No-Till Design, Theory & Implementation

[John Deere]

You may not vote on any more threads today.

Excellent thread. You all inspired me to start my no-till after seeing so many fantastic results. I used 20 G geopots and rotate them between my veg area under the stairs and my 2' x 2' flower cab. Only one partial run so far, both were males and culled, but they were fantastic. There's a couple seedlings in the other pot, one of which was a volunteer from some underdeveloped seeds that i chucked in there with some other trimmings.

 

[BlueJayWay]

That is awesome JD!

I'm going to be setting up another small flower area, completely separate from the main one - 2x 600w lights with probably 8x 20gal fabric pots. What's going to be different than my 'perpetual' 12/12 flower room is that these 20gal no-tills will have barely rooted cuttings transplanted directly into them - vegged on 18/6 for 3 to 4 weeks (or whatever) and then flip the lights...

...It will also, from time to time, be utilized as the boom boom room if ya know what I mean

 

[SilverSurfer_OG]

this is what i need to make... what did you use for the fabric? and where did you get it?
i can't seem to find smart/geo fabric rolls, only weed blockers, is that what i should be using?

So long as it feels/looks more like a soft fabric with tiny perforations its the right stuff. Its sold here as landscape fabric. The weedblocker is more this woven, crispy plastic kinda stuff that is more shiny and shit looking basically...

Also its the same fabric thats used for some of those re-usable shopping bags.

Its really tough, rip resistant and mould resistant.

Cheap as chips usually too!

 

[xmobotx]

i like the direction this no-till/TLO trend has taken where growers are more and more sophisticated

i see folks integrating what they are learning w/ their lifestyle ~kind of like those of us who eat some of the same things we feed our soil ~NTM people applying the tech to their veggie gardens {HAVING veggie gardens}

DYI'n goodies like making smart pots from landscaping cloth ~as well as folks who are re-using things they might throw away {compost kinda gets us started ~next thing ya' know; we're recycling yogurt containers}

and what really set this poast in motion? fr@k'n BJW's "boom boom room" ~producing our own seeds and our own genetics and truly making the plant our own

brings a fucking tear to my eye ~i m proud to have been watch'n this develop and learning w/ the crop of y'all

 

[Coba]

in a 2' x 4' space, under 600w, with 4 mother plants ( 2 sativa and 2 indica) ... would you recommend.

two 10 Gallon Self-Supporting GeoPots or one 36x16x14 GeoPlanter...

I was thinking of two 10 gallon pots with two cuts in each (to separate the long ones from the short ones) but, if one container with 4 cuts will perform better... I'm all about it.

Great thread man!!! Great pics too! Is good to see folks take the plunge on no-tills. Once you no-till, you don't go back..

Just want to add some side notes. Mulch is a requirement and not a luxury. No tills perform so much better with a nice layer of mulch. Living or dead .. You must mulch!!! I have used only the fan leaves for mulch before and it works awesome. I get a kick out of lifting up the mulch and seeing the little critters scuttle about.

Folks who hand water
I find I get much better water retention and even watering by watering with a shower head watering can (with small holes). The beads of water soak evenly versus just pouring water in and finding the path of least resistance and trickling out. A plus to that is the soil compacts less with gentler watering..

Leave space in your no till for future top dressing and mulch!!

Volume IMO is key with no-tills. The larger they are, the more of a buffer there seems to be with watering, longevity of use, etc... 5 to 7 gallons pots works but they scream in a 15 to 45 gallon setup.

thanks Neo, I'm not sure if this was directed at me but I appreciate it

 

[BlueJayWay]

Coba - I missed your question, for me it would depend on the 'end game' plan for the moms. I eventually flower out my moms and replace with a small one, in that sense I would use two 10 gal so they can be easily moved to a flowering area....

XMO - thanks for posting that here dude! It means a lot.....

I for one always have a tall glass of aloe and coconut along with the plants....sprouts are eatin by the handfuls

Worms have invaded my life, possibly a small side business venture by years end I hope.

No-till ROLS, its a revolution and a way of life!

I learned about flippen hugekulture from the crop of ya'll and now I have some in place and mounds of wood ready to make more....there's good things goin on around here and like ya said, its pretty cool watching it develop...tear tear.....

 

[FunTimesIndeed]

How else would we refer to the second person plural---"yous guys"?

 

[BlueJayWay]

I've always liked all ya'll!

