At Doc's request here is how to "tune" your soil.
I vote you share your whole process here and on my In the Lab thread. Please????
No problem...I'll do my best to make sense of it
...one more bong rip
...there we go..
Now that I'm good and baked and coughed myself into remembering I have broken ribs...I can explain this I think.
Lets start with explaining what I do. I add my "scrap" any plant matter I am not going to use as medicine gets recycled into my soil (aside from thick woody stems). It can be fresh or dry, I try to get it in there fresh. But it honestly doesn't matter. I add a handful of Root zone cover it with soil and water it. We will call this TUNING THE SOIL. This puts the soil energy "in tune" for our crop. Its just green mulching people have been doing it for hundreds of years. It's nothing new. I didn't reinvent the wheel. I just went back to