Can FF soil be reused from one grow to the next?

[RandyL]

I grow indoors in soil (Fox Farms Ocean Forest). It'll soon be time for me to transplant new plants into larger buckets. I can spend $50 on 3 big bags of FF, or, as my "expert" neighbor suggests, just re-use the dirt from the last grow. All full of roots and crap. His main argument is that farmers reuse their dirt, so why can't I?

I don't think it's a good idea, but I thought I'd ask here. I don't have a real good way to get the old roots out of the dirt, I can shake it out but that's about it. It's all in my apartment.

I'd like to save $50, but not if it'll hurt the new plants.

 

[oks226]

I read in a high times not too long back that you can re-use soil once as long as its not full of nutes and bugs. It also said that the existing roots from the old soil would act as a pathway for new roots to grow through.

That being said...I have not tried this yet, I kinda want to, but then again, I am more willing to spend 50-80 bucks to make sure I don't decrease yield or have some kind of nutrient lockout due to salt buildup than I am to "take a chance".

 

[YardDog35]

I kinda want to, but then again, I am more willing to spend 50-80 bucks to make sure I don't decrease yield or have some kind of nutrient lockout due to salt buildup than I am to "take a chance".

Exactly

Like you said RandyL "I'd like to save $50, but not if it'll hurt the new plants."

If we are spending all this time and effort into producing a great harvest in the end, why skimp on one of the most important things our plants need.


Tell your neighbor that farmers use huge, heavy disks to turn over their land between crops. Some that have less fertile land change crops each harvest for different effects on the soil and nute intake.

Another thing to consider...if you re-use the old, dead soil you will have to start feeding that much sooner. A fresh bag of Ocean Forest will feed for 3+ weeks.

Good luck with your grow bro! Keep asking questions, that's what I do. So much knowledge here

 

[Dacob]

No.

No.

No.



NO.




NO!





NOOOOO!







Got it?

OK!

Yes, why do farmers use those amazingly large tractors and tillers and all those machines, which were originally just a set of one or two oxen and a plow, to turn topsoil?

Because the amazingly thin, tiny little "skin" of the earth, or its topsoil, can be turned over and reused, depending on a number of factors. Outdoor cultivation of crops is just not at all applicable to indoor gardening.


FF soil is NOT meant to be reused, and if your plants have established roots into any significant portion of the soil, it is likely they have used the available nutrients in the soil and are wanting more.

I do not recommend reusing soil -- any microbes that have had time to develop in the soil, any root problems, basically all kinds of nasty little buggers, have had time to live and grow in the soil. When you turn it all out and reuse it, they get three more months to live and grow. Not good.

Personally, I know of no effective way to reuse potting soil, while it can be revitalized with ferts and such, it just is really not the same after it has been used by a hungry cannabis plant.

If you have a garden, compost pile, or similar, it would be fine to recycle the soil there, but it is really critical to remember that generally, when using soil indoors, you are shooting for maximum growth in a very very.... very short amount of time, on the scale of 2 to 3 months. That is very different than outdoor cannabis, which has many more months of growth available to it before it is harvested.

Thusly, slowing down or inhibiting that process is really detrimental to a indoor grow, as even a week or two of cumulative lost growth ends up being a significant amount of the total growth cycle. And believe me, if you try to reuse exhaused soil, you will loose many weeks of growth, it is ideal for a young seedling or cutting to spend many weeks primarily using the soil's natural resources before you start assulting the roots with all the ferts that are, in reality, absolutely necessary to ensure your plant produces the most it is genetically programmed to produce.

Wow. Sometimes, I think I talk... type... waaaay too much. Perhaps not.

 

[Droopy Dog]

Well, I make my own mix and run organics for the most part and constantly re-use my soil. Why would I go to all the trouble to create a living organic soil just to toss it out?

It seems to work better with the second use on.

