Lets Make Soil

Hey there I've been hooked on organics ever since I started growing and I think I've learnt a lot reading through all the stickies here. It's time to make some new soil and this time I'm treading into new territory as I'm trying to make a recyclable soil for the first time. I have some questions as I'm now starting to experiment with organic growing but first off here is what I'm working with.

Base soil is
-50% peat
-20% worm castings (store bought for now until my worm bin starts producing)
-25% lava rocks (in the future I hope to switch to rice hulls but for now I'm still trying to source those and I'm trying to get away from using perlite as I don't like how it floats to the top)
-5% Biochar (this may be less as I just used the leftover charcoal from a fire I had not too long ago but if that's the case then more lava rock would be used. I did let the charcoal soak in a compost tea with alfalfa,kelp and fish hydrolysate)

Now for amendments I have collected quite a few over the year that I have been growing and this is the part where I get a little confused as I have such a diversity that I'm not quite sure of the ratios to use but here are my thoughts.

This is per 1 cubic foot of soil.

-1/2 cup Alfalfa Meal
-1/2 cup Neem Meal 4-3-2(should this be more? Was thinking of making it 1 cup but not sure if it will add too much nitrogen. It's mainly for pest control as I have had problems with fungus gnats in the past)
-1/2 cup Fish and Crab Meal 8-5-1
-1 cup Kelp meal 1-1-2
-1 cup Bone Meal 2-14-0
-1/2 cup Granulated Rock Phosphate 0-27-0 (I read that this may not be the best mineral amendment but I need to use it up. Hoping to get azomite and glacial rock dust in the future)
-1/2 cup langbeinite 22%k-18%Mg-22%Sulfur
-1/2 cup Gypsum
-1 cup Greensand 0-1-8
-1/2 cup Diatomaceous Earth
-1/2 cup Dolomite lime (usually I use 1 cup but read that biochar acts as a liming agent so I halved it would this still work? If I need more mag I do have epsom salts I can add to the waterings but I figure the langbeinite would cover that)
-1 cup Powdered Egg Shell (for calcium I know oyster shell flower works better but I still need to acquire this)
-1 cup Humik (says its a humic acid derivative from leonardite.)

I also have Canola meal 6-3-1(I think its known as Rape Seed in the United States?) that I plan on re-amending with every second cycle or so for a different nitrogen source. I also have bat guano 4-26-1 that I use to make teas with during flower for an extra boost if the plants need it.

Does this sounds right as I looked at other peoples recipes and somewhat ball parked what I thought would be similar with what I'm using. Please let me know if I have too much or too little of something. All help is greatly appreciated.

Siris,
Observations:
Rice hulls are an OK amendment, but not for aeration because they break down. Better off with small lava rock or perlite.
Biochar is good.
Rock Phosphate and other rock dusts are non interchangeable.
I'd skip the bone meal.
Go heavy on the gypsum, lite on the dolomite.
Don't use something just to use it up.
Good luck. -granger

Compost! My favorite soil builder.

I'd skip the rock dust until you get glacial rock dust. Some rock phosphates have shown to be radio active. Prolly a minor risk, but still.

I'd skip he lime and replace with oyster shell and crab shells, neem meal will also have calcium. Magnesium should be covered with a decent rock dust and the crab shells, and oyster shells. If you wanna be a good organic grower throw the bottled cal mag far away.

The k-mag and greensand I'd skip as well. K-mag can burn plants and throw your soil balance off, much better to add it to teas, if it's in the soil and it's hot, your screwed. Greensand takes years to break down. Glacial rock dust will cover anything greensand would anyway.

Personally I'd look at Coot's mix as to quanities and what to include. Its been tested and proven to work well. If money's tight, you can use espoma to get started and get amendments as your buds sell, or the money tree makes a drop.

But once again, get the best compost you can, that's what drives organic soil.

+1 for good compost!

