Cann's Organic No-Till Garden

[ziggestardust]

So I filled my room with soil, I decided to try out some worms in the bed; I put a piece of PVC pipe about two inches down the soil - filled with 50 worms mixed with the EWC they came in and some from my bin - on top of that I added some old decomposing fan leaves for them to eat. Apparently they are supposed to live in the bed and go to the tube to eat, leaving castings as they travel in the bed.

Anyone else tried this?

http://shecooksshegardens.com/2012/11/wicking-bed-update-and-an-in-bed-worm-tower/

Apart from that my setup utilizes a wicking bed, there is a layer of hydroton under the soil with some fabric that makes sure the soil don't fall down the wicking material. A float valve controls an aquarium pump that pressurizes a canister of water, a tube connected to the bottom of the canister supplies the wicking material with water when it is pressurized. I hope this will let me leave for up to a week without having to worry about watering.

I also sprinkled some white clover seeds on the bed as a living mulch.

I think this setup will rock, it is still pretty new so we'll see...

 

[ziggestardust]

Actually these are really cool resources
http://shaunsbackyard.com/535/worm-towers/
http://www.treehugger.com/lawn-garden/diy-worm-tower-creates-self-spreading-compost-video.html

I'm thinking of moving the feeding station for the worms around the bed, they will smell(?) the food and move about in the bed spreading their castings.

 

[Cann]

nice pics folks!

ziggie - i'd never heard of the worm tower before, but it sounds like a cool idea. not sure how well it would actually work in practice though....also, I would be careful with any sort of plastic in the soil...PVC has been known to leach chemicals.

 

[Cann]

K time for an update. Been crazy busy lately..between my outdoor and indoor gardens there is a lot of work to be done!

Been battling a bit of powdery mildew in the flower tent...since I am pretty late into flower I didn't want to spray neem, so instead I have been making horsetail tea following the recipe outlined inthis thread. The tea has been working surprisingly well, and the visible patches of mildew are almost gone from my tent...breathing a sigh of relief.

I finally figured out how to take some nice bud shots with my new camera, so here goes:

first, a poorly photostiched panorama shot

Sourband (sour d x headband) happily sharing a 30gal smartpot

Gods gift x OG kush

 

[Cann]

Plushberry #3 (last run of this along with most of my TGA gear)

Two more plushberries sharing a 45 gallon smartpot...these ones are really stacking flowers like crazy. you can see a bit of leaf damage from a heavy neem topdress.

Qrazy Train

 

[xmobotx]

wow great grow and great shots ~looks like you have 1 ready for chop there too eh?

 

[Cann]

yeah thats a little reject plant in the corner...i forget what strain it even is..gonna chop in a few days to make room for some new ladies.

swami plants starting to show sex...

EDIT: or you're taking about the Qrazy Train...totally forgot she is ready to chop until I went in there a second ago to water lol. 4/20 is 8 weeks for her bout to get my scope and check out the trichs...i'll probably chop 'er tomorrow regardless tho lol

 

[xmobotx]

essentially way left center in this shot; to the left of that biggest lower cola in the left center foreground

 

[greenmatter]

essentially way left center in this shot; to the left of that biggest lower cola in the left center foreground
View Image

exactly

 

[Cann]

yup thats the random one...just went in there and looked at the label, its woody harrelson OG? lol...i got a few cuts from a friend a while ago and decided to flower em out. we'll see how this smokes...but i'm definitely culling the one remaining plant I have in veg. i havent watered that one in a while..its kinda just been dying in the corner lol. i knew it was done a while ago. i'm real lazy about things sometimes...it only looks like an oz. or so anyway...no biggie.

just installed a new A/C unit...got 2 in there now. hoping i don't blow the circuit...we'll see. gotta prepare for the so-cal summer......

 

[ziggestardust]

ziggie - i'd never heard of the worm tower before, but it sounds like a cool idea. not sure how well it would actually work in practice though....also, I would be careful with any sort of plastic in the soil...PVC has been known to leach chemicals.

Hmmm, thanks for the heads up! I might just build a small wooden cabin with the roof functioning as a lid. That'd give my garden gnome a home, not sure he is very happy to live in a house full of worm shit though. Haha!

