How to get started growing indoors organically - No bottles

Sweetsue said:
We have a community garden down the street that built their compost heap on a concrete slab, right next to an open edge of the garden space, where it SHOULD have gone. One of the reasons I haven't joined this group yet is I am stupefied that people who garden outdoors and compost can be so clueless! Every time I walk past it I wonder how they expected the worms to get to the compost. Surely they know about worms and compost?
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Its funny, but kind of sad... I think this is pretty common. I have gardens around here that compost on top of tarps. Whats even better is that most of their compost piles are actually just branches and sticks of varying size. How about that 10 year compost, guys. WHOOO!

Not to mention all their beds are just cute pet projects with no meaning. Dead tomato vines everywhere and somebody let their squash creep through the whole grounds. Rain barrels sitting on platforms under the edges of roofs WITH NO GUTTERS. WHY?! Empty flower pots everywhere....pretty sure a homeless person is sleeping in a patch of trees there...What a happy facade. Rant over.
 
Sweetsue said:
We have a community garden down the street that built their compost heap on a concrete slab, right next to an open edge of the garden space, where it SHOULD have gone. One of the reasons I haven't joined this group yet is I am stupefied that people who garden outdoors and compost can be so clueless! Every time I walk past it I wonder how they expected the worms to get to the compost. Surely they know about worms and compost?
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I agree 100% Sue, the compost pile feeds my yard at the same time it's working.

But don't worry too much. The worms are probably sneaking into the compost on rainy nights when the moon is full and the guards are sleeping. Try as folks might, it's hard to keep living organisms away from their favorite food sources. They don't call them nightcrawlers for nothing. When it rains the little beggars will get a taste of runoff and head straight to the source.

Being on concrete makes large mulch or compost piles easier to manage with machinery, so in some instances there is a reason.

:Namaste:
 
The majority of our community gardeners are hipsters, very serious about their gardening, which is why the compost pile location shocked me so much. FatRob, I'm sure you're right. I have a vision of them on a seeking mission, wriggling in formation across the wet concrete slab towards that enticing runoff. :laughtwo::green_heart:
 
Sweetsue said:
The majority of our community gardeners are hipsters, very serious about their gardening, which is why the compost pile location shocked me so much. FatRob, I'm sure you're right. I have a vision of them on a seeking mission, wriggling in formation across the wet concrete slab towards that enticing runoff. :laughtwo::green_heart:
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Thanks for the mindworms.

Now I'm going to have to build a trebuchet so I can fling worms over my privacy fence into the hipster neighbor's concrete covered back yards.

They thought that the bees were bad.

:Namaste:
 
What a hoot! Shouldn't have taken that sip of coffee before reading!
 
My compost heap is doing funny things by the way .. it decided to spawn a cover crop all by itself .. no clue what I threw in there that was still able to grow :p

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I started with quite a bit of over fertilized soil for this bin .. about 10l .. then kept feeding it scraps, leafs, mosses, stuff I scavenged and it seems something fertile was in there as well ... the soil is wet from treatment with Dislike against a bunch of persistent fruit flies.
 
Another question ... could I just use clay powder instead of glacial rock dust ? It should contain a lot of the same minerals, right ? (depending on the kind of clay I'd guess)
 
PlanetJ said:
Another question ... could I just use clay powder instead of glacial rock dust ? It should contain a lot of the same minerals, right ? (depending on the kind of clay I'd guess)
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I love the way you keep asking these provocative questions PlanetJ. :Love:

I don't know enough about soil chemistry. That's a sad but true fact, so I'm going to answer here from my instinct. People who understand the science will speak up soon. My sense is that clays aren't an appropriate substitute for rock dust for the simple reason that the particles are much smaller, making the desired water distribution through the soil more difficult to attain. One of the challenges of a successful organic grow is keeping the soil evenly hydrated. I like to think of it as trying to create this open and airy space for the easy movement of microbes and nutrients and water and electricity and..... Well, you get the picture.

Clay, being these tiny little particles, will smash together too easily and create spaces where water can't flow and micro critters can't wander. Rock dust, in contrast, has a multitude of little cracks and crevices, mountains and valleys on the microscopic scale where microbes and fungi and the wild and varied micro community that is living in your soil can hide and live and serve the plant that dominates their world.

Clay is good for many things. Soil for cannabis isn't one of them.

This discussion made me wish I had a kick wheel and some clay. It's been over 35 years since I last threw a pot. I'd be better at it now.:laughtwo:

:Namaste:
 
See: Uses; in Thai farming
Bentonite - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Seems clay isn't all that bad. Bentonite is for sale in a powdered form. I wonder how different that is from any clay you can find locally, if you dried it and crushed/ground it up.
PlanetJ, lots of crushing and grinding up, lol.

I am thinking that clay isn't a bad thing in soil, its good, and too much clay can cause problems.