I do know a person that re-uses FFOF by re amending and cooking, but this is also organics and he usually mixes it 1/2&1/2 with fresh, with very good results.

If FF was designed as a 1 use soil, that's sad and a really sad commentary on our 'throw away' lifestyle.

DD

 

[cyrystic]

Do the root enzymes you use in say coco not work the same in soil ?

 

[rastajbd]

^They defiantly do. I personally have a used soil compost pile in the back yard. Let it sit at least 3 months, throw some worms and pill bugs in there. I planted a hindu skunk clone in some of it about 3 weeks ago and it looks amazing, very healthy! Only fed with superthrive and hygrozyme ..

 

[N.W.Gthumb]

No.

No.

No.



NO.




NO!





NOOOOO!







Got it?

OK!

Yes, why do farmers use those amazingly large tractors and tillers and all those machines, which were originally just a set of one or two oxen and a plow, to turn topsoil?

Because the amazingly thin, tiny little "skin" of the earth, or its topsoil, can be turned over and reused, depending on a number of factors. Outdoor cultivation of crops is just not at all applicable to indoor gardening.


FF soil is NOT meant to be reused, and if your plants have established roots into any significant portion of the soil, it is likely they have used the available nutrients in the soil and are wanting more.

I do not recommend reusing soil -- any microbes that have had time to develop in the soil, any root problems, basically all kinds of nasty little buggers, have had time to live and grow in the soil. When you turn it all out and reuse it, they get three more months to live and grow. Not good.

Personally, I know of no effective way to reuse potting soil, while it can be revitalized with ferts and such, it just is really not the same after it has been used by a hungry cannabis plant.

If you have a garden, compost pile, or similar, it would be fine to recycle the soil there, but it is really critical to remember that generally, when using soil indoors, you are shooting for maximum growth in a very very.... very short amount of time, on the scale of 2 to 3 months. That is very different than outdoor cannabis, which has many more months of growth available to it before it is harvested.

Thusly, slowing down or inhibiting that process is really detrimental to a indoor grow, as even a week or two of cumulative lost growth ends up being a significant amount of the total growth cycle. And believe me, if you try to reuse exhaused soil, you will loose many weeks of growth, it is ideal for a young seedling or cutting to spend many weeks primarily using the soil's natural resources before you start assulting the roots with all the ferts that are, in reality, absolutely necessary to ensure your plant produces the most it is genetically programmed to produce.

Wow. Sometimes, I think I talk... type... waaaay too much. Perhaps not.

ya defintly dont cut corners or ull never know what might have been, and believe me when i say u wanna know<cure advice is perfect>

 

[Purple Goose]

No.

No.

No.



NO.




NO!





NOOOOO!







Got it?

OK!

Yes, why do farmers use those amazingly large tractors and tillers and all those machines, which were originally just a set of one or two oxen and a plow, to turn topsoil?

Because the amazingly thin, tiny little "skin" of the earth, or its topsoil, can be turned over and reused, depending on a number of factors. Outdoor cultivation of crops is just not at all applicable to indoor gardening.


FF soil is NOT meant to be reused, and if your plants have established roots into any significant portion of the soil, it is likely they have used the available nutrients in the soil and are wanting more.

I do not recommend reusing soil -- any microbes that have had time to develop in the soil, any root problems, basically all kinds of nasty little buggers, have had time to live and grow in the soil. When you turn it all out and reuse it, they get three more months to live and grow. Not good.

Personally, I know of no effective way to reuse potting soil, while it can be revitalized with ferts and such, it just is really not the same after it has been used by a hungry cannabis plant.

If you have a garden, compost pile, or similar, it would be fine to recycle the soil there, but it is really critical to remember that generally, when using soil indoors, you are shooting for maximum growth in a very very.... very short amount of time, on the scale of 2 to 3 months. That is very different than outdoor cannabis, which has many more months of growth available to it before it is harvested.

