Back to organics. needing some info

i been around a while....been doing soil and chems for the most part but im really wanting to get back into the life of true organics. I need some help. I have read teaming with microbes....and the soil food web by Dr. laura ingram. That was years ago when i was practicing organics with bad results. i know a LOT about teas and organics but im going back to the basics.
Is the old super soil recipe still relevant ? im sure there has been some great mods to it over the years ?
What organics foods are you guys using with success ?
If i wanted instant N what would be the fastest food to break down ? alfalfa ?
If i want to add P to the soil , whats best ? i used to use bone meal but i think it takes too long to break down in a 2 or 3 month pot.
Finally , last and the worst of my scenarios, i have no compost pile nor a worm bin yet. So im lacking the biggest part of my soil blends and thats the FRESH compost/ewc.
I know its almost not worth it using outsourced compost/ewc but its all i got for now.
Im not worried about spending a lil more then organics are supposed to be. My only goal is to watch a plant feed itself for awhile.
Before this year is up , ill have my compost and worms breeding again, so i'll be there soon enough but for now where do i start ?

Catch me up on the 10 years i missed in this wonderful organic section. WETDOG ! where you at?! (i started organics with wetdog 10-15 years ago on this site and others)

Good luck! Sorry no real answers for ya. Besides slow down. Buy the good castings make a great soil ( I can help with recipes), and water. Shouldn’t need to much instant food for any portion of the grow. Bone meal2-3 months?? These types of amendments can take years and years to break down. Minerals 10plus years! It’s the slow game with organics Recycling soil correctly. Adding top dress is more for the next round instead of current.
Obviously you can feed organic teas or nutrients if needed. But plan ahead , way ahead

keep it simple
I use either Promix Organic or Black Gold amended with worm castings and Dr Earth powdered organics, water or teas.
It doesn't get much easier.

Hash Hound said:

keep it simple
I use either Promix Organic or Black Gold amended with worm castings and Dr Earth powdered organics, water or teas.
It doesn't get much easier.

View attachment 4783906

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this is the type of info i was hoping for. Dr. earth huh ? i'll look into it. im gonna start with a happy frog or OF then amend as i need it. FFOF already has a lot of food in it but its not enough at all. i would like to cut OF with chunky coco , perlite and some EWC.
3 months is about all they would ever sit in one pot ....usually less.
Will i need a sand ?
Will dr earth break down quick enough to use for bloom only ?
I already have Rainbow mix grow and happy frog powder mix for grow.(i gotta grab a "bloom" formula and thats why i need you guys.)
Are those pretty much the same as Dr. earth ?

Thanks for any and all replies!

green_machine_two9er said:

Good luck! Sorry no real answers for ya. Besides slow down. Buy the good castings make a great soil ( I can help with recipes), and water. Shouldn’t need to much instant food for any portion of the grow. Bone meal2-3 months?? These types of amendments can take years and years to break down. Minerals 10plus years! It’s the slow game with organics Recycling soil correctly. Adding top dress is more for the next round instead of current.
Obviously you can feed organic teas or nutrients if needed. But plan ahead , way ahead

Click to expand...

This is the end goal. I'll get there.
I know how long it takes to get good recycled soil for every run so thats another reason im here asking for help. If i buy a few things i should be making then i can start my test runs quicker. The quicker the test results are in , the quicker i can get the ok from the boss to switch it all over.
We waste a fortune on soil because of lack of room and laziness. I want my REAL soil back ....its "free" and works much better then premixes.

I have plenty of used FFOF to use as a base for my new stuff. Or i'll use chunky coco and ewc as a base..... it doesnt matter to me , i was just looking for an easy solution to start off with like the one boasting Dr. earth .....
Thank you sir!

I like this thread, it has been active for almost 15 years and there is some great stuff in it. https://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=53792 If I were you, I'd look up the basic Cootz mix and work off of that-I like his recipe way more than the old Subcool recipe. Here is the basic Cootz mix:

Equal parts of Sphagnum peat moss, some aeration deal (pumice, rice hulls, lava rock - whatever is sitting in the garage) and finally some mix of humus - my compost, worm castings some black leaf mold I bought from the local 'worm guy'To each 1 c.f. of this mix I add the following:
1/2 cup organic Neem meal
1/2 cup organic Kelp meal
1/2 cup Crab meal (or Crustacean meal when available - it has Shrimp meal with the Crab meal. It's a local product from the fisheries on the Oregon & Washington Coasts)
4 cups of some minerals - rock dust

After the plant is in the final container I top-dress with my worm castings at 2" or so and then I hit it with Aloe vera juice and Comfrey extract. Or Borage. Or Stinging Nettle. Or Horsetail ferns. Whatever is ready.

