100 gallon smart pots indoors

Rasta Roy

Well-Known Member
yeah well that would put me where I am now lol, I do hvac for a great company all this time off work I have been trying to think of a new career that wont mess my knee up again. I've been out of work for four months now D:

but thats enough about that. Keep it up man looking forward to seeing more of your work. I have always wanted to do a rols no-till but for me I'm going dtw coco next run. Please let me know how you are liking your job, it is very interesting to be a full time grower
I hear ya man! I don't know if growing would be much better for you; we had a guy blow out his knee a few months ago when he kinda foolishly jumped off a rack of upper shelving he was cleaning!

No til was fun, honestly if I could go back I would have gone with making a large compost pile to continually add old soil too and take new soil from, and then grew in smaller containers. The big pots are dope but it took way too long to get my roots system full
 

Rasta Roy

Well-Known Member
the weight of the soil and hauling it around is what discourages me from those large smart pots. I love the idea of reusing the soil and amending though, I've always just tossed it in the veggie garden out back as it hides any suspicious materials.
Same! I actually had a little weed plant pop up from a stray seed in some old soil I put in the garden!

20190731_183630.jpg
 

Mayrazuzo

Member
I hear ya man! I don't know if growing would be much better for you; we had a guy blow out his knee a few months ago when he kinda foolishly jumped off a rack of upper shelving he was cleaning!

No til was fun, honestly if I could go back I would have gone with making a large compost pile to continually add old soil too and take new soil from, and then grew in smaller containers. The big pots are dope but it took way too long to get my roots system full
So you wouldnt do 100 gallon pot, in 4x4
I would do 4 (15gallon pots)in there instead
 

DocofRock

Well-Known Member
I caution you that living soil respiration can produce a large amount of CO2 as well as other gases. Do you have monitoring equip for CO2? I have seen levels reach 3500ppm with several hundred gallons of living soil in a sealed room overnight.
This is shocking. Is that true? Makes sense I guess but good god man. Who needs tanks when you can just have a shit ton of CO2 with living soil? Haha
 

Rasta Roy

Well-Known Member
This is shocking. Is that true? Makes sense I guess but good god man. Who needs tanks when you can just have a shit ton of CO2 with living soil? Haha
Without proper air exchange, it can get pretty toxic pretty quick. Remember you never want your levels to get over 1500ppm!
 

deimos phobos

Active Member
Not if I could go back no lol. I would've stuck with ten gals.
Hey there, thanks for making this thread, just read the entire thing from front to back.

I am really glad I caught this end bit here. If you could go back in time, especially in a 5x5 tent in my case, should I ditch the idea of a 150 gallon planted and go down to multiple 10 gallons? The not being able to lift the pots, move them, etc seems like a major inconvenience. But loved the idea of having worms and all of that in a big geopot, so I’m super conflicted.

Also, I notice you stopped using the straw mulch very early on. I already bought a big bale of it, damn. Was it an insect magnet or what? I’m terrified of a bug infestation as well, maybe I’ll call it a loss and just chuck it

I’m definitely leaning towards following your advice here as you’ve literally done what I was about to do.

I’m using KIS soil
 
Sooo currently in my personal room I got 16 plants in 7 gallon smart pots.

About 112 gallons soil. It seems to be working out for the most part.

View attachment 3823818

This is all under three 1000w hid lights.

Now today, I fortuned into four 1000 gallon smart pots.

Whoops I meant 100. Could you imagine 1000?! Jesus titty fucking Christ our Lord and baby savior.

So that's 400 gallons of soil.

I wanna add a light, but do the same number of plants.

So I'd basically be doing four plants per light. all in this giant plot of soil. It's almost like an indoor raised bed.

I know some dudes that have grown giant trees in 100 gallon pots outside. But anybody else ever use one of these giant smart pots indoors like a bed to do multiple plants before?
I did 25gal smart pots in Coco w sprayers for 2nd feed, hand watered at lights on for first feed. One light per tree 1kw d.e. 4lbs/plant. Trees were pushing 13 feet. Colas like baseball bats. Think I'm bluffing? Never touched stickier buds or seen anything like it in my life. 15ft ceilings, lollipopped bottom half. Could have taken off a lot more, alot sooner, and got even more. They probably vegged em way too long. Because there wasn't a room avail yet.
 

sandman83

Well-Known Member
well I've got a single plant in a 10 gallon smart pot, and yeah that's as big as I ever want to move again. Need to hit the hardware store for a larger drain pan as it doesn't fit anywhere in my current setup!
 

Couch_Lock

Well-Known Member
Sooo currently in my personal room I got 16 plants in 7 gallon smart pots.

About 112 gallons soil. It seems to be working out for the most part.

View attachment 3823818

This is all under three 1000w hid lights.

Now today, I fortuned into four 1000 gallon smart pots.

Whoops I meant 100. Could you imagine 1000?! Jesus titty fucking Christ our Lord and baby savior.

So that's 400 gallons of soil.

I wanna add a light, but do the same number of plants.

So I'd basically be doing four plants per light. all in this giant plot of soil. It's almost like an indoor raised bed.

I know some dudes that have grown giant trees in 100 gallon pots outside. But anybody else ever use one of these giant smart pots indoors like a bed to do multiple plants before?

I'll definitely be documenting the grow I do in them.
Nice head stash there.

Cheers!:bigjoint:
 

Rasta Roy

Well-Known Member
Hey there, thanks for making this thread, just read the entire thing from front to back.