There are different kinds of clay and the calcitic bentonite looks just fine to use as a mineral amendment.
So, what kind of clay are you thinking of using? Purchased? Scavenged? Any idea what it is?

I'm learning as I go here, just kinda furthering the discussion. If I'm wrong or missing something, let me know.
 
im trying this organic living soil my self , not that i know what im doing but im learning lol

what i did was ferment all my stuff in an air tight drum and grew bad bacteria , let it ferment for 6 weeks or more
then i made up a batch of compost tea with good bacteria with air stones
after a while when i seen plenty of life in the good bacteria drum i added the bad stuff , the air kills the bad and the good feed on them , i let this go on for couple of days then i use my tea on my soil , seems to be keeping them happy enough
i am growing autos at the mo due to not much room and they are the best ive grown yet .

ive also made up some super soil , give it a month to cook , then ill drench it in my tea then use it , it should be lively by then
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COorganics said:
See: Uses; in Thai farming
Bentonite - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Seems clay isn't all that bad. Bentonite is for sale in a powdered form. I wonder how different that is from any clay you can find locally, if you dried it and crushed/ground it up.
PlanetJ, lots of crushing and grinding up, lol.

I am thinking that clay isn't a bad thing in soil, its good, and too much clay can cause problems.

There are different kinds of clay and the calcitic bentonite looks just fine to use as a mineral amendment.
So, what kind of clay are you thinking of using? Purchased? Scavenged? Any idea what it is?

I'm learning as I go here, just kinda furthering the discussion. If I'm wrong or missing something, let me know.
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I've found Eco-Style additives ... 20 liters bentonite clay powder will cost me 40 euro's .. 20 liters of basalt powder will cost around 25 euro's

BUT .. it is quite easy to buy all sorts of clay powder, normally used by people sculpting, and mix and max different geological areas that way ... I am debating replacing the glacial rock dust with different clays, bentonite being the main ingredient in that case ..

The biggest issue would be to keep it from clumping ... I might also add some sand to the mix to prevent this.
 
Also .. this makes me rather wanna crush rocks with a hammer ... those prices suck. Even tho it will last me a lifetime :p
 
Reading up on the topic, I learned that rock breaks down to these products, from coarse to fine: sand, silt, clay.
What we call rock dust or meal, is commonly referred to as silt. Swapping out al silt for clay is not gonna work.

Reading up here, I think I will be able to adapt the CC recipe to my locally available ingredients, without having to pound up kg's of stones transported here by glacier .. which we are rich in where I live :) I think I will get some local sand from the sand pit, get some basalt silt/meal/dust/whatever, use some bentonite clay, some not yet determined type of clay, en roll with it :)

Also interesting: Brix Chart (could be useful in determining what to compost)
 
Right proportion of clay can be very useful, cause minerals like to hold onto it, but too much will cause nitrogen leeching and water runaway. I mean that's how it is outdoor. Good loam for example is usually characterised by right proportions of clay, sand and organic matter. You want them all in balance, and that's why here where I live gardeners cut their soil with white sand. Well, I'm smarter cause I use biochar and compost, which I advise you to do. Don't go overboard with it though if you want to work on High Brix, which we cannot escape from I see :) I'm not gonna fertilize at all this season with bat guano or bloodmeal I think cause Doc Bud advises to bring down phosphorus and potassium to very low level, which is all right with me as that might be just what I'm looking for. Also, to work High Brix you have to raise calcium and magnesium levels significantly, but I always did it. Here I can see an organic solution in stinging nettle liquid fertilizer which is 4-1-1-2 the last being calcium, and very abundant in trace minerals. Actually if you start using it and add a horsetail to it, you're gonna have all the micronutriens you need and in soluble form, so good to use as a booster when needed without messing with potassium levels.
 
Great info, Conrad. :thumb::thanks:

A lot of the soil in my garden here is heavy clay, as you say no bad thing in itself although not good for plants that need a bit of aeration. I cut it with beautiful black humus that I collect from the surrounding forest and my own compost, which also contains wood-ash from the fire; I also use the humus as part of my cannabis soil mix. Just have to filter it carefully for any tap-root eating grubs. :cheesygrinsmiley:

And I've been collecting all the spring nettles from the forest to make tea with for my first run at LOS.

I like making soil. :laughtwo:
 
The way to go, Mr Teddy :)
Try to use wood ash sparingly as it has a lot of potassium and use more biochar instead. This is another way to stimulate mycorrhizae to break down phosphorus and sufur into soluble form, but without need to add more.
 
Will do! :thanks:

Each time I've got seedlings going they all get a bit of nute burn from the commercial seedling compost I've used. Nothing serious, but I thought this time I'd start them off in peat moss with plenty of perlite and a little added wood ash to offset the acidic nature of the peat.

Waddya think, experts?
 
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