Surf's multiroom living organic fabric pot soil beds

[surfguitar]

New beginnings, new grow method and a new diary!

Last grow yielded some pretty good smoke but the FFOF soil and General organic nutes didn't have the plants looking pretty.

During the past month I have shifted my grow to a Living Organic Soil approach as popularized by Cootz, Gas, microbeman, MHG and others. I currently have a 400 watt flower room, 1k flower room and small clone/mother area with plans to build another 400 watt room that will be manually flipped off the other 400 w rooms ballast in the next couple weeks.

I run big fabric pot beds with the intention of no tilling and recycling the soil. The 1k room has a 45 gal geopot with 10 clones atm and gonna add 4-6 more once the other ones root. The 400w room has a 20gal, 5 gal smart pot, 2 mother plants in a clay pot and some clones till I flip this room to 11/13 in a couple weeks. I think I'm gonna do 30 or 45 gal in the new 400w room.


I have 2 soil mixes that are pretty similiar first one that the 20gal SP has,
11.5gal peat
7.5gal Bu compost
3.5gal ewc
7.5 gal diatomite rock
1 KIS nutrient pack

Second mix,
Leftovers from mix one after using about 20 gallons of it.
13 gal peat
~5 gal worm gold plus 93% EWC 3% rock dust 3% kelp
7.5 gal commercial compost made from veggie scraps which contains some bentonite as well(using this might have been a bad idea not sure yet haha)
8 gallon pumice
5tb powdered gypsum
~8tb kelp
1 KIS nutrient pack

All the pots have been mulched with a 1-2in layer of EWC from my local worm guy and than enough oat hay to cover that. They've also been topdressed with neem seed meal and kelp.

These beds are basically water only but every watering usually includes Agisil, ful-power and aloe. I'll also usually throw in some aerated meal, ewc or tm-7 teas thru out the week and Sprouted seed teas but I've been lazy about these, need to make up another batch tomorrow. I foliar feed with the same stuff too for the most part.

For pest management I have rove beetles and hypoasis mites, still have a small fungus gnat population despite that but they don't bother the plants. Might throw some nematodes in the mix and more rove beetles.

Feel free to ask any questions, should be some more updates soon

 

[Siskiyou]

Very interesting! I hope you don't mind if i follow...

 

[surfguitar]

Be my guest glad to have you along for the ride!

 

[surfguitar]

The store bought compost is just temporary till my worms come thru I have access to all the free horse manure I want so atm I have about 60 gallons aging under my house, I also have 3000(probably more now) worms that have been living in a makeshift bin filled with compost and topped with oat hey for about 2 weeks now. In about 1-2 weeks I'm gonna put everything in a 100gal smart pot with amendments such as kelp/neem/crab/comfrey/yarrow etc. and let that go for about 6 months before I use it. I also have a commercial made stack-able worm bin that has been going for about 1.5 months now, that one is just peat with all my veggie scraps.

The worm bin is outside and it's pretty cold right now(gets to 40 at the lowest) so I use the towel and hay to insulate it which works nicely!

 

[Siskiyou]

Right on, surfguitar! I am also using fully recycled soil, with homemade worm castings and organic amendments. Water only for the whole lifecycle. Very happy with the results so far.
I am interested whether you are growing any of the same strains with your new method that you grew before. As I made the transition to recycled organic soil I kept a few cuts that i enjoyed and knew well and learned a great deal from the way they changed as their medium changed. From my completely subjective standpoint, it seems to me that the true characters of individual strains are more clearly expressed in organic living soil. Colors, forms, aromas, tastes and stones are more individually pronounced, less "generic". Although I am still learning (almost 30 years after my first homegrown), it's definitely better than ever.

 

[surfguitar]

I am growing the same strains currently siski Forgot to mention that haha

I have 4 different phenos of The White s1, 2 definite keeper, 1 maybe keepers and 1 better impress me this round or its gone

Right now I'm running mostly what I have dubbed the "happy" pheno. Didn't get a chance to run this gal last round but I've been getting her rdy for the conversion to LOS, shes some tasty smoke and I wanna really see what she can do. I have 5 of her in the 20 gal smart pot and 8 in the 45 gal. In the 5 gallon SP I have the gal I'm probably gonna let go after this round, she just takes a little to long to finish and isn't quite as good as her sisters but maybe that will change in LOS. Also have one of her in the 45 gal. The two mother plants in the clay pot are probably my favorite phenos, only have one clone going from the pheno I named "bashful" in the 45 gal but more are in the cloning stage and should be rdy to go in the next couple days to fill out the rooms.

