CT Guyb.Add 1/2 teaspoon (not tablespoon) of Nature’s Essence SEP soluble seaweed powder in each gallon of diluted material AACT and WATER…
I'm about to do this step: "Mix all the dry ferts into the soiless mix well and wet it, but don't soak it with Liquid Karma and water @ 1 tbs./gal."
so that's LK @ 1 tbs per gallon of water or gallon of mix?
tia, sorry may have seen this answer around post #1,432 but cannot find it with search.
Just to be 100% clear, is that soluble seaweed powder from kis usable for mix#1 as a replacement for the 'kelp meal' amendment or not?
If using recipe 5, can i add in molases during flower? If so how much?
Here are some pics of the GHS Trainwreck I have going right now. I used LC's mix, then I upcanned into LC's mix with about 3 cups of espoma biotone added in(in a bout a cubic foot of mix). So far they really haven't needed to be feed anything but an EWC slurry/LK/Molasses combo a few times. They are about 1 week into flower now. I had some issues early on with them (overwatering, light to close but they have responded) Love the LC's mix, been working out great so far. I need to post up some DNA SleestackxSkunk I have in veg right now, they look fantastic.
Yes, I started them out in plain LC's mix(in 1 gallon pots), when I saw the bottom leaves yellow a bit I added some EWC slurry with LK and molasses. I upcanned them into the mix with the biotone, let them veg for another 2 weeks and they just went nuts. They were vegged under 5 42 watt CFl;s of mixed spectrum light (3 6500k and 2 2500k) in my small cabinet. They are now under my 250 watt hps for flower.
I am sure I will probably have to top dress them through flower, but since this is the first time I used biotone starter I want to see how they react.
I also use the promix ultimate organic bagged soil as the base.
Well I mixed in 3 cups of the biotone in about a cubic foot of LC's base mix, let it cook for about a month. I am thinking they might need to be topped dressed a few times in flower as I think biotone starter is a mild amendment or so I am led to believe. I have guano, powdered kelp and liquid karma as my other nutrients, and plan on adding as needed.
The analysis on the biotone is:
4-3-3
0.6% Water Soluble Nitrogen
3.4% water insoluble nitrogen
3.0 % available phosphate
3.0% soluble potash
4.0% calcium (seems a little high?)
1.0% magnesium (0.6% water soluble)
2.0% sulfur
Derived from: feather meal, dehydrated manure, bone meal, alfalfa meal, green sand, humates???, crab meal, cocoa meal and sulfate of potash magnesia
It also contains 8 species of ectomycorrhizal fungi.
It's not really 100% organic, but what really is out of a bag?
Espoma has been around for years and I have used their plant and vegetable amendments in my vegetable garden with nice results for the past 5 seasons, and it is pretty cheap.
Hah yeah what is 100% organic anymore - seems people slap that word on their products and watch sales go up.
I may add the biotone as an amendment because I like the idea that it already has the fungi in it. Where would they come from otherwise if using LC's mix? The LK? The guano? The castings/compost? All of it? None of it?
I guess the source of the microbes is still the mystery of organic growing for me; I'm reading Teaming with Microbes by Lowenfels and Lewis and it has lots of good info ABOUT bacteria/fungi but I am not understanding where the hell the microbes come from. Do they exist naturally? Do you add them? I know we add FOOD for them...I'm assuming they exist naturally and you can add more by using teas / feeding them which in turns helps their numbers to fluorish.
That book is a great place to start. You will get an understanding by reading it, and really I don't know how it exactly all works but I do know I have had some pretty good results so far.
I do believe they exist naturally to some degree, but I always add mycorrhizae to mine. A good source is fungi dot com.
CT Guy
My bad - I was referring to the application amount of seaweed extract when used as a soil soak and not for adding to an AACT.
I was basing that on the catalog sheet from ASL which did not include directions for compost teas - just soil and foliar applications.
BTW - what percentage of perlite/pumice did you use for your container veggies? I'm running about 30% aggregate total but that's more out of habit than probably anything else.
CC
Ugh...just wrote you a long response but forgot to hit send and then lost it when I got a phone call and the computer hibernated on me!
Basically, I use the lower rates due to the fact I'm watering almost daily. I even go a little lower than I posted. After reading TL Senn's book on Seaweed I'm worried that I might stunt plant growth with too high of concentrations.
I went with the 30% perlite/pumice combo based on what I read on here. Seems to be working a little too well in the drainage dept., as I find my soil dries out quite quickly. Top layer is a bit cakey on a few of the pots too, which I attribute to the Alaska Humus, and the soil in my smart posts wants to crack (I've had to move the pepper plants indoors at night due to the cold).
Going to be feeding with just the seaweed and Tera Vita LC10+7. I figure the compost has enough nutrients for the veggies. Planting the tomatoes tonight (I'm trying out a couple of different upside down containers to see how they compare with regular pots).
Going to be in Portland May 28th-30th and was going to schedule an extra day there to do some microscope work with a few guys. Shoot me a PM if you're interested.
The microbes are found in the organic material you add to your potting soil base (usually some combination of peat moss, coir, perlite, pumice, etc.) in the form of compost and/or earthworm castings.I guess the source of the microbes is still the mystery of organic growing for me; I'm reading Teaming with Microbes by Lowenfels and Lewis and it has lots of good info ABOUT bacteria/fungi but I am not understanding where the hell the microbes come from. Do they exist naturally? Do you add them? I know we add FOOD for them...I'm assuming they exist naturally and you can add more by using teas / feeding them which in turns helps their numbers to fluorish.