So I get what you’re saying about maintaining the balance but my thought process is, if the plants only used half of what was available, and I go throwing more minerals on top of that, isn’t that going to send it off balance eventually?
For example,
@StoneOtter has been running Revs mixes for a while. He had a soil test done and found his P was way high and he needed to back off amending it. This tells me that continuing with the same recipe will eventually throw your balance off since certain elements will continue to build up over time.
Now that I type that out I think I see the problem. There’s no way for me to know what does or doesn’t need to be added without a soil test or without running plants through it, so in your mind it’s better to stick to the script and adjust from there as you see your plants reflect it.
OK i see what you are saying. Yeah theres no real way to know without a test. You could reuse it with only EWC and some coco added, and grow it out. Just be ready to rescue in case it doesn't make it.
This is where the 3 equal parts of new soil, used soil, and coco get important. If it all doesn't get used, say only half does, it's only really a half of a third of a pot that gets left unused. The rest is coco and EWC.
You could always rebuild it but cut the recipe in half to lower inputs in balance.
I like trying things, and I have the luxury of a stash that is rather large, so I would grow it again without reammendment, just EWC and coco, to see what happens.
If it works, then rebuild it and cut the mix at potting with 1 part new Rev's soil, 1 part coco, and 1 part used soil, then perlite to your preference.
Or use smaller pots, or veg bigger plants.
Smaller pots equals a smaller rootball, so your yield will be smaller, but you can fit more smaller pots in the tent to offset the smaller yield and it equals out. More trimmimg tho. And smaller prime colas. But smoke quality doesn't depreciate in a smaller pot, just size/yield.
This is kinda how I got to where I'm at. Big pots cut into a third new soil, a third used soil, and a third coco. I mix that up, then add perlite. Then I mix EWC and perlite in a seperate tub. Then I use 3 parts of the soil mix with 1 part of the EWC mix.
So my final mix is 3 parts soil (equal parts new soil, used soil, and coco, then perlited) and 1 EWC/perlite. I run my perlite at about 25%. So a 10 gal pot is only 2.5 gals of each new soil, used soil, coco, EWC, then you perlite it to your preference. This is how you end up with a lot of extra soil, it grows.
I say perlite to your preference, because both the rebuilt soil and the used soil already contain perlite, but the coco and EWC don't (my EWC does, I use used soil in my worm farm) so mix your soil all up, then perlite it to how you like it, and expect left over soil. The cooking process will kill myco so the used soil mixed with new rebuilt soil that has been cooked, reinnoculates it.
That sounds confusing so to clarify, this is my full process on rebuilding.
1 part pre-cooked rebuilt Rev's Mix.
1 part coco.
1 part used soil.
Perlite to your preference.
Then 3 parts of that mix is mixed with 1 part of EWC that has been cut with perlite already. Then mix and possibly add a bit more perlite.
Then plant in it. Expect leftover soil after potting.
Then if the entire pot doesn't get eaten, half of whats left is coco and EWC, a quarter is twice-used soil, and a quarter is your rebuilt Rev's mix. It stabalizes the mix and if you still have mileage left in the pot then use a smaller pot or veg longer. If it didn't make the finish line, use a bigger pot.
It took me a couple years of non-stop growing to settle in on 10gal pots, and they work for me using Durban Poison and manifolds all grown in that pot from sprout. You need to fiddle to find your size for your grow style/strain.
My veggie garden got quite a few pots of (s)crap soil until I got it right. Rev is cryptic in how he adds his coco and ewc.
Now that I understand that big LED's don't require more calcium and magnesium if you don't turn them up higher than the plant can handle, and don't use CO2, I'm going back to his actual recipe.
The extra calcium puts you too close to the line of disaster. It grows really well, but it makes the pots go farther which screws up rebuilds. My last grow left about 30% behind. I could have gotten to finish on 7gals, but I'm going to stick with 10gals and go back to the calcium levels in his recipe.
When I had to soak the pots to correct them, the extra calcium ignited and I got bad tip burn.
Sorry for the long post but this is a grey zone in Rev's recipes. It's hard to decipher what he means. He never actually walks you thru his full process step by step. He gives you all the pieces but you need to put them together. Once you get pot size correct, the rebuilds go better.
Aproximately 90% of the dry matter in a plant (whats left after water is removed) comes from the air. (47% carbon, 43% oxygen is what makes up 90% of the dry weight of a plant. 3% hydrogen, so again free from water) the rest is what you have to pay for. The coco is for the microbes. The perlite doesn't add any nutrition, so half your pot isn't for the plant.
So take out the coco and perlite, and half of what is left is used soil, and half is fresh rebuilt soil.
So your newly rebuilt Rev's soil is only about 25% of the pot.
Another option would be to mix your leftover soil 50/50 with commercial soil, add EWC and perlite, and grow that out.
Stick with the same pot sizes so you can compare. Then next grow you can adjust pot sizes accordingly.
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just in general. A lot of people want to just be told what to do without any effort or thought on their part. It explains a whole lot about the current state of the world actually.
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