So far in the veg stage the plants look extremely healthy and vibrant, the real test is gonna be in flower tho.

For the new room I'm gonna get some new seeds, still not sure on what I'm gonna do. At this point I'm thinking zamadelica, malawi and dream beaver but I'm open for suggestions for a nice heady sativa

 

[Siskiyou]

Interesting, since i am currently growing Lucky Charms (the white x appalachia) for the first time, and have a pack of Dream Beaver on deck.
The LC are still just seedlings, but i got 5 healthy plants from 5 seeds.

 

[surfguitar]

Lucky charms sounds like a good mix The white is definitely some very tasty potent smoke!

 

[Lapides]

 

[surfguitar]

This is what's in the KIS nutrient pack if anyone's interested.
"KIS Microbe Catalyst, Gaia Green Canadian Glacial Rock Dust, Calphos Soft Rock Phosphate, Pacific Pearl Oyster Shell Powder, Sulfate of Potash (Sul Po Mag, K Mag), Alfalfa Meal, Fish Bone Meal, Crustacean Meal, Kelp Meal, Ahimsa Organics Neem Cake/Karanja Cake, Tera Vita SP-85 Humic Acid, Fish Meal, Feather Meal, Steamed Bone Meal, Natural Calcite, Mycorrhizae*, and Benefical Microbes."

amends 4cuft of soil for $40 shipped, not too shabby for smaller growers or us guys starting out

 

[EverLast]

In for the show! Good luck and merry Christmas SG

Nice wave in your signature

 

[surfguitar]

Ordered myself some xmas gifts: 400w digi ballast, hood, bulbs, 4in fan, fan speed controller, comfrey leaf powder, yarrow flower/leaf powder, horsetail powder, bocking comfrey cuttings, coastal yarrow seeds, 100gal smart pot for new worm bin and some seedbay christmas special seeds.

I ended up getting a pack of (ohaze x nl)x(ohaze x nl) by a private breeder and dutchgrowns abyss99 which is deepchunk x c99 I think. Also gonna try to get some Rez chemdog ibl and a lucky dip mix pack for freebees, Very excited for all these!

 

[surfguitar]

Installed a little ghetto self irrigating planter under the 5 gal SP made with a seed tray and lava rocks from home depot. Still chugging along nicely

 

[surfguitar]

Sent out my order/money express to seedbay today, should be there by the 3rd. Ended up requesting SOL blue satellite, Mandala chakra and Rez SSSDHxG13(not sure there will be room for these tho). Should be a nice addition to the Abyss99 and (ohazexnl)x(ohazexnl).

Waiting on azure standard to get my basalt rock dust and amorphous silica DE, think the drop is on jan 14. Once I get that I'm gonna throw together my soil mixes for the new 400w room. I've decided to do a side by side of 4 different soil mixes based on advice/reading cootz, yosemitesam and others. YS's mix is more of a high energy/brix soil and cootz/local mix is more about simplicity and moving away from any type of boxed/bottled product.

The base for all mixes will probably be:
45% Sphagnum peat
30% 50/50 local ewc and malibu compost
25% drainage(lava rocks or diatomite)

yosemitesams mix(this is for 20gal of base mix):
2lbs Calcium Carbonate
2lbs Cal Phos SRP
2lbs Kelp
.5lb Amorphous silica DE
12 cups cascadian basalt rock dust

Rough version of Cootz mix per CUFT:
1/2cup Kelp
1/2cup Neem
1/2cup Crab
1/2cup alfalfa meal
4cups cascadian basalt
1/2cup powdered gypsum
1cup calcium carbonate

Cootz mix doubled:
1cup kelp
1cup Neem
1cup Crab
1cup Alfalfa meal
8 cups cascadian basalt
1/2cup powdered gypsum
1.5cups Calcium carbonate

Local mix per cuft:
1cup local kelp
1cup fish/crab bones/shells
1cup local weed meal
3cups crushed beach shells
5cups local rock dust

Each mix will have its own 15 gal fabric pot with probably one plant(identical clones). Cootz mix and the local mix will be getting mostly SST's, Compost Tea's, botanical tea's, aloe, agisil, ful-power, tm-7. Yosemite mix will be watered with nitro-plus fert 1-2oz/gal, epsom 2grams/gal, TM-7 ~0.5g/gal most waterings(at least in veg) and probably get a little bit of the other stuff too.

