Greetings all! @Vulx has recently become a sponsor here:
And they were offering samples to some of those who asked.
Here are their claims:
Let's take a look at the plants I'm using:
They were cut in January, rooted in water (AK-47s will do that), and put in solo cups on March 9, 2019. They were growing on an 80º heat mat under a 23w 6500K CFL up until about two weeks ago, when I hardened them off to live outside.
To make this as fair a comparison as I could, I did not add additional mykos to the ProMix beyond what is already blended in, and I started with equal amounts of soil. Funny thing...a 1 gallon nursery pot holds exactly 420 grams of soil!
Vulx says to use 5% of the weight of the medium, so one pot got 21 grams of Vulx powder blended in:
Both got transplanted:
Now here is part I found the hardest: Vulx says their product will "reduce water requirements by 50%." And this admonition: "IMPORTANT: It is essential to decrease water and fertilizer usage by about 50% after adding the product into soil. You will almost certainly kill your plants by overwatering them! "
Trying to be true to their instructions, I watered the standard plant to runoff, as I would with most transplants. I gave it 32 ounces of water and immediately got 6 ounces of runoff. That would mean I should water the Vulx plant with (32-6)/2, or 12 ounces of water. That seemed like very little, so I went with 16 ounces. No runoff (as expected) but also no water near the bottom holes of the pot. That mean't that not all the roots got watered.
So what I did was weigh the standard plant and watered the Vulx plant so they weighed the same. No runoff, but the bottom holes looked like they were dark. I guess going forward I will see if the Vulx plant needs water less often or what. Maybe that 50% savings isn't for 1 gallon pots!
Now let's talk about the 50% reduction in nutes. I am watering the standard plant with 4g/gallon, which is the starting veg number from MegaCrop. The Vulx plant gets 4g/gallon diluted to 50% with water, or 2g/gallon. As the plants get bigger and the grams/gallon increase, the 50% dilution will remain constant.
I will be updating this journal on an irregular basis, only as things change. I wanted to make sure that this comparison grow didn't get buried in my regular journal, which tends to run pretty quickly.
Lastly, a little bit about me:
I grow outside during the day, and indoors at night for the plants in veg, so my plants are usually run 24/0 or 18/6 to save electricity. Flowering plants get flipped by putting them in darkness for 12 hours/day. I grow in ProMix HP, I don't pH my nute-water, and I have been using MegaCrop lately and have had success with it.
Thanks for reading, and let's try to keep this one completely on topic.
Vulx Volcanic Soil Amendment: Corporate Introduction
We're excited to introduce ourselves as a corporate sponsor of 420Magazine. We started Vulx with one simple goal in mind: to create an effective, sustainable soil amendment that not only grows better plants, but contributes to a better environment. Vulx is a soil amendment comprised of...
www.420magazine.com
And they were offering samples to some of those who asked.
Here are their claims:
- Reduce water requirements by 50%
- Provide 40-50% nutrient savings
- Increase yield by 10-40% (10-20% is readily attainable, 40% is usually achieved by dedicated, experienced cultivators)
- Buffer soil pH
- Loosen soil structure
- Increase soil buffer capacity
- Increase mycelium production in living fungal soils
Let's take a look at the plants I'm using:
They were cut in January, rooted in water (AK-47s will do that), and put in solo cups on March 9, 2019. They were growing on an 80º heat mat under a 23w 6500K CFL up until about two weeks ago, when I hardened them off to live outside.
To make this as fair a comparison as I could, I did not add additional mykos to the ProMix beyond what is already blended in, and I started with equal amounts of soil. Funny thing...a 1 gallon nursery pot holds exactly 420 grams of soil!
Vulx says to use 5% of the weight of the medium, so one pot got 21 grams of Vulx powder blended in:
Both got transplanted:
Now here is part I found the hardest: Vulx says their product will "reduce water requirements by 50%." And this admonition: "IMPORTANT: It is essential to decrease water and fertilizer usage by about 50% after adding the product into soil. You will almost certainly kill your plants by overwatering them! "
Trying to be true to their instructions, I watered the standard plant to runoff, as I would with most transplants. I gave it 32 ounces of water and immediately got 6 ounces of runoff. That would mean I should water the Vulx plant with (32-6)/2, or 12 ounces of water. That seemed like very little, so I went with 16 ounces. No runoff (as expected) but also no water near the bottom holes of the pot. That mean't that not all the roots got watered.
So what I did was weigh the standard plant and watered the Vulx plant so they weighed the same. No runoff, but the bottom holes looked like they were dark. I guess going forward I will see if the Vulx plant needs water less often or what. Maybe that 50% savings isn't for 1 gallon pots!
Now let's talk about the 50% reduction in nutes. I am watering the standard plant with 4g/gallon, which is the starting veg number from MegaCrop. The Vulx plant gets 4g/gallon diluted to 50% with water, or 2g/gallon. As the plants get bigger and the grams/gallon increase, the 50% dilution will remain constant.
I will be updating this journal on an irregular basis, only as things change. I wanted to make sure that this comparison grow didn't get buried in my regular journal, which tends to run pretty quickly.
Lastly, a little bit about me:
I grow outside during the day, and indoors at night for the plants in veg, so my plants are usually run 24/0 or 18/6 to save electricity. Flowering plants get flipped by putting them in darkness for 12 hours/day. I grow in ProMix HP, I don't pH my nute-water, and I have been using MegaCrop lately and have had success with it.
Thanks for reading, and let's try to keep this one completely on topic.
