Is this mix legit?

I made a small batch to fill about 7-8 gallons worth of smart pots. Fills 2 3-gallons and 2 1-gallons with enough room for the root ball I'm transplanting.

5 gallons FFoF/Happy Frog 50/50mix
16 cups EWC
2 cups Basalt dust
1 cup kelp meal
2/3 cup fish bone meal
8 quarts perlite

I soaked it down and mixed it up best I could. A bone dry 1 gallon weighs about 58oz. Fully saturated it weighs 91oz. I'm wondering if I might need more aeration in my mix. Anything else I'll need/want to change?

*I* would strongly suggest another 4qts of perlite, bringing the total to 12qts (3 gallons). This will at least get you in the ballpark of 40% aeration. I usually use the 40% as a starting point and mostly end up with closer to 50% aeration.

You're good for a starting point, but you WILL need something more for when the FFOF's nutrients get depleted. Kelp meal and EWC are great, but aren't enough to carry a grow by themselves.

Espoma tone's will work fine. I mostly use individual amendments, but that can get expensive when first getting them. Even while having them, tomato tone and Garden tone still get used quite regulary in my gardens.

Something to think about.

Wet

Wetdog said:

*I* would strongly suggest another 4qts of perlite, bringing the total to 12qts (3 gallons). This will at least get you in the ballpark of 40% aeration. I usually use the 40% as a starting point and mostly end up with closer to 50% aeration.

You're good for a starting point, but you WILL need something more for when the FFOF's nutrients get depleted. Kelp meal and EWC are great, but aren't enough to carry a grow by themselves.

Espoma tone's will work fine. I mostly use individual amendments, but that can get expensive when first getting them. Even while having them, tomato tone and Garden tone still get used quite regulary in my gardens.

Something to think about.

Wet

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I'll look into those for sure. Are they fairly fast acting? Also would using coco coir instead of perlite work in much the same way? I happened to aquire some roots organic cocopalms or whatever it says.

I'm curious, why was 3/4cup FishBoneMeal the quantity of choice instead of 1cup for example. What was the reasoning behind it? Curious that's all. Is it because the FF soils have this ingredient or lots of other phosphorus sources in it like guanos? I am a sponge.

Didn't want to overdo it. On the back it was saying to use a pound every 100sqft. Pound is 4 cups of the stuff. I probably would have been fine using more though. I figured I could always top dress to some extent if it needed it. Also yeah I heard FFoF was on the hot side.

Lighter404 said:

I'll look into those for sure. Are they fairly fast acting? Also would using coco coir instead of perlite work in much the same way? I happened to aquire some roots organic cocopalms or whatever it says.

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No, coir is not a replacement for perlite. Some use it as part of a base mix, but not as a aeration component.

Like any organic, it's usually a couple of weeks before you begin to see any effects. Sometimes longer.

Lighter404 said:

Didn't want to overdo it. On the back it was saying to use a pound every 100sqft. Pound is 4 cups of the stuff. I probably would have been fine using more though. I figured I could always top dress to some extent if it needed it. Also yeah I heard FFoF was on the hot side.

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Gotya, I mix my own soils and like to hear the how's and why's of other growers' soil mixes. Always learning. Thanks. The only suggestion I can make here, if you didn't already do this, is the first initial watering/wetting of the newly mixed up soil is best done with a EWC/KelpMeal(or similar) tea brew to get the soil microbe action buzzing and active right from the start helping to digest the ingredints down further for more available less chance of burning nutrient uptake. Your soil mix is almost exactly what I do, but base of peat/promix/sunshine instead of FF soils and glacial rock dust instead of the basalt rock, and I use more fishbone meal and rely on teas more for the NPK value whereas you have more rich soil already using the FF. I also use Alfalfa Meal in my soil mix, not too much. With the FF soil ingredients in there, you're probablly right that you should use a bit less of the bonemeal as you have, don't wanna overdo it. Ok, cu Good Growing.

Lighter404 said:

Didn't want to overdo it. On the back it was saying to use a pound every 100sqft. Pound is 4 cups of the stuff. I probably would have been fine using more though. I figured I could always top dress to some extent if it needed it. Also yeah I heard FFoF was on the hot side.

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A very good mindset to have.

I've only been doing organics for 8 years or so, but have been growing for decades.

As I've gone along (and not alone here), the amounts of initial amendments has gone down and top dressings have gone up. Like, using 1/2 to one cup instead of the two or even 3 cups used in years past and using light top dressings throughout the grow.

The trick is, knowing what the plant will need/want two weeks ahead of time. LOL

Thank you so much for the replies guys I'm very new to this stuff and I appreciate all the help I can get. I picked up more perlite. Didn't see the Espoma garden/tomato tones, though they did have espoma blood meal, rock phosphate, gypsum, lime etc. I held off for now until I can get a better grasp of things. So yesterday when I mixed and watered the mix I listed I put them in the grow tent to cook as it was the hottest area I could think of. I'll start brewing a tea to give the soil microbes a boost and I'll add in more perlite today. As it stands it will be quite a while before I'll be using the mix.

I can see how it would be tricky to be able to anticipate nutrient problems ahead of time, is there an advantage in doing this vs making a super soil and feeding water only?

Rock phosphate takes too long to break down and become available for indoor soil growing in pots. It's good if you were bringing outdoor soil back to life over many years or reusing your indoor soil for many years.
Blood Meal is a rich Nitrogen source but it comes from animal slaughter houses waste product. A lot of people use it, I don't.
Dolomitic/Dolomite Lime contains good levels of Mg and Ca, and when acid touches it it reacts and nuetralizes the acid bringing pH up closer to nuetral, and is used as a pH stabilization so you don't have to pH in soil. Peat moss is very acidic for example, and without some sort of pH stabilization in the soil, you'd always have to pH watering and pH within the medium would always be driven down into acidic peat moss' natural range where nutrient uptake would be hindered or blocked. Your soil already contains some dolomite lime, and also contains Oyster shells which does basically the same job stabilizing pH and due to it being a shell, it's rich in Ca as well.
Gypsum, I don't use and never really read in detail about it, but it has it's uses I know.

Hope this helps a bit. Good Growing.

Lighter404 said:

I can see how it would be tricky to be able to anticipate nutrient problems ahead of time, is there an advantage in doing this vs making a super soil and feeding water only?

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There are advantagesthat become apparent with experience. First off, no matter how super (heavy amendments), you will still run short of something before the end of the grow cycle. It seems that plants, like us, prefer several light feedings over the grow cycle, rather than a huge one at the beginning. The amounts of each method end up being close to equal at the end.

Slow stuff, like bone meal, has the full amount added at the beginning. IDK about fish bone meal breakdown, no experience. Funny fact: Bone meal is far from being a waste product and not that much is used for agriculture. The overwhelming majority of bone meal is used to make gelatin. Yep, Jell-o is made from bone meal.

It was kind of a joke, the guessing 2 weeks ahead thing. A light top dress once/month or so keeps nutrients constantly available. No worries.