Thusly, slowing down or inhibiting that process is really detrimental to a indoor grow, as even a week or two of cumulative lost growth ends up being a significant amount of the total growth cycle. And believe me, if you try to reuse exhaused soil, you will loose many weeks of growth, it is ideal for a young seedling or cutting to spend many weeks primarily using the soil's natural resources before you start assulting the roots with all the ferts that are, in reality, absolutely necessary to ensure your plant produces the most it is genetically programmed to produce.

Wow. Sometimes, I think I talk... type... waaaay too much. Perhaps not.

You could invest in a odorless indoor composter build a bin large enough to hold all your soil plus a bit and then about 25lbs of red wiggler worms put them worms in the old soil and add the compost from the composter as it is ready and allow the worms to do there work if you have enough space to build a bin that will hold 2 grows worth of soil the worms will be able to turn process the compost and soil into super rich and completely revitalized soil by adding iguana juice to the soil as well you can build up a very rich population of beneficial microbes and by the time you have finished your 3rd crop you should never need to buy anything but composter accelerator. I have also found that having a few worms in my soil also seems to be beneficial for the plants as they continually add castings as well as eat up dead roots and other roting compounds.

 

[Primo]

I can certainly feel for the people who want to reuse their soil.
It's an expense.
It's a pain to go buy and lug home.
It's a security threat.
It's a pain to dispose of used dirt.
It's wasteful.
It fills landfills.
However, I haven't heard another good option.
The composting sounds even more "chancy"
than reusing the dirt straight from the harvested buckets.
There have been lean times when I scrimped and used half
old and half new, without any obvious problems, but
I'll never know for sure, will I.
Why mess with success?
My two cents.
Primo

 

[Droopy Dog]

LOL Apparently none of the peeps using dirt one time and then tossing it have never had a garden?

You can actually improve the soil by re using it. Tossing it and spending $$$$ for more is just beyond silly and shows a total lack of gardening skills. For shame!

DD

 

[SnowBender]

Does FF make is bagged soil out of thin air?

No, they are bagging up dirt and amending it. Which is what you do if you reuse it.

If your worried about bad pathogens, maybe use 2 soil batches. One batch can sit in the sun under black plastic or in a composter and cook out the bugs and you can also amend the soil back up to snuff while you are growing with the other batch.

 

[YellowAndBlue]

I know this is an old thread, but for future readers I hope my experience will give an insight.

I have a plant that was transferred over to a 5 ga pot from a 6 in pot. The bag seed plant was the last to display pistils. The bucket itself contains the roots of 2 previous plants which one died prematurely and the other one a male plant. Since day 1 of the transfer, the plants began to display nitrogen deficiency/lockout and mg deficiency. The lower leaves started dropping rapidly (they fall just by touching). The color is not as green as my other healthy plants. I flushed but it got worst. By the way, my 400w T5 HO fell on top of it and took out all the major colas.
Then I realized that after a dead plant decayed, it produces inorganic nitrogen. My plant is deteriorating at a rapid pace because of the excess ammonia nitrate.

 

[Ellevista]

This is why I use Enzymes throughout the growing cycle along with the mycorrhizae, beneficial aerobic bacteria along with some other microbial life . With continuous use of an enzyme formulation along with the presence of healthy microbial life, all the dead organic matter is broken down by the enzymes and the microbes further chemically decompose all of what would otherwise be pathogens if left to simply rot in the soil. I'm no expert in the overall decomposition process but I know what I need to do in order to help my plants and soil thrive.

 

[Gman123]

Absolutely stupid that people are saying no,no,no your ruling something out without trying it , I'm currently coming to the end of my forth harvest using the same soil and every yield has been the same !!!

 

[Emeraldo]

Entertaining thread, the cannabis community divided along soil lines. One side throws out the expensive soil after one use, insisting "no no no don't re-use the soil" and "throw it out". Never tried to re-use it but convinced it ain't good for the plants.