In addition to this, get your compost tea going to douse your mix when you start "cooking" it. And don't forget to use the occasional SST, at least alfalfa to start your veg, and corn to start your flower. Of course you could just use potting soil and organic ferts, but in that case I'd just use liquid organic nutes + compost tea/sst weekly-it's old but you can grow killer buds with Earth Juice nutes-buying in bulk and making your own mix will be cheaper in the long run though!

getogrow said:

This is the end goal. I'll get there.
I know how long it takes to get good recycled soil for every run so thats another reason im here asking for help. If i buy a few things i should be making then i can start my test runs quicker. The quicker the test results are in , the quicker i can get the ok from the boss to switch it all over.
We waste a fortune on soil because of lack of room and laziness. I want my REAL soil back ....its "free" and works much better then premixes.

I have plenty of used FFOF to use as a base for my new stuff. Or i'll use chunky coco and ewc as a base..... it doesnt matter to me , i was just looking for an easy solution to start off with like the one boasting Dr. earth .....
Thank you sir!

Click to expand...

For me it’s a waste of time and energy messing with anything labeled -bloom- or -veg- all the dry companies out there making stage specific nutrients for organics I really believe are lucky the the plant and the connections between soil and plant, are far more intelligent then any human can be.
So you give a bag of dr earth bloom fertilizer. There is nothing wrong with it, those type of grows can produce some great results. I’m only suggesting that there is a tons of wasted $ in cool marketing, bloom this, veg that et. The truth is the plant takes what it wants when it wants it. We just need to promote healthy soil. That’s it.
So we can give all the credit to roots organic, ff, or happy frog but really it’s just the plant feeding itself. Those companies are successful because it’s hard to mess up a plant when nature is in control. Why do almost everyone of them add beneficials in as well? Cause the nutrients only work With the micro herd.

sorry if I’m not making any sense I’m slightly hungover today.... to make a long story short.
Build your own soil. Peat/ perlite/ ewc. 1/3 each as base. Look at my sig thread for a simple recipe. And water. You need to prove to someone organics is the way.
Then do it right from the beginning. After you 100% recycle your soil. Hell even switch to no till beds, the test results will be in after the first cycle. The longer you wait the longer it takes to get test Results in.
You don’t need a huge worm farm. Castings are available nowadays almost everywhere.

You are making plenty of sense , i have a good understanding of organics already and i KNOW the results are better.
Im wanting to steer away from peat in the long run because of its anti-microbial properties but for now its just fine. If you amend it enough , i think it voids them properties. not sure.

How long are you cooking recycled soil before ready for use ? When would you recommend adding the food to the dead soil ? Im thinking mix dead soil with all the goodies and then cook for about a month before using.....whatcha think ?

Im gonna go back to my regular 2 tote worm farm....very easy and i know whats in it. PURE castings , not just peat thats been in a highly living worm farm. (at least thats the junk my grow store sells)

Some people are still down with Super Soil. But lots of dudes use one, milder soil mix ("cornell mix"/coot's mix") for all stages of growth and then top dress or use teas later.

Organic foods like All-In-One mixes? Happy Frog and Dr Earth have already been mentioned. They are both easy to get and have different veg and bloom formulas and are easy to use. These all in one, ready to go mixes are way more common and easy to find than 10 years ago. Roots Organic, Down to Earth, Dr Earth, etc etc. You could even get away with Espoma stuff.
See
Alfalfa is good for fast N. Neem meal is good. Blood meal and Bat guano are fast too, but lots of people have moved away from guano and slaughter house stuff in the last few years. Most good N sources can also be soaked in water for awhile then poured on like tea to act fast.

High P guano is good for fast P. Crab shell works pretty fast. A lot of organic growers are down with Fish Hydrolysate (bottled fish gut fertilizer) for P and other nutrients. Hydrolysate, not emulsion. If you plan to reuse your soil the bone meal and fish bone meal will be used some time.

Bagged worm castings aren't the greatest worm castings, but they are about the best bagged "compost source" you can get. Commercial, bagged worm castings are still way, way, way better than the bag of sticks and sand Home Depot calls "compost."

