---->use of compost tea in coir<----

ive been looking and cant seem to find anyone who has used a 'compost tea' as a main source of nutrients in a mostly coco medium. i realize the general consensus is to not treat coco as soil but if it worked than why not? supposedly, its very difficult to 'over feed' with compost tea's and i think that quality combined with coir's ability to drain so well could combine for a feeding frenzy with little risk for burn.

plus if you could go 100% organic with the great yields from coco then what could be better?

just a thought, take it easy on me. havent posted since og days ;]

thanks

Yup, some of us use coco as an additive to soil, and soil amendments as additives to coco and so on. I use a very mild compost tea solution on my plants in conjunction with a couple scoops of powdered guano in the large bucket coco mix. A good product based on this idea is canna terra http://www.canna-hydroponics.com/canna_terra_just_results

sounds like a good idea to me

can't hurt much made weak?

I use the following mix:

10 parts coco coir
7 parts recycled soil(coir, perlite, clay, composts, vermiculite, peat)
2 parts clay
1 part composted manure/humus(I plan to replace this with EWC when my worms bin is started)

I add to this:
2 tbsp per gallon dolomite lime
2 tbsp per gallon bone meal
2 tbsp per gallon Flower-Tone
1 tbsp per gallon Bio-Tone StarterPlus

Then I treat it with aerated compost tea, and use a little molasses now and then. I have been really happy with this mix. It's EXTREMELY important that you make sure your water has no chlorine in it though. I used to this this wasn't a big deal, but the simple change from water with chlorine, to water without chlorine totally revitalized my grow. It was a grow room full of just barely healthy enough plants, with lots of yellowing, magnesium deficiencies, weird growth patterns. Letting my water sit in jugs for a day(hot water is best! evaps the chlorine faster) made my plants all green again and they now only really start to discolor when they are becoming root-bound.

I clone in pure coir, but I treat that coir with aerated compost tea. I just use a little, but I take a cutting from the plant, scrape the end of it lightly just a little, lick it, and then smear a little honey on it. The only time this didn't work was when the temperatures got too low. Otherwise even with temperature changes, it's been incredibly reliable. I had a couple cuttings just sitting in a cup of coir and I barely paid any attention to them, yet they still managed to root themselves without any dome, without clipping leaves, and by just sitting outside my grow cab catching a little stray light. Not the fastest cloning method out there, but it seems pretty reliable to me.

thanks for your show of interest guys! hopefully we can change a few organic 'soil only' guys minds about coco.

voodoo: its nice to see people trying to use coco in new ways. upon my first discovery of coir it seemed as though organics were frowned upon but the more i look the better this medium's potential gets...

xmobotx: i agree. used in a diluted solution, i dont see why it shouldnt be great. im thinkin just brew your post' in advance and just add to the resevoir/water bucket to achieve desired ppm. the question is, could you feed your girls with a tea dilute and NOTHING else? i would think that this would be superior to adding ferts to the medium ahead of time, seeing as how tea provides the most 'readily availible' nutes. idk. your thoughts?

magic: that recipe is a great example of a organic/coir combo. have you ever run a 100% coco medium (ok maybe a lil' perlite or hydroton)? have you tried feeding with teas' only? does anyone do this kind of thing or am i nuckin' futs?

oh and btw, i am diggin the supplemental flouro lighting you got goin on. its the production of HID lighting combo'd with flourescents knack for bringin the trichs out. LOVE IT

I'm starting an organic, dry nute only coco/perlite run shortly. I've been studying for a few months on it, and am excited about it. I should be able to use a drip system with just RO water PH@ 5.8, set it and forget it. Top off with dry ferts every couple of weeks, and top off my rez as well. I've done really well with liquid chem nutes in pure coco for the past few years, but I like to expirement.

::/<oncept:: said:

tea provides the most 'readily availible' nutes. idk. your thoughts?

Click to expand...

i like "a little of everything" soil amendments up front, some fish emulsion for seedlings - compost tea and/or top dressings later

COOL!! Glad I found this thread. I had been contemplating on which nutes I am going to use for my SOG grow. I previously used GH Flora series in a bubbler for my Mazar grow and the results were pretty decent.

I have recently upgraded my whole grow set-up, hence trying to piece in the nute portion of the puzzle. I knew I didn't want to go the bubbler route again, mainly because I wanted to grow in a substrate most closely identical to soil. So after much research this is what I came up with.

Botanicare Ready Gro aeration mix is my substrate of choice:
All measurements are per 5 gallons of RO water

Seedlings (capillary seedstarter) and rooted clones (EZ Cloner):
5 tbsp Black Strap Molasses
1 cup Earthworm Castings

Vegetative & Mother Plants:
1/3 cup Peruvian Seabird Guano (10-10-2)
1/3 cup Mexican Bat Guano (10-2-0)
1/3 cup Earthworm Castings
5 tbsp Maxicrop Powdered Kelp Extract (1-0-4)
5 tbsp Botanicare Liquid Karma
2 tbsp Botanicare Cal-Mag
1 tbsp Botanicare Silica Blast
5 tbsp Black Strap Molasses

Flowering:
2/3 cup Peruvian Seabird Guano (10-10-2)
2/3 cup Jamaican Bat Guano (1-10-0)
2/3 cup Earthworm Castings
5 tbsp Maxicrop Powdered Kelp Extract (1-0-4)
5 tbsp Botanicare Liquid Karma
2 tbsp Botanicare Cal-Mag
1 tbsp Botanicare Silica Blast
5 tbsp Black Strap Molasses

Soooo, what do all think? I believe I've covered all the nutritional, macro & micro bases. I Hope!!

soound pretty good roots! all this organic talk gets me excited, best cool off with some meds ...

mmmm blueberries

be easy, my camera skills suck

Forgot to ask this, but do you still run the 1 week flush prior to harvest when using compost tea?

ROOTZ said:

Forgot to ask this, but do you still run the 1 week flush prior to harvest when using compost tea?

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makes sense - but, usually a flush will be less critical w/ organic
- it's a why not as the plant is going into the twilight at that point anyway

::/<oncept:: said:

magic: that recipe is a great example of a organic/coir combo. have you ever run a 100% coco medium (ok maybe a lil' perlite or hydroton)? have you tried feeding with teas' only? does anyone do this kind of thing or am i nuckin' futs?

oh and btw, i am diggin the supplemental flouro lighting you got goin on. its the production of HID lighting combo'd with flourescents knack for bringin the trichs out. LOVE IT

Click to expand...

I have done a little playing around with pure organic coir, but I just found it too high maintenance. I had to be more on top of specific feeding requirements, whereas the mixing of foods and beneficials into the medium makes it fairly self-sufficient.

I am definitely in love with using heavy amounts of supplemental fluoros. HID wins in intensity, but the fluoros make healthy plants that don't stretch a lot. My cabinet has an average stretch of 5-10% lately. My old vertical fluoro-only grow had more like 15-20% maximum stretch. Odd that adding the overhead light reduced it even further, but it also sorta makes sense. It's harder in some ways now because my plants don't stretch to fill the cabinet. I have to just veg them to the right sizes, which takes longer. I'm growing perpetual though so it's not really a big deal. I just need more veg space than I currently have.

ROOTZ said:

Forgot to ask this, but do you still run the 1 week flush prior to harvest when using compost tea?

Click to expand...

yea i would definitely flush as usual... although it seems a lot of people will continue to add small amounts of molasses during flush to better serve the finished product.... i think