Bio-dynamic grow

[DownOver]

Hi everyone,

I have been using a Bio-dynamic grow regime for about the last 3 years, whether it be indoor or outdoor. Have found using the cycles of the moon, and the application of buried horns filled with various composted fertilisers has improved the general vigour and health of the plants.

Was wondering if anyone else had been using this methodology with their grows?

 

[maryjohn]

I don't do bio-dynamic, but like you, I try to keep fertilizers and manures away from my plants. I try to work with the microbial systems that occur all around us, which in nature create something called nutrient cycling.

N, for instance, is mostly made available by protozoans munching on bacteria and then pooping around the roots. If it isn't needed or not in the right place, another microbe comes along and makes use of the poop. According to an NPK test, such soil can appear dead. In reality, it is quite fertile, and also more versatile than conventional soil, where the whole medium is fertilized, and fertilizer reapplied when it runs out.

So when I have a problem, I figure my microbes are out of whack. I run for the microbes, not the nutes. Since my grow is small, I just throw fresh wormcastings from my bin into some water, stir, and pour. That gives me a balanced infusion of microbes to repopulate the soil.

I do use fertilizer when I first make a potting soil - blood, bone, etc..., but then I spray with effective microbes and compost slurry, and wait a few months.

The beauty of it is that you can't overfertilize, and all you have to do is water.

 

[Biodynamic]

I have been studying Steiner for quite some time now, yet I do not strictly adhere to his specific preparations. I have my compost piles (greens, browns, food scraps, lime, ashes, coffee grounds, etc.) that I use as an energizing soil amendment. I do follow lunar cycles (full moon for cloning, above ground harvest) but I have yet to crop. I'll keep you posted as that happens.

I am testing various types of soil combinations, yet all of them consist of some sort of mixture of the following: mushroom compost, cheap potting soil, composted humus (containing composted chicken manure), my own composted soil, sand, perlite, trace rocks, trace wood branches, trace lime.


I add worms to the soil whenever I can (and I don't find dried up worms in the soil thereafter). In some plants I bury about a cup of composted chicken manure about halfway down and as soon as the plants hit it they explode. If necessary, I use lime to raise the pH but have shamefully resorted to commercial ph down. I use the Sonic Bloom foliar spray (roughly N 2.0 P-.6 K-.6)in addition to playing a certain chirping frequency for 12 hours a day to dilate the stomata. Of course, I play the frequency at least 30min. before and after foliar spraying twice a week.

Do you know anything besides citric acid that I could use for ph down? I started using distilled vinegar the other day.

Also, what do you do for flowering ferts? I make an aerated tea out of dry bat guano, composted chicken manure, and molasses but I am really unsure about it lacking potassium. I do not have access to farms very readily so horn preparations are unfeasible for me. I am very open to minerals such as quartz for sulfur.

In short, I need some help with organic ph down, Biodynamic flowering ferts and methods. Thanks