If you live near the woods you can also go dig around for rotting wood chunks and nice hummus from around tree stumps and stuff. You want spongey soft wood you can break apart with your hands, or crumbly old, black leaves that almost look like finished compost. That stuff is just like your own awesome compost pile, only it's already ready to go. Just look out for bugs crawling around.

Also a lot of these all in one mixes are pretreated with bacteria and fungus, so even your nutrient amendments and top dressings help to kickoff your microbes.

I think Ocean Forest with some more castings and perlite, and maybe even a little coco would be fine. Once the nutrients in the Ocean Forest are used up it's basically just peat and perlite again anyway and you can add whatever you want to make it "your soil."

Building your own from scratch is fun too. Or you could do some combo, starting with Ocean Forest now then adding to your soil supply by making your own then mixing it together some time in the future.

For the future, I think a month is plenty of time for your spent soil + added goodies to break down and cook together.

For right now, these all in one mixes are good to go. Like if you want to start some plants in Ocean Forest today that's fine. Then in 3-4 weeks you can topdress with your Happy Frog Grow stuff and it will start working in a week or less. Then a week or two after the flip you'll be able to top dress with some of whatever bloom mix you decide on. And it will start to work in a few days. Since it's made of multiple ingredients, some are more water soluable and work right away you want have to wait months for it to break down.

youraveragehorticulturist said:

Some people are still down with Super Soil. But lots of dudes use one, milder soil mix ("cornell mix"/coot's mix") for all stages of growth and then top dress or use teas later.

Organic foods like All-In-One mixes? Happy Frog and Dr Earth have already been mentioned. They are both easy to get and have different veg and bloom formulas and are easy to use. These all in one, ready to go mixes are way more common and easy to find than 10 years ago. Roots Organic, Down to Earth, Dr Earth, etc etc. You could even get away with Espoma stuff.
See
Alfalfa is good for fast N. Neem meal is good. Blood meal and Bat guano are fast too, but lots of people have moved away from guano and slaughter house stuff in the last few years. Most good N sources can also be soaked in water for awhile then poured on like tea to act fast.

High P guano is good for fast P. Crab shell works pretty fast. A lot of organic growers are down with Fish Hydrolysate (bottled fish gut fertilizer) for P and other nutrients. Hydrolysate, not emulsion. If you plan to reuse your soil the bone meal and fish bone meal will be used some time.

Bagged worm castings aren't the greatest worm castings, but they are about the best bagged "compost source" you can get. Commercial, bagged worm castings are still way, way, way better than the bag of sticks and sand Home Depot calls "compost."

If you live near the woods you can also go dig around for rotting wood chunks and nice hummus from around tree stumps and stuff. You want spongey soft wood you can break apart with your hands, or crumbly old, black leaves that almost look like finished compost. That stuff is just like your own awesome compost pile, only it's already ready to go. Just look out for bugs crawling around.

Also a lot of these all in one mixes are pretreated with bacteria and fungus, so even your nutrient amendments and top dressings help to kickoff your microbes.

Click to expand...

Great post! this is kinda what i needed.....a kick in the ass....a reboot if you will. i knew half this stuff but dont remember 7/8ths of it.

youraveragehorticulturist said:

For the future, I think a month is plenty of time for your spent soil + added goodies to break down and cook together.

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Great general info sir!
Thank you , thats what i kinda figured. Usually the roots have been eaten within a couple of weeks to a month so it must be live and well.
My "problem" is that i dont veg much , so my main mix can be made for "bloom". I think it will be easier for me to get them the instant N they might need in a "bloom mix" then it would be to give them an instant boost of PK ect. from a "veg mix"

Ok cool , my brain is moving again ..... keep um comin guys!

getogrow said:

this is the type of info i was hoping for. Dr. earth huh ? i'll look into it. im gonna start with a happy frog or OF then amend as i need it. FFOF already has a lot of food in it but its not enough at all. i would like to cut OF with chunky coco , perlite and some EWC.
3 months is about all they would ever sit in one pot ....usually less.
Will i need a sand ?
Will dr earth break down quick enough to use for bloom only ?
I already have Rainbow mix grow and happy frog powder mix for grow.(i gotta grab a "bloom" formula and thats why i need you guys.)
Are those pretty much the same as Dr. earth ?

Thanks for any and all replies!

Click to expand...

