Organic Soil Moisture Management

[SpicySativa]

Ya, the Smarts are floppy. You can fold them, crumple them up, stuff them, whatever... They are neatly folded up when you buy them.

I dig the idea of a modular SCROG... I've just been using tomato cages cut down to just one or two rings, and lots of twisties to tie and train my plants.

 

[SpicySativa]

Verdant- Do you use Neem and Crab meals in your mix? Since I started adding these to my soil each recycle I have not had fungus gnat issues. Can't take credit for the idea, but it seems to be working fantastically. I also added neem and crab to my worm bins, and have not seen a fruit fly or fungus gnat since.

 

[VerdantGreen]

i use neem seed meal, finally managed to get hold of it in the UK about a year ago. before then i would have more gnats now and again, but the neem has pretty much wiped them out - so im with you all the way there.

scrog is good for getting the most out of your space if you need to. the modular side takes away most of the inconvenience of scrog. the screens actually protect the plants as you move them about!

 

[SpicySativa]

Do you have a picture of one of your mod scrog setups so I could see how you made them? I thought about making some out of PVC but never did...

 

[Mr. Krinkle]

if a bunch of fungus gnats got together and built themselves a high rise apartment block - it would look pretty much like an airpot

do the smartpots fold up small for postage?

VG

 

[VerdantGreen]

Do you have a picture of one of your mod scrog setups so I could see how you made them? I thought about making some out of PVC but never did...

mine are made out of wood. check my grow diaries or galleries for pics. the method of attaching to the post has evolved over the years.

VG

 

[waktoo]

Greetings, all! I'm new to IC, but not new to the growing game. I've read the whole thread.

I used plastic pots in the past. Now, I'm a big fan of the Smart Pot. Visual inspection of the root zone after harvest confirms that air pruning is effective at producing a healthier, more robust root mass. But they do dry out the outer soil prematurely and in an uneven manner.

It's dry as hell where I live, average RH ranging between 20-25%. As I have no forced air heat/AC in my grow space, I rely solely on fresh air drawn from outside. As you might imagine, this created a lot or "issues", mainly with heat stress.

IME, growing in home made organic soil and Smart Pots, an SIP is the best way to maintain proper moisture levels in the soil. It fixed by heat stress issues, allowed me to lower my lights closer to the tops of the plants, and provides for explosive growth rates, especially during veg'.

I got this idea from another cannabis forum, and can post the link if anyone is interested. Here's a quick run down...

Find some kind of container that can hold a lot of perlite/clay pebble (several inches at least, the more the better). Your pot needs to be able to fit into this "reservoir". Fill the res' with water, but keep the top water level BELOW the top level of the medium. Put your Smart Pot on top of the medium. Capillary action will draw water up into the pot, which is controlled by plants need, as is needed. No more overwatering/underwatering, dry spots, or side pot leakage (as we all know Smart Pots are notorious for). All you have to do is fill the res'.

FWIW, I prefer to use small grade perlite for the res'. The smaller the medium in the res', the higher the water column can be raised through capillary action. Higher res'/medium volume means you don't have to fill the res' as often.

Hope this might help. Peace.

 

[Zwaghuf]

Do you have a picture of one of your mod scrog setups so I could see how you made them? I thought about making some out of PVC but never did...

These are something I made up a while back. The posts stick into the dirt so they work with both my regular pots as well as my SmartPots.

 

[Zwaghuf]

Wonderful, I forgot to add the picture...

 

[Bennyweed1]

Blumats.



dank.Frank

blumats are seconded

I tweak mine until the entire mass is moist, always. When ever I unwrap the smart pot, I have a white thick pruned mass of roots right to the edge of the soil

Blumats for sure.

 

[SpicySativa]

Glad you guys are happy with your Blumats. But, as I've mentioned a few times I don't think they will work for me since I frequently have to take my plants out of the room and can't be readjusting and troubleshooting the Blumats each time.

 

[waktoo]

re. post #67.

Move your plants all you want. Take them out of the reservoir. Put 'em back. Keep the reservoir filled. Constant, even moisture levels which are dictated by the plants need, as it needs it. As long as you keep water in the reservoir. With plenty of fresh O2 drawn into the root zone as well. It really is worry free.

 

[Bennyweed1]

Glad you guys are happy with your Blumats. But, as I've mentioned a few times I don't think they will work for me since I frequently have to take my plants out of the room and can't be readjusting and troubleshooting the Blumats each time.

I am unsure of your exact circumstance. I run in a small bloom area, there is no space to get in there and do anything. I have to take the plants out and move them about 10-15ft to do maintenance or whatever.

I take the blumats out of the containers, and place them in a bowl of water. When I am done with the plants I water the hole in the soil the blumats are plugged into so the hole is consistently as moist as the censors when they come back out of the bowl of water.