 

[ClackamasCootz]

I've always liked all ya'll!

So did my ex-wife as in Y'a'll can to a group of sailors on leave

 

[BlueJayWay]

OUCH!

So I did an experiment in rooting last night. The cuts and 'rapid rooters' soaked in the usual aloe + coconut + fulvic

6 cuts were then rubbed in fresh live aloe gel before insertion.

5 cuts were rolled in 200x organic aloe powder

1 cut was rubbed in the gel and also the powder....for shits n giggles...

It would be worth mentioning though, I've been rooting without these added steps for a long time with a survival rate of 99.9% and all rooted within 14 days, most at 7 to 10 days....so its not like the status quo isn't already 'good enough.'

 

[ClackamasCootz]

BJW

The aloe vera powder is the one I'm really interested in hearing about in a couple of weeks. That sounds way too slick and since Vonforne posted that he was doing it this way I've wanted to give it a try but haven't had a need to take cuttings yet and probably won't for at least 2 weeks.

So about the time I need to take cuttings again you should be wrapping up your experiments - sounds like you covered most of the options. Good for you!

CC

 

[BlueJayWay]

Way too slick huh? I'll be sure to report back here.

 

[Coba]

i've always liked all ya'll too... especially FTI and Jay.

 

[ClackamasCootz]

The concentrated aloe vera powder should preclude any possible chance of damping-off and related problems. I probably would still want to soak the new cuts in water treated with the powder, Ful-Power and Silica but I'll wait to hear what your tests show.

CC

 

[Coba]

Southerners are known for their tempers... BTW.

 

[ClackamasCootz]

BJW

Planting Instructions for Growing Barley at Home from Oregon State University's Barley World project. Barley is a major crop grown over in Eastern Oregon.

Some interesting research & information about barley production and related studies if you're interested...

CC

 

[Corpsey]

So long as it feels/looks more like a soft fabric with tiny perforations its the right stuff. Its sold here as landscape fabric. The weedblocker is more this woven, crispy plastic kinda stuff that is more shiny and shit looking basically... :smoke

yeah after looking up what smart pots/geo pots are made of, i found a landscape fabric that was similar. both are non woven polypropylene, while most of the weed blockers were woven.




perfect timing Mr Cootz, my barley seed should be here today!

 

[dogfishheadie]

siiighhh...i've been putting off making my next round of soil to start my no-tills...guess i have no choice after reading this thread.

have a scrog setup here, enough room for either (3) 18 gallon rubber maids and or (2-3) 20 gallon smart pots, need to double check our measurements when i'm back in the garden. currently have 5 girls going in their final five gallon homes right now, LST'd into the netting, going on week six today in veg. my first run growing here so i don't have a baseline in terms of yield just yet, but i'm thinking that your test run with the just rooted clones going right into flower might be our best option, SOG if you will. i'll be waiting with high high hopes pal, pictures along the way would be the bees knees as my partner is more of a "see it to believe it" kinda dude.

haven't had a chance to clone just yet, but how many cuttings do you think you could fit in a 20 gal smartie? would ya end up with just 2-3 giant nuggets pet cutting? from an ease of use standpoint it's a no brainer; keep a mom, take cuttings, smoke bowl, plant cuttings, forget about them then harvest. no need to mess with training, bending, tying, scrogging and all that shennangins. don't get me wrong, i love it...but yea....i don't have any other reason aside from it hurts my back to keep going in and out of our secret room

 

[John Deere]

dfh--I'm planning on starting 4 seeds in my 20 G and culling the males. Not really sure how it'll work out yet but that's my initial plan.

For reference, top of the last page is my pic of 2 plants in a 20 G. They vegged for ~3 weeks in 1 G smarties before I got my no-till. Transplanted them to the no-till, vegged for ~2 weeks and the pic is shortly after going into flower. They both turned out male and got culled so I can't say how big they would have gotten. The stems were huge though, biggest I've ever grown. Amazing since they were still so short.

 

[BlueJayWay]

BJW

Planting Instructions for Growing Barley at Home from Oregon State University's Barley World project. Barley is a major crop grown over in Eastern Oregon.

Some interesting research & information about barley production and related studies if you're interested...

CC

What a hectic day - ill catch up tomorrow but this caught my eye, I'm using barley and clover for my first year cover crop on areas I'm preparing for next year, would love to harvest my own seed.