Still awhile till any plants hit these mixes but should be fun Got a little inline fan that will be perfect for a minicab that can house my upcoming seedlings and mother/clones too. The seedlings will probably end up going in the original 400 watt room once everything finishes in that room in ~2 1/2 months.

 

[surfguitar]

Ended up getting in contact with the local guy who carries cascadian basalt so I ended up getting 50lbs of that yesterday, A little pricey at $35 but I was in a hurry to get it and he was a very helpful dude. He recommended about 3/4c per gallon of rock dust which would be around 5cups for CC's recipe, perfect He had a cool brochure with a picture of a plant comparison, it was pretty wild how much it changed from 0% to 150%. He also said my worms will love it. This will allow me to throw together my soil mix on friday when my crab meal comes instead of having to wait 2 weeks. Still probably gonna order from azure standard as its a tad cheaper so I can stock up.

I'm really considering going vert in this new room. I had originally planned to run 4 15g smart pots but I've been reading about vert grows the past week and I really wanna give it a try and I think it will be a cool comparison between my vert and flat room. I got this cool idea to basically build walls with about 6 inches of space inside of them, line the inside with poly, drill drainage holes up and down the sides and on bottom and make about 50 holes in the front about 1 inch wide and than attach a little half cup type planter. Maybe that sounds confusing haha? the picture should explain it better.

Everything is going great in the 400w room, should be rdy for flip in about a week I hope. Got a absolutley free 1000w setup with a brand new ushio grow bulb So stoked on that, don't got room to use it just yet I don't think but I can definitely use the bulb and the full setup will for sure come in handy very soon.

The 1000 watt room is coming along slowly, only 2 clones are really even growing at this point. I'm gonna let my new round of clones really root nicely before throwing them in there and then start running the 1k and get rid of whatever clones can't handle that haha

 

[xmobotx]

cool!

 

[surfguitar]

Another clone transplanted in the 1k room and I threw the new 400w with MH bulb in there for the time being, not all the clones can handle it's intensity yet so I balance it out by only turning it on for a couple hours and than misting the room when I turn it off and revert back to the small flouros. Hopefully this hardens off the other stubborn clones. This new 400w digi setup I got is pretty slick for $130(shipped) from Apollo on amazon, hood, ballast, hangers, timer, mh and hps bulbs. The bulb is definitely better than the MH in my current 400w room.

Started construction on the new room, I basically just extended the wall on my lung type room to create about 2 1/2ft x 3 1/2 feet of open space. Gonna head over to HD in the next couple days to get some wood to build a sorta tick style box(DIY build on icmag/OG), a smaller veg box to go ontop of that and a box to house my 2 ballast and other electric stuff. I'm gonna have the 4in fan vent air from the 400w room into the veg room and the veg room will probably be mostly passive outtake maybe with some computer fans. Decided on 4 10 gallon smart pots with a scrog for now, not enough room for much else atm. Mixing up all the soil mixes by next monday hopefully.

 

[surfguitar]

Little update

400w room is still moving along nicely and I'm thinking about flipping around Tuesday once I get all the kinks worked out in this room. Everyone got a oyster shell foliar, crab meal top dress and sprouted seed tea today.



Got some powdered plants in the mail today, gettin some comfrey tomorrow. Gonna topdress all these on everyone next watering probably


Stay posted folks

 

[surfguitar]

Little update! 400w room got flipped yesterday, mother plants transplanted into 1k room for flowering. Got my soil mixes all mixed up and cooking and am starting construction on the new 400w room today! Oh and the seedbay got my cash and sent out my seeds yesterday


1k room should be getting the flip within the next 2 weeks prob.


400w room still going very nicely, couldn't be more happy with this room so far.


My attempt at making budder


Hydro barley hahaha

I'll have some more updates once I finish off the 400w room

 

[bigshrimp]

Damn getting shit done surf!

Those huge pots are definitely gonna give you a good buffer while your mix comes along.

Nice