 

[ziggestardust]

Oh, and happy 420!

 

[xmobotx]

woody harrelson OG ~epic!

yeah sometimes i cant bring myself to chop ~a cross between not wanting to do the trim/dry process "today" & 'i wonder what another couple weeks might do?'

 

[scai]

Nice? I'm gone try that method with cuttings.Yours look so ..oooo healthy and rooty.
Had no problems with rooting but that looks even better.
Thankyou!

 

[Cann]

holy shit y'all....things got a bit busy after 4/20 lol.

gotta run and do some stuff for my veggie gardens, but i'll be back tonight with an update

stay posted

 

[Cann]

Time for an update...

Veg Room

chillin under the t5's

On the right side of the frame in the picture below you can see the swami plants ~ the 4 tall ones in front are BOxNL5/haze, 4 out of 5 confirmed female one male which isn't pictured. The two short plants immediately to the left are TOxBMR Bx1 - both of those confirmed female, with 1 more female not visible. So out of 10 seeds (5 BOxNL5 and 5 TOxBMR), 9 popped the surface (5 BOxNL5 and 4 TOxBMR), and 7 were female (4 BOxNL5 and 3 TOxBMR). Pretty awesome thank you swami..and thank you mother cannabis.

Nighttime shot to show the true color green

 

[Cann]

Progression of cheese quake clones - these three are in a 5 gallon smartpot on its second round...they have formed a bush visible in the middle of the second picture - looks like 1 plant. they could definitely use more space...but I wasn't initially planning on vegging them this long when I planted - will probably transplant to a 10 gallon for flower, they're going to need it. might just put the 5 gallon smartpot straight into a 10 gallon so I can preserve the no-till goodness of the 5 gallon - pre-established fungal networks/bacterial communities/mycorrhizae. sorry about how blurry the 1st pic is - shitty old camera. also the second shot is taken in the dark FWIW

Moms in closet - each of these plants is under a tiny shoplight - 54 watt CFL - you can see the shadow of one hanging in the picture. they are growing surprisingly fast/well....praying leaves and obviously very happy given the low light conditions..

Praying leaves on a TOxBMR female -

Burnt tips from an overzealous neem meal topdress...

Now onto the flower room...

 

[Cann]

Week 8...starting to chop plants that look ready. Been spraying every 4 or 5 days with apple cider vinegar to control PM (thanks to fattiemcnuggins!) - the horsetail was working but not well enough/it was costing me a fortune to spray every 2 days, not to mention it's a pain in the ass to spend that much time spraying....

We'll see if the buds taste like vinegar at all..based on the way they smell (totally dank goodness) I doubt I will be able to taste anything wrong. Fingers crossed...

Here is a poorly photostitched panorama shot of the flower tent. The two plants in front are The Flav (big plant on the left) and Fire OG (tall skinny plant on the right). Both of these plants are on their last run through..not the greatest genetics IMO:

Sourband in a 30 gallon no-till w/ two other plants - it got so heavy that it tipped over and was blocking the light of the other two...i kept tying it up and it kept tipping - time to chop. sorry about how dark the photo is.

The Flav as seen from inside the tent - has something like 10 colas all tipped over/tied up. Woody Harrelson OG (lol) hogging the shot on the left hand side of the frame - curled tips from apple cider vinegar spray.

Plushberry sharing a 45 gallon no-till - orange pistils from the apple cider vinegar spray. You can see that the other plant in the back of the smartpot is tipping over to the left pretty bad lol...damn enzyme teas make the buds too fat! a good problem to have...

 

[Cann]

Plushberry - almost done @ 8 weeks.

The Flav - Still stacking @ 8 weeks...this cut is sativa dominant for sure

Plushberry (different pheno)

You can tell that the vinegar spray fries the pistils..but doesn't seem to harm bud development too bad - maybe a tiny delay in growth. worth it for mildew free buds


time to get trimming....

really excited to have some room in the flower tent for swami's stuff! can't wait.....

 

[VerdantGreen]

plants looking great!