I adjust nothing on the dripper, in and out they go. Has worked for the last 1.5yrs since I got blumats; even cleans the ceramic a little which is never a bad thing. good luck

 

[SpicySativa]

Benny- Thats good to hear. I was under the impression that they would need to be readjusted or otherwise F'd with after each time the carrots were removed from the soil.

My situation is similar to yours. The plants are in a home-built cabinet with a 4x4 footprint. Other than reaching under the canopy to water, I can't do anything to my plants unless I take them out of the cab. If its not difficult to remove and replace the carrots once a week to inspect, train, foliar spray, etc, then I just may give Blumats a shot after all.

After my initial reading, it sounds like I would want two of the "patio" type units per 10-gal pot? Or would I be better off with the longer "Maxi" style carrots?

 

[SpicySativa]

I guess my only concern now would be runaway drippers. It sounds like most Blumat users have experienced this at least once. Since I would be plumbing the Blumats straight to a water supply, I could potentially come home after a long weekend and discover a flooded basement full of soggy, moldy camping gear... (no res to run dry).

That worries me more that a little bit.

 

[LBOrganic]

blu mats

blu mats

Im also interested in using these blumats I was thinking about using 8 7 gallons pots and putting 3 sensors in each...does that sound right?

also if the reservoir just has RO in it does it need a to oxygenated (bubbled) while in the res ive seen people do that and wondered if it was important.

 

[OZZ_]

I used the air pots for a run or two, not the smart pots but the hard plastic air pots. It truly was a pain in the a$$. I went back to plain ol white, square plastic containers. I use organic soil mixes and set up a plain water res with 1/4" feed lines in conjunction with a repeat cycle timer. The timer comes on every 8 hours and gives the amount of water needed to keep consistant moisture in the containers. It took a bit of tweaking to figure out exactly what that was... but the organic soil stays moist and its simple to tweak if its getting slightly over or under watered. I simply adjust the timer by 5 seconds more or less.

I have a bunch of airpots Ill sell cheaply if anyone wants em? lol ...

I love the idea of air pruned root zones... but it was a pain.

Multi strain right before chop at 63 days, some yellowed a bit to early some a bit to late depending on the strain ... but I left for several weeks and all a babysitter had to do was dump a few buckets of water into the res for me. Didnt even have to open the tent.

 

[SpicySativa]

I like it. This is similar to the watering system I'm setting up, onlyine is plumbed to a tap instead of a reservoir. I have an irrigation timer/valve that will be use to time my watering once I've dialed it in by manually opening and closing the valve to determine run times.

 

[OZZ_]

Ya I just turned it on for 30 seconds and collected the water in a container then measured the amount. That gave me the amount of water per second the system was pushing then I calculated it by the number of plants and number of feed lines

 

[Holdin']

SmartPots do take some extra care when it comes to watering and maintaining good moisture levels without drying out. But, if used properly, the benefits are not to be doubted by any means IMO. Extra work? Yes. But, IMO, that extra work will translate to better results. Not only that, but I feel that with organic soil, this extra work is needed, regardless of container type. We don't want our containers to follow the widely followed dry-out-completely between waterings, no? And keeping the top layer moist seems to be an all important aspect to successful container organic soil gardening.

I've seen, what I believe to be, better results while keeping the top layer moist. I top dress with a healthy layer of EWC, and while I don't mulch (probably should....), I aim to keep that top layer moist by a quick spray down with my Chapin sprayer. PITA? Kinda. But 10 mins of misting the top layer of 30ish SmartPots between waterings is peanuts compared to all the other work indoor gardening involves.

So it goes like this. When it comes time to water, I water each pot lightly, just enough to ensure to top few inches is moist and ready to absorb like a sponge. I then go back to the first pot I started with, as at that point several minutes has passed since I lightly watered it, allowing the medium to absorb what bit of moisture was recieved. I now water again about 2x the previous amount. Evenly, but not over, saturating the entire volume of the medium. No water drains through the walls of the SP. One day passes, the medium is mostly wet in appearance. Next day comes, the top layer appears somewhat dry, and is sprayed/misted until visually moist. Next day comes, still visually moist on top, but the main portion of water weight as been absorbed by the plant, but still a bit of moisture present throughout. Next day, I perform my watering routine. So thats water day one, let dry day two, mist top layer day three, let dry day four, water day five.

With allowing the top layer to dry out completely, I believe that allows for the dry material to wick the moisture from the rest of the pot to the top, where airflow is present and maybe even exposed to light. When I don't keep the top layer moist, I water every other day.

Bottom line: I'm sold on SmartPots. I don't feel that I could achieve the same results with regular plastic pots, with the amount of space, veg time/plant size, and soil used. Proper watering practice/moisture level in the medium is essential, as well as one other factor I think some growers don't consider:

DON'T MOVE THE POTS. If you don't have to. I feel that the rootzone is disturbed and negatively impacted by lifting the SP's from the trays and scoping the roots coming out of the bottoms of the pots.

Maybe this post makes it sound like using SP's is too much work, but they work for me, and work well.