I'd be inclined to keep the alfalfa out, you've already got two N heavy amendments. Alfalfa tea is easy as nuts to make.

Agree with granger on the bone meal, or at the least a much lighter dose (1/2 to 1/4). An easy slurry tea as well if you need additional nutrition.

DE has a mild liming effect re: something to take note of.

Don't really see an issue myself with the rock phosphate and greensand as you mentioned reusing the soil down the road.

Cutting the VC 50/50 with compost would be wise.

Mixing in powdered Dunks works well as a FG preventative. Never had much luck with neem as an amendment or tea for FG control but that's just my experience.

I like the ratio of peat/aeration/VC/char, not from experience but because that's what I've settled on for the next mix. re: you=Guinea pig

I feel the same way about the alfalfa mikell. You can also just top dress it, pretty easy stuff.
And yeah for fungus gnats get mosquito dunks(bti) and crumble them on top of your soil.
Don't use too much neem seed meal, I go light on everything but especially the N inputs.
Replace bone meal with fish bone meal if you can.

Without reiterating too much. Definitely would probably go with a cup per foot with the gypsum, that mix is sure to have tons of available potassium, like most organic mixes, but it you adding more, your probably asking for it to lock up you magnesium. The gypsum will correct that. I never really saw mosquito bits on the forums much, do a lot of folks use them? I swear by them for fungus knats...like seriously.

the bits are the same as the dunks, I recall some conversation about them having less BTI but i think that turned out to be untrue.

Mikell, was that you who proved that? I remember reading something like that from you in a thread.

Im sure there about the same, people are weird, in practice there probably equal reguardless.

Alright so after reading all the comments I've decided to make a few changes to the recipe. I'll probably wipe out the granulated rock phosphate as I'm not a big fan of radio active stuff
(even if it is a minor risk) just sucks as I don't like throwing stuff away but with that being said is there another mineral replacement for phosphate? If not then I'll keep the bone meal in the mix. I'll also increase the gypsum probably to 1 cup, just wasn't sure about that one as its a new addition to the garden and I'm not all that familiar with what sulfur does. Since everyone is saying light on dolomite does 1/4 cup sound better, I'm not sure if I want to take it completely yet as I still need the oyster shell flower. K-mag will be used in teas instead of soil as well.

I do have some compost going but sadly I don't think it will be ready in time for this mix so it may have to be top dressed later on down the road. Most likely when I switch the girls over to flower.

Mikell you are probably right about the alfalfa so I'll keep that out for when I make teas. It's looking like the old batch of soil I made is a little N heavy right now and as I recall it had a similar ratio of N amendments.

I did see some glacial rock dust at the local garden store so I may pick some of that up before this soil gets made and mix some in.

I was wondering about the mosquito dunks as I've seen them around the store but always wondered if it was O.K. for organics but it seems like it is so I'll add it to arsenal.

Oh and Scrappy no need to worry about the bottled cal mag as I've never touched the stuff. I've always knew I would grow organic so I spent a lot of time reading about it here and everyone here said to stay away from bottled stuff so that's what I did.

I'll post the new recipe here in the next few days. Just need to go figure out which garden store I saw that glacial rock dust at. Also just got to say I'm a little mind boggled by coot's mix, just the fact that he only uses minerals for his phosphate but I guess I'll have to try it one day and see how the plants do.

its funny that you mentioned the coots mix. I was going to say, not trying to dog you, and i totally respect all the effort and thought your putting into your mix, that said it kinda seems like your looking at this from a bottle nutes mind set. Its definitely cool to add all the fancy goods for your first run with the soil, but the compost/castings are your #1 suppliment, your plants should be drawing most of there nutrients from the compost in conjunction with your soils microbiology. The rest is bonus. The best thing you can add to this mix to make ot work for you and get better throught the grow is to mulch a solid few inches with straw or leaves or whatever. With your attention to the soil your going to be fine 1/2 cup either way.

Sorry for all misspellings.

