure i have once forked out for good meter and it sprung a leak, for me cheaper is better because i don't have a lot of dough and the simpler it is the better just because i am a lazy gardener so in saying that i hope i can just grab water from the tap and water it strait into the watering device or pots if it doesnt work out however i would really like to make the soil work over coco i would still like a nice yield when i do the canna's, chasing the taste is long forgotten actually back in the 1990's i use to get that smashed i can't remember how pot use to taste! since than everything has been hydro but i wanna roll back a couple of decades from the beginning, i have seen some spectacular grows on other forums in soil but trying to source there products or similar is quiet hard when u know nothing about soil

 

if there were a basic 4 or 5 ingredient soil mix that i could follow that is known to produce quality and yield i would dive strait in but from what research i have done people are adding 10+ ingredients in their mixes and i just cannot comprehend it all or see it worthy of spending all that money when i will only use 30L or so

[Carbcon]

I understand what your saying.

 

Hard to translate a usa mix here when some ingredients have to be subbed.

 

Itchybromusic, Greenqueen and sooty are only 3 that come to mind here that mix their own. Their results are documented and they are in Oz. There are plenty others and apologies to those, I'm just going on info that comes to mind right now.

 

After the base mix of 3 ingredients, (castings, peat,drainage) clakamus coot really emphasises kelp\alfalfa\neem. That's a total of 6 and others could be top dressed, used as a tea etc down the road if needed.

 

As I said, I'm a total newb. I have done a lot of reading on no till.

 

Any medium can be a bit of a hurdle to begin with.

 

How about Coco amended with some organic stuff? Apparently keeps a lot of the Coco speed. Maybe worth a look.

[itchybromusic]

ever counted the amount of individual components in a bagged soil product , keeping in mind most of those components are waste from another industry 

not all but most would have somewhere close to 10+ ingredients 

 

no probs to use waste product but when you step across industries , what's in the waste product , how do the checks & balances of that industry compare 

to using this stuff in your world , keeping in mind " In Our World " the last thing you would put in your compost bin are a bunch of flowers from a florist / commercial flower producer 

they have nowhere near the regs of food growing farmers & can pretty much spray all sort of Nasty anytime they like 

 

sorry mate but there is no prize without effort , & if there is , it's meaningless imho

 

change your thinking , & look at what the base is on these 10 part soil mixes 

in my case it's peat , air & castings , add dolomite & gypsum part of the mix  

& that'll work , all nutes fed via mulch layer , & nothing but plain water or very simple 

seed sprout teas will cover nutes & increase soil life along the way 

[Chrystal]

ever counted the amount of individual components in a bagged soil product , keeping in mind most of those components are waste from another industry 

not all but most would have somewhere close to 10+ ingredients 

 

no probs to use waste product but when you step across industries , what's in the waste product , how do the checks & balances of that industry compare 

to using this stuff in your world , keeping in mind " In Our World " the last thing you would put in your compost bin are a bunch of flowers from a florist / commercial flower producer 

they have nowhere near the regs of food growing farmers & can pretty much spray all sort of Nasty anytime they like 

 

sorry mate but there is no prize without effort , & if there is , it's meaningless imho

 

change your thinking , & look at what the base is on these 10 part soil mixes 

in my case it's peat , air & castings , add dolomite & gypsum part of the mix  

& that'll work , all nutes fed via mulch layer , & nothing but plain water or very simple 

seed sprout teas will cover nutes & increase soil life along the way 

 

 

So if i had coco,perlite, worm castings, add dolomite and gypsum, what kind of ratios should i be adding? maybe i need to look this up and get some sort of an idea

 

do u need to adjust in going water to a specific ph?

[micmac]

The water no , should be able to find the ratios somewhere mate

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using OZ Stoners

[micmac]

That's what the dolomite n lime r for,

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using OZ Stoners

[Chrystal]

Ah ok i am getting it now the only thing is i need it now and the soil must cook for 1-2 months, Found the ratios online of gypsom and the other one it said 5-6 grams per litre of soil, i will google to see if there is a way of speeding up the cooking process

[micmac]

Gazza there probably is , be patient u chose this way for reason

I'm getting soil ready for next season now , maybe even a sneaky attempt at a winter crop

The longer it cooks the better

Introduce worms I think that will help , but if it's good and they can get access they'll find there way in

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using OZ Stoners

[pedro de pacas]

I start preparing me outside plot for the next season, as soon as the last plant comes out, let it stew for 6 months