I am really glad I caught this end bit here. If you could go back in time, especially in a 5x5 tent in my case, should I ditch the idea of a 150 gallon planted and go down to multiple 10 gallons? The not being able to lift the pots, move them, etc seems like a major inconvenience. But loved the idea of having worms and all of that in a big geopot, so I’m super conflicted.

Also, I notice you stopped using the straw mulch very early on. I already bought a big bale of it, damn. Was it an insect magnet or what? I’m terrified of a bug infestation as well, maybe I’ll call it a loss and just chuck it

I’m definitely leaning towards following your advice here as you’ve literally done what I was about to do.

I’m using KIS soil
The worms were super dope, there is just a lot I've learned since, and as much as I wanted to replicate a real soil bed, at the end of the day it was still potting soil in a basement. I should have saved that shit for a greenhouse in my future lol.

The straw mulch presented no problems, honestly the worms thrived best when it was there...but with such deep beds a mulch layer wasn't really necessary and it made more of a mess for me to clean up without much additional benefit in trade off. Also quality straw that you know wasnt sprayed with pesticides can be hard to come by year round. Mulching indoors is kinda pointless though, mulch should help keep your roots cool in the hot sun...but if your indoors and your roots are getting hot like that...than you've got a lot bigger problems to worry about than mulch will ever solve...and a fan on your floor pushing air around will keep your root zones cooler than mulch will.
 

Rasta Roy

Well-Known Member
Hey there, thanks for making this thread, just read the entire thing from front to back.

I am really glad I caught this end bit here. If you could go back in time, especially in a 5x5 tent in my case, should I ditch the idea of a 150 gallon planted and go down to multiple 10 gallons? The not being able to lift the pots, move them, etc seems like a major inconvenience. But loved the idea of having worms and all of that in a big geopot, so I’m super conflicted.

Also, I notice you stopped using the straw mulch very early on. I already bought a big bale of it, damn. Was it an insect magnet or what? I’m terrified of a bug infestation as well, maybe I’ll call it a loss and just chuck it

I’m definitely leaning towards following your advice here as you’ve literally done what I was about to do.

I’m using KIS soil
But yeah I'd skip the geopot personally.
 

hybridway2

Amare Shill
So you wouldnt do 100 gallon pot, in 4x4
I would do 4 (15gallon pots)in there instead
I dont understand any of this. My plants should maybe be in 10's but are in 7's. Each one takes up a 3x4 or more easily, only cuz I'm crunching them in.
How or should i say why would you go more then a 10-15 gall. Pott in a 4x4? Especially slow drying soil. Wouldn't that be asking for more problems then one would care to mention ? In 7 gall. On a x2 month veg there is no gaps in my trellis.
100gall. Of soil indoor. Hope you had 3000w hps on that plant & some LEDs. Lol! With 16' ceilings.
Help me understand pls.?
 

Rasta Roy

Well-Known Member
I dont understand any of this. My plants should maybe be in 10's but are in 7's. Each one takes up a 3x4 or more easily, only cuz I'm crunching them in.
How or should i say why would you go more then a 10-15 gall. Pott in a 4x4? Especially slow drying soil. Wouldn't that be asking for more problems then one would care to mention ? In 7 gall. On a x2 month veg there is no gaps in my trellis.
100gall. Of soil indoor. Hope you had 3000w hps on that plant & some LEDs. Lol! With 16' ceilings.
Help me understand pls.?
If you read through the thread the point of the 100 gal beds was to build some of the soil life that you can't typically have in an indoor environment. You need to have over a foot of depth to get some bacteria to develop, that's all I was really chasing...and like I said...i would probably not do it again. I work for a commercial grow company now and yeah we use 7 to 10 gallon pots in our grows.
 

4ftRoots

Well-Known Member
If you read through the thread the point of the 100 gal beds was to build some of the soil life that you can't typically have in an indoor environment. You need to have over a foot of depth to get some bacteria to develop, that's all I was really chasing...and like I said...i would probably not do it again. I work for a commercial grow company now and yeah we use 7 to 10 gallon pots in our grows.
I personally think large soil beds are underrated. KIS organics had a podcast a while back and if I remember correctly, he had a commercial grower in Canada that did SOG in large soil beds.

Also, I may be missing something, but what is this about filling out the roots before flower? If you have ever grown with Mycorrhizae and dug out the roots you would see a very dense root system that does not travel very far. What you really should be focusing on is nutrient availability, the roots will grow as the plant grows, if needed. We don't grow in 10 gallon pots outdoors and I experience the plants get bigger and badder than anything we could grow indoors.
 

kkookoo

Well-Known Member
I have three 100 gallon soil pots indoors and the maintenance is so low. I can add soil bugs and they live in there for multiple runs. Also watering is so easy with soil moisture sensors you can easily dial them in with blumats

the only gripe is that you can’t easily move plants in and out, but, I pulled 1.5 pounds off a slurricane plant in a 4x4 and I’m an amateur. The plants get so huge in the 100 gallon pots effortlessly

I’m torn because it’s not as easy to cram plants in I end up with space that I feel could be better filled in if I had movable pots

Last run I ran one of the 100 gallon pots, 3 7 gallon pots, 2 10 gallon pots and a3 gallon hydro pot.Because I use blumats the 100 gallon was by far the easiest to manage, I just found it was a lot of fucking around with the smaller pots, but, if you can get your watering cycle figured out the smaller pots im 100% sure are good because lots of grows run 1000 7 gallon pots per room and have good results. I just wanted close to zero maintrnence setup and definately that’s what the 100 gallon pots do
 
Top