Why is nobody mentioning coffee grounds.. I use about 3 lbs of coffee grounds per month. I just scatter them around my rose bush or wherever. I haven't burned anything yet. And gavebmy pepper plant over two big cans mixed in the dirt.

What do the coffee grounds do?

RustyShcklfrd said:

Sorry for all misspellings.

Click to expand...

While composing a message you can right click on any word and choose "check spelling." Misspellings will be shown. Right click on them and fix it. Good luck. -granger

I dig that i just wasnt paying attention, and cant edit yet. Thanks alot man.

I get that the compost/VC is super important to soil but I also thought the awesome thing about organics is that you want the most diverse amendments in there as well, also I understand my store bought castings are crap compared to the home stuff but it takes time for compost to finish and time I do not have right now.

Not sure why people keep saying I have a bottle nute mentally as I've never touched the things, I don't think that by adding all this stuff it will give insane boosts to the plant I just want all the goodies in there so that if the plant does need more then it's already in the soil waiting to be used up. The reason I asked about the different ratios of amendments is because I'm trying not to create any imbalances and lock something out, I know with organics you just let it do its thing but if you have too much of one thing its never good. I've only been growing for a year and half and I started on organics (LC mix #1 with recipe#1) so I feel that I'm at the point where I need to start learning more and I find when you follow a recipe you don't always learn the why and how of everything working together.

Skeeter - I just throw the coffee grounds in the compost I'm sure it does the same thing though I always thought coffee grounds were only good as an N nute but a quick google search says otherwise. Has your nitrogen, phosphorous and potassium, though I wouldn't know at what ratios or availability and it also has some minor nutes in there as well like magnesium and copper but I'm sure these change depending on what region your coffee grounds are coming from.

Cool I learnt some something new about coffee grounds

siris---

it looks like a mix i made a few years ago. definitely hitting the diversity mentality.

as long as you're adjusting the ratios when figuring out how much to add of each amendment you can build a really sweet soil that works great and can be recycled or adapted to no till pretty easily.

when i made my diverse mix i wrote down every amendment, then next to each one put their major nutrient/mineral contribution as well as their availability (%soluble vs %insoluble) and decomposition rate.

when i found stuff that overlaped in both what they provided and when, i cut back on the suggested amendment ratio of both items.

better to adjust with topdressings and teas for any deficiency than watching all your plants burn up and not being able to do a thing about it imo.

heady blunts said:

siris---

it looks like a mix i made a few years ago. definitely hitting the diversity mentality.

as long as you're adjusting the ratios when figuring out how much to add of each amendment you can build a really sweet soil that works great and can be recycled or adapted to no till pretty easily.

when i made my diverse mix i wrote down every amendment, then next to each one put their major nutrient/mineral contribution as well as their availability (%soluble vs %insoluble) and decomposition rate.

when i found stuff that overlaped in both what they provided and when, i cut back on the suggested amendment ratio of both items.

better to adjust with topdressings and teas for any deficiency than watching all your plants burn up and not being able to do a thing about it imo.

Click to expand...

Good advice.

Here are some common screw ups, adding too much amendments, then feed too often. I've transplanted into straight pro mix (with compost) before and fed teas, it worked pretty well. But once you over do it, you pretty much have to ride it out or mix new soil. If you want to feed teas a lot, don't mix so much into the initial mix. Diversity? Yes! But in realistic amounts.

Not feeding enough nitrogen. I see it a fair mount but I don't understand why growers shy away from nitrogen so much. I look at N as fuel, and fast growing plants need fuel. And even more important in no till, you have microbes doing the breaking down of old roots continuously so they need fuel. I like fish, neem meal, and alfalfa for nitrogen in veg and alfalfa and neem meal in flower, and of course other things like kelp, and kelp is a good nitrogen source although we mostly look at the P and K and micro nutrients when thinking about kelp, at least I ussually do.

And of course not adding good compost to the mix. It is the engine that makes the wheels go round and round.