The other side, the folks who have themselves made home-cooked soil, hands on, developed it and carefully adjusted and amended it (which is also an expensive AND time-cosuming effort) say -- from experience -- that it works just as well as or even better than "new" soil.

This thread isn't just about FoxFarm soil. It is about soil. Soil science is a subject one could study for a long time and always learn something new. Soil is incredibly important to a soil grow. As a newbie a few years back, I didn't really appreciate that.

There is one post from 2013 about a bad experience transplanting into twice used soil in a 5-gal pot. Doesn't say whether the soil was replenished with any nutrients or minerals or microbial life, just a plant tranplanted into the old soil that contained the roots from two previous occupants. I don't know exactly what went wrong there, or what was missing in that pot of used soil, but the implication -- that used soil is per se bad -- is contradicted by growers who actively regenerate the soil environment and had great results.

Contrary to some of the posts, I think the comparison to farmers using the same topsoil is valid. Talking about how they use a tractor to disc it is beside the point. Farmers go to great lengths to care for the topsoil by amending it, letting it rest, rotating crops, planting crops like alfalpha that add N, having soil tested and correcting deficiencies and depletions, etc. Recycling soil for your next grow is the same, even if on a smaller scale than what professional wheat or potato or grape farmers do.

There is also a little info here on HOW to recycle soil. Mix 50%/50% old and new, add organic nutrients, add worms, add composted material, mycorrhizae, microbes, soil bacteria. Allow time for cooking, let it bake in the sun for a month or two. Basically, give the soil an environment that refreshes it for a new grow.

The OP was motivated to save some $$ by recycling. Me too. But there are hints from some that the recycled/amended soil can actually be as good or even better than the "new" out-of-package soil.

After all the work and time spent researching and learning how to amend soil this year, and having had two amazing grows in that soil, I learned that getting the soil right makes the grow easy. I had two organic grows outdoors. I did not have any serious pH issues, NPK deficiencies, disease or pests. I started with great genetics, but given that plus good soil let the plants stay healthy and green through harvest. Preparing the soil was a huge part of the grow, but the plants loved it.

So I was curious about how experienced growers go about recycling home-baked organic soil. I shake the soil out of this year's containers and root balls, and will keep the soil dry in a black plastic bag for the winter months, then start again next March to build a basic soil. Part of that will be maybe 30% new soil out of the package, but most will be recycled amended with new organic sources of NPK, lime, and trace elements, plus soil bacteria, funghi. I guess I will know next year for sure, but I expect the remixed soil would work just as well as "new" soil.

Any other experiences out there? Any comments or tips for the less experienced? Thanks!

 

[tannaberton]

Usually by crop's end the PH is way off toward acidic with the P from NPK. I have tried neutralizing the stuff and adding it to outdoor holes and it works. Also neutralizing it and mixing it 1/3 with your new stuff indoors, works for me as well.

 

[252Growme]

I re use

LOL Apparently none of the peeps using dirt one time and then tossing it have never had a garden?

You can actually improve the soil by re using it. Tossing it and spending $$$$ for more is just beyond silly and shows a total lack of gardening skills. For shame!

I reuse fox farm all the time. Throw a 25lb bag of work castings in and 3 pales of perlite, mix it up and back in bags for plants. Its soil not plastic lol. Why would anyone throw it out?

 

[FelipeBlu]

Interesting old thread..

Another issue to consider is that peat - which is a major component of many bagged media products - breaks down and will tend to become more compacted. This will need to be addressed by adding more drainage (like perlite).

 

[Phytoplankton]

I re-use FF all the time. I let the soil dry, get a hand trowel into and turn it over, then flush it very well. Old dead roots are great compost. Yes you will probably have to add nutes from the beginning, but the nutes FF adds only last about 39-60 days, so what’s the difference? Now if you have bugs, nematodes, or other pests, then I’d toss it. I even have a great honey hole for FF, $20 for a 3 cu. ft bag!