11 yrs growing I've never used sand.
My friend uses Ocean Forest with the Dr Earth with good results. And I have used the Fox Farm powdered organics with good results too. The Fox Farm organics are similar to the DrE products
As far as break down, I cook my soil for a few weeks at least to help break it down. I have also done without cooking the soil and don't notice a big difference. I've top dressed some on occasion, but for the most part I amend.
I have also layered the Dr Earth with the Bud and Bloom in the bottom half and Tomato and Veg in the upper half which is how I am growing the current Pineapple Skunk pic I posted.

I seem to be going in the same direction as you are. I'm going away from coco and chemical ferts to organic water only soil. Water only unless I need to add something which will depend on how the plants grow. I've already started switching over and will do my final coco run over the winter.

I've already had good results from soil I mixed using recycled soil that I amended with some organic all purpose fertilizer, kelp meal, alfalfa meal, crustacean meal, and azomite. I also have a cheap worm bin made out of a 30 gallon trash can that just keep adding kitchen scraps to minus any meat products, a layer of shredded newspaper, and then a layer of compost before starting the layers all over again. The worms just keep moving to the top after eating through the lower stuff. Last spring it was full and the top was nothing but a layer of worms that I removed before collecting the worm compost they left behind. I then put some more compost and stuff in the bottom added the worms and started the process all over again. It's ghetto but it works.

I'm also collecting microbes using the KNF gardening methods and plan on making FPJ as well. My goal is to become pretty much self sustaining without the need for commercial products of any kind. I'm also making my own pesticides using ingredients already present in my kitchen. I started reading about KNF and JADAM and realized that I can grow while spending just a negligible amount of money and still grow healthy plants. Some think it's expensive to grow weed. It's only expensive if you make it. I'm fortunate to have a yard with a wooded area in the back to collect microbes and the room to make compost and such. It wouldn't be feasible if I didn't so growing this way won't work for everyone.


Here's a batch of soil I recycled and added some amendments to before putting the wheelbarrow out in the rain to moisten up before bagging and putting in the greenhouse for a few months.






Here's the worm bin. It's teeming with worms that are making their black gold.




Here's a plant I grew in a batch of soil I made. It was given nothing but plain water and it stayed nice and healthy until I harvested the pollen to be used for one of my projects.




I've been growing for so long that I was starting to lose interest in it. It was just getting boring doing the same thing over and over. Learning these different methods has made growing exciting again. It's really not difficult at all which is why I find it strange that so many people spending tons of money on this that and another thing. Switching from one product to the next and just making such a simple task more complicated than it needs to be only to end up with unhealthy plants and crappy harvests. I think one of the biggest reasons many people have such a hard time is that they've fallen for all the marketing and believe that they can find a fix in a bottle. But the only way to fix a lack of knowledge about plants is to study and learn. Forget all the cannabis specific nonsense and learn basic plant science because if you have that knowledge you'll be successful without the need for some ridiculous weekly feeding chart.

Good luck with your growing.

xtsho said:

I seem to be going in the same direction as you are. I'm going away from coco and chemical ferts to organic water only soil. Water only unless I need to add something which will depend on how the plants grow. I've already started switching over and will do my final coco run over the winter.

I've already had good results from soil I mixed using recycled soil that I amended with some organic all purpose fertilizer, kelp meal, alfalfa meal, crustacean meal, and azomite. I also have a cheap worm bin made out of a 30 gallon trash can that just keep adding kitchen scraps to minus any meat products, a layer of shredded newspaper, and then a layer of compost before starting the layers all over again. The worms just keep moving to the top after eating through the lower stuff. Last spring it was full and the top was nothing but a layer of worms that I removed before collecting the worm compost they left behind. I then put some more compost and stuff in the bottom added the worms and started the process all over again. It's ghetto but it works.

I'm also collecting microbes using the KNF gardening methods and plan on making FPJ as well. My goal is to become pretty much self sustaining without the need for commercial products of any kind. I'm also making my own pesticides using ingredients already present in my kitchen. I started reading about KNF and JADAM and realized that I can grow while spending just a negligible amount of money and still grow healthy plants. Some think it's expensive to grow weed. It's only expensive if you make it. I'm fortunate to have a yard with a wooded area in the back to collect microbes and the room to make compost and such. It wouldn't be feasible if I didn't so growing this way won't work for everyone.


Here's a batch of soil I recycled and added some amendments to before putting the wheelbarrow out in the rain to moisten up before bagging and putting in the greenhouse for a few months.

Here's the worm bin. It's teeming with worms that are making their black gold.

Here's a plant I grew in a batch of soil I made. It was given nothing but plain water and it stayed nice and healthy until I harvested the pollen to be used for one of my projects.

