colored mulch to increase yields

i've been reading several articles in veggie forums that talk of using red mulch to reflect more far-red wavelength light. this is backed up by university research, but was mostly done on tomatoes and strawberries. it would be worth a try to see what effect it would have on our crops.http://gardening.about.com/od/totallytomatoes/qt/Red_Mulch.htm

I'm looking to use something on my next grow, seems promising.

robertmarvel.com, a commercial site with some info on plastic mulch.

Berry and tomato crops seem to benefit from this so it makes perfect sense. Straw outdoors throws off a good amount of light but red mulch plastic sounds interesting, thanks for sharing ideas. NS

if your grow is tight there shouldnt be any light hitting the soil or mulch surface. so i sincerely doubt you would reap any benefits

supermanlives said:

if your grow is tight there shouldnt be any light hitting the soil or mulch surface. so i sincerely doubt you would reap any benefits

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Word, lol

jammie said:

i've been reading several articles in veggie forums that talk of using red mulch to reflect more far-red wavelength light. this is backed up by university research, but was mostly done on tomatoes and strawberries. it would be worth a try to see what effect it would have on our crops.http://gardening.about.com/od/totallytomatoes/qt/Red_Mulch.htm

Click to expand...

I have a thread here ( Control red to far-red light ratio to limit stretching ) that is on-topic to your post; re red:far-red ratio intracanopy. The assumption made in that article you posted is flawed for cannabis in terms of stretch.

The red:far-red ratio intracanopy has a large impact upon stretch of plants; the lower the red:far-red ratio intracanopy the greater the plant will stretch (due to the 'shading' effect). So for cannnabis, using red mulch will not incresae yields, but could increase stretch, that is, if it reflected far-red and not red light upward (intracanopy).

What is a bit confusing and seems wrong on the part of that article is the claim red mulch will reflect far-red light; when red colored mulch should reflect greater red light (i.e., ~650-720 nm) than far-red light (i.e., 720-740 nm and longer wavelengths).

In my thread hades posted good link to the PSU website an d gloryoskie posted good links to plastic sheeting, the same link gloryoskie posted in this thread.

IMO using plastic sheeting is not the best option idea due to reduction in soil/soilless respiration of Co2 and movement of O2 into media; as well as reducing evapotranspiration (which can be a good thing for some media). Better would be to use red plastic mulch, like plastic bark mulch, but I do not know of anyone selling such a thing.

Here is a relevant post of mine from that thread re PSU website claims: https://www.icmag.com/ic/showpost.php?p=4098768&postcount=58

supermanlives said:

if your grow is tight there shouldnt be any light hitting the soil or mulch surface. so i sincerely doubt you would reap any benefits

Click to expand...

I agree to a point, however, even in a closed canopy (like tight SCROG) there will be "sunfleck" reaching the media, especially if there is air movement in the room (moving leaves). Also, nearly all indoor growers using HID provide a majority of light in diffuse, not direct form. With diffuse light more photons will be able to reach media surface, especially true if reflective walls are used.

Using red mulch can be beneficial during veg and preflowering (before the caonpy becomes "closed") to reduce stretch by increasing the red:far-red ratio intracanopy.

In terms of light reaching the media, far-red light will do so, even in a closed canopy due to high rate of transmittance though leaves. Likewise, green light will reach intracanopy due to transmittance (albeit much reduced vs far-red light transmittance) as well as reflection downward from angled leaves.

Hmm...

Never used mulch myself. Indoors it would get mixed with reused soil. There are benefits with mulching no-till.

Outdoors, simply a luxury to mulch.

Probably would rather do a cover of clover, than mulch.

You have to be careful with plastic mulch. My tomatoes and melons love it because they like a hot root system. Never tried it with cannabis. I wonder if it would be too hot for the roots. Maybe I'll throw one in the tomato row and see. I'll update here.

I'll add some red plastic scraps underneath one cherry tomato plant set aside, a little sbs comparison just for kicks.

As far as the cannabis plant, it would be interesting to expirement with different colors. Suppose you could just shine a red led upwards instead of reflecting off the mulch\sheeting. Or even hang red x-mas lights around your tomatoes..

Couldn't you just hang red film over your greenhouse? Also, if you take the tomatoes and throw them under and HPS with increased red spectrum, you probably get 20% more tomatoes anyway, so the mulch probably doesn't make any difference if you were growing with lights.

I just stumbled acrossed it last night, had to bump the thread.

I was talking outdoor field grown, no lights or greenhouse.

It definitely makes a huge difference for tomatoes, peppers, squash, melons, etc.

I use black for everything besides tomatoes.

Lester did you ever put a plant with your tomatoes?