new to using happy frog a couple questions.

AgentPothead · Jul 27, 2018

Is this stuff always so "airy" I guess? I'm having troubles watering it the way I was watering my other soil mix. It doesn't seem to suck the water up the way my soil was. It pools on top of the surface then it gets sucked into the top layer, but a half inch or so under the surface is still dry as it was without watering. If I keep watering it just seems to drip out the bottoms somehow, I can feel the pot isn't water logged, it feels quite light compared to the same size pot with my old soil blend. My best luck using it so far has been in a fabric pot that would suck the water back up from the bottom, but these hard pots don't do that. Any suggestions?

Ibechillin · Jul 27, 2018

It sounds like the soil has become hydrophobic (repelling water on surface instead of drinking) and the water that is making it past the surface is channeling the path of least resistance out the bottom. This can happen by letting the soil dry out too much.

this is a good example:

Adding a surfactant (wetting agent like when foliar spraying such as yucca extract or dish soap) to your water will help it penetrate the soil beneath the surface. Water a little slowly and wait for the soil to absorb it and repeat (a nozzle that spreads the water like rain works great for this) after a few times it will start to drink normal again. Adding a layer of mulch will help loosen the crusting top layer of soil and prevent from reoccurring.

Last season my outdoor plant's top layer of soil crusted on me from top dressing dry fertilizer pellets all season, id just break the top inch or 2 of crust up with my fingers before watering.

AgentPothead · Jul 27, 2018

Alright thanks for all the info Ibechillin! I will source some yucca extract or use some dish soap if I can find some unscented. Once they are transplanted up to their larger pots they will get a layer of lava rocks too.

Fiddynut · Jul 27, 2018

Good afternoon pothead.

I use happy frog, sometimes mixed with ocean forest and my soul often becomes hydrophobic like that. The technique I use is kind of a 3 step system of watering. In my pots they get about 3 quarts of water total each watering, about every three days. I slowly put one quart in each pot, then another quart and finally the last quart, giving them a few minutes between quarts while I do the other pots. I find that if I go very slowly on the first quart I can usually put the second and third in more quickly without getting premature runoff and wasting water and nutes. Hope this helps. Happy gardening...Fiddy.

AgentPothead · Jul 27, 2018

Thank you Fiddy that reassures me that it's not just my batch gone bad, but is inherent in the soil mix. I'll probably try to go back to smaller, multiple, daily waterings. I have been slacking the last few months and just watering a bunch once a day. Love your indoor thread btw. Gonna hit ya'll up with rep once it resets.

troutman · Jul 27, 2018

Sometimes it helps to spray the surface of the soil a little and wait a minute or two.
By then the surface tension isn't as bad and the water goes down easier. :tiphat:

Maybe next time, mix 2 different soil types together.
Like a light soil and heavy soil to get a medium weight mix.

Switcher56 · Jul 28, 2018

Peat is hard to "wet" when completely dry. Several watering in a row will alleviate this but... the trenches crated earlier will still transport the majority of the water. IWO it takes time (read more than one water session) What you can do is two things: submerge the entire pot until the bubbles stop; or bottom water the pot. This only needs to be done once, unless you let your pots go bone dry.

Mengsk · Jul 28, 2018

Be careful top watering mixes with a lot of perlite as it will float easily. Watering can or submerge them although that can get pretty heavy/tiresome.

AgentPothead · Jul 28, 2018

Thanks for all the replies guys! Has anybody mixed Happy Frog straight with coco coir? I can easily source that. Maybe a 1:3 ratio of the coir:frog?

Vanilla Phoenix · Jul 28, 2018

I have been using Happy Frog for years. The soil was never hydrobolic until recent years. Within the last year or two, it has become quite a problem with HF...especially in the winter. It’s a pain in the ass for sure. I wish they would go back to doing whatever the hell they were doing before!

Gonna try some yucca extract and hope that helps. Really hope it works because in the winter, it’s so bad that it really effects the smaller freshly rooted cuts. I’ve actually lost cuts that have rooted in the aerocloner when I transplanted them to solo cups of hydrobolic HF. I do a perpetual so it really messes up my timing.

Switcher56 · Jul 28, 2018

Interesting :tiphat:

AgentPothead · Jul 28, 2018

Vanilla Phoenix said:
I have been using Happy Frog for years. The soil was never hydrobolic until recent years. Within the last year or two, it has become quite a problem with HF...especially in the winter. It’s a pain in the ass for sure. I wish they would go back to doing whatever the hell they were doing before!

Gonna try some yucca extract and hope that helps. Really hope it works because in the winter, it’s so bad that it really effects the smaller freshly rooted cuts. I’ve actually lost cuts that have rooted in the aerocloner when I transplanted them to solo cups of hydrobolic HF. I do a perpetual so it really messes up my timing.

Damn bro I'm glad again it's not just me, but that is rough losing a cut in it. I have to be double careful I'm just finally getting the hang of this cloning I think, I don't wanna lose everything to airy soil. I will ask at my hydro store too see if they have heard anything about this.

Fiddynut · Jul 30, 2018

AgentPothead said:
Thank you Fiddy that reassures me that it's not just my batch gone bad, but is inherent in the soil mix. I'll probably try to go back to smaller, multiple, daily waterings. I have been slacking the last few months and just watering a bunch once a day. Love your indoor thread btw. Gonna hit ya'll up with rep once it resets.

Good afternoon pothead.
Thank you for the kind words and feel free to stop by the jungle anytime. We talk about all kinds of stuff and even about growing weed sometimes lol.
Now that I'm seeing some others comments and thinking back it does seem like the bags of happy frog I have used recently have been more hydrophobic than the stuff I was getting a couple years ago so maybe there is something to that. Probably some variance in batches as well.

AgentPothead · Jul 30, 2018

I asked at the hydro shop and he said that they have a new factory sourcing the east coast mix. I am assuming they are not mixing it like the old factory used to mix it and that is explaining this new hydrophobicness.

Vanilla Phoenix · Jul 30, 2018

AgentPothead said:
I asked at the hydro shop and he said that they have a new factory sourcing the east coast mix. I am assuming they are not mixing it like the old factory used to mix it and that is explaining this new hydrophobicness.

Well they better get their ass in gear!!! I’m thinking about switching up if it continues....

AgentPothead · Jul 30, 2018

Vanilla Phoenix said:
Well they better get their ass in gear!!! I’m thinking about switching up if it continues....

If you are also east coast and think that is the problem, I would email them and let them know. foxfarm@foxfarmfertilizer.com I will fire one off, but since this is my first time using it, it doesn't have the weight of you guys who have been using it and noticed a difference lately.

AgentPothead · Aug 2, 2018

They actually replied and want a bunch of the information on the soil. They seem to be on the ball for sure. Oh and they said the east coast factory isn't new.

Vanilla Phoenix · Aug 2, 2018

What info do they want?

AgentPothead · Aug 2, 2018

If you would like me to look into this further, could you please provide me with the name of the products(s), size of the product(s), photos, name of the store you purchased it from, when you purchased it, photos, and the born-on-date code? The date code will be embossed above the top seam of the bag and will help us determine pertinent information regarding that particular batch.

Pasted the relevant part of the email.

Som 2 · Aug 5, 2018

I've had this issue with the soil when it is fresh out of the bag. My solution has been to put in a large container like a garbage can, add water until it is saturated and let it sit for a few hours. At that point, you can put it in pots and it seems to hold water fine when it is watered in the future. I think the key is to get it resaturated the first time.

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