I've been growing for so long that I was starting to lose interest in it. It was just getting boring doing the same thing over and over. Learning these different methods has made growing exciting again. It's really not difficult at all which is why I find it strange that so many people spending tons of money on this that and another thing. Switching from one product to the next and just making such a simple task more complicated than it needs to be only to end up with unhealthy plants and crappy harvests. I think one of the biggest reasons many people have such a hard time is that they've fallen for all the marketing and believe that they can find a fix in a bottle. But the only way to fix a lack of knowledge about plants is to study and learn. Forget all the cannabis specific nonsense and learn basic plant science because if you have that knowledge you'll be successful without the need for some ridiculous weekly feeding chart.

Good luck with your growing.

Click to expand...

Beautiful xsto!!
Thats kinda where im at. ive been there and done this but i didnt know enough about plant science to do it right. Now im going into this with MUCH more knowledge and the basics is where i excel. I dont need cannibus specific food, never have , ive always been a lil brighter then that.
That said, i still use cannabis food in fox farm trio. Chem for N, chems for PK and big bloom to feed the soil.
My worm bins are geto too....just two totes with holes drilled in them ......when one is close to done, i'll lay the new one right on top of the other.....the worms go right up into the new one

I have used earthjuice back in the day. thats my "proof" that ph'ing is not needed in soil. The meter reads 4.0 after mixing up EJ food. No need in uping it , just use it.
Im shooting for powders and full organics. gonna be awhile before i get it all together but im doing it.

Rurumo said:

I like this thread, it has been active for almost 15 years and there is some great stuff in it. https://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=53792 If I were you, I'd look up the basic Cootz mix and work off of that-I like his recipe way more than the old Subcool recipe. Here is the basic Cootz mix:

Equal parts of Sphagnum peat moss, some aeration deal (pumice, rice hulls, lava rock - whatever is sitting in the garage) and finally some mix of humus - my compost, worm castings some black leaf mold I bought from the local 'worm guy'To each 1 c.f. of this mix I add the following:
1/2 cup organic Neem meal
1/2 cup organic Kelp meal
1/2 cup Crab meal (or Crustacean meal when available - it has Shrimp meal with the Crab meal. It's a local product from the fisheries on the Oregon & Washington Coasts)
4 cups of some minerals - rock dust

After the plant is in the final container I top-dress with my worm castings at 2" or so and then I hit it with Aloe vera juice and Comfrey extract. Or Borage. Or Stinging Nettle. Or Horsetail ferns. Whatever is ready.

In addition to this, get your compost tea going to douse your mix when you start "cooking" it. And don't forget to use the occasional SST, at least alfalfa to start your veg, and corn to start your flower. Of course you could just use potting soil and organic ferts, but in that case I'd just use liquid organic nutes + compost tea/sst weekly-it's old but you can grow killer buds with Earth Juice nutes-buying in bulk and making your own mix will be cheaper in the long run though!

Click to expand...

This is an easy basic mix, i'll try this one.
I dont have the backyard to get my microherd but i have plenty of wooded areas to get it from. I suppose i have no choice but to break out the tea brewer or build a new one.

First: Is neem cake and neem meal the same ? im pretty sure it is...
Third: Is there a "bad" kind of clover to use as a nitrogen fixer and cover crop ? I have some long leggy stuff in the yard that i want to use....its wild and invasive. That shuold work, correct ?
Thanks all!!

lil bumpy bump.

Your on the right track!!

Starting a worm bin, or 2,3,4, is the best thing you can do.

Now start a leaf mold pile. Takes 3 years before you can use it, but well worth it!!

Find, or start your own comfrey patch!!

Get a rabbit and alpaca. Or ask around if anyone has them. There shit is the shit!!

Organics is a great journey!!!

getogrow said:

First: Is neem cake and neem meal the same ? im pretty sure it is...
Third: Is there a "bad" kind of clover to use as a nitrogen fixer and cover crop ? I have some long leggy stuff in the yard that i want to use....its wild and invasive. That shuold work, correct ?
Thanks all!!

Click to expand...

Been a while since I really did some research into neem, but I remember reading somewhere on this forum that this was the "go to" product for neem/karanja.. http://www.neemresource.com/ Sorry I don't know if there is a difference in cake vs meal, but I would imagine they are both the same or close enough. Just figured I'd throw out that link since I had it saved and remember it being recommended a while back when I first started reading about building up a soil.