Storing soil in Rubbermaid-type containers killed my plants!!!

[Tactical Farmer]

I was joking around before about plastic grow tubs but BPA & other toxic plastics are not a joking matter.

Its not topic related but found something new last night listening to a doctor who brought up to AVOID things like non-stick cooking pans, microwave popcorn bags, pretty much anything that was a lining to keep hot grease from seeping through the paper.

Fast food burger wrappers are one such item.

Peace & Health

 

[Critter]

Shit I just got a 3 pack of black 18 gal bins from lowes was gonna do a DWC There is no recycle # on em just p/n 355-L 5. Anybody know if im screwed?

 

[Tactical Farmer]

This type ? http://www.lowes.com/pd_286359-5143...18+gal+&pl=1&currentURL=/pl__0__s?Ntt=18+gal+

 

[Critter]

No these

 

[couchlockd]

yeah i feel rubermaid/sterlite bins, foil aluminum tape, medicine syringes, and flexible ductting are an absolute MUST have for growing. more so they are growing essentials.

i hope the fella in post #38 is joking about the NGW hose he is using. or hope it is like NGW hose from a half a dozen years back at least.

but yeah it has to be something else, what was he doing, maybe his wife or signifigant other tainted his soil cuzz he spends too much time with the plants and not enough time with her.

thats just a heavy heavy speculation, but i have seen the jealous wife taint the growers ferts, nutes, and other stuff like clone gell, and stored water form the RO machine. matter of fact in speaking of a buddy of mine. his wife did this to him. and he kept using the smae sutff till it ran out and then he basically quite growing cuzz of all of his 2 years of failures. when he quite his wife told him and he beat her up and got arrested for DV.

hell of a situation. sorry for the hijack.

 

[stihgnobevoli]

im gonna go ahead and call shenanigans on this one. ive used soil stored in plastic containers rubbermaid/sterilite tubs for years and not a single issue. doesnt even make sense to be quite honest. how would storing your soil in a rubber box lead to dead plants? unless there was some toxic elements in the plastic that broke down into the soil. did the plastic disintegrate into your soil?

 

[Muleskinner]

Hey, sorry I bailed on this thread after starting it. THANK YOU for all the posts about using these containers successfully, it's excellent info. That is exactly why I posted, this seemed too hard to believe and I wanted to hear what others are doing.

As for me, I will never use them again. I can't explain why it works for everyone else & not me.

I am an experienced 100% organic grower with many successful crops under my belt. I just went through a 4-month period of scientifically measuring & charting everything I did. Every factor from water to all soil ingredients were noted. Right now I am looking at 3 females that are exploding out of their pots with vigorous growth.

The only thing I changed from the previous 4 months of seedling trials was using the Rubbermaid/Sterilite containers to mix & store the soil. I'm not sure what else to explain, here is the exact soil mix I'm using:

6 parts Coast of Maine Bar Harbor soil
2 parts Fafard Potting Soil
2 parts Foxfarm Light Warrior
1-2 parts Perlite
.75 TBLSP Dolomite lime per gallon
1/3rd the recommended dose of Espoma Plant-tone

The above ingredients varied slightly but not significantly. To ID the problem I had tried seedling runs with and without lime, with higher and lower parts of the COM and Light Warrior soils, with and without espoma, with higher and lower percentages of perlite.

I couldn't figure out what was happening, in the past every single mix I tried would have worked, they were all fine, but this year they all grew weak and stunted. It became obvious that the changes I was making were having no effect on whatever the problem was.

As soon as I started over with the same mix stored in a big 5-gallon Plasterra gardening pot instead of Rubbermaid/Sterilite the plants exploded in growth.

Who knows, maybe the container I was using was from a defective run? Or maybe I left the soil components in the container for too long?

Bottom line: if the containers are working for you, don't worry about it. But if you're fighting problems or mysterious die-offs the first thing I would do is mix and store your soil either in a cardboard boxes or containers designed specifically for gardening.

 

[mad librettist]

to solve this problem, spread the soil out on a tarp and dry it out with a fan

 

[Purple Monster]

The problem is obviously with your soil, not the tubs. It sounds more like you had some bacterial issues.

Everyone and their grandma has been using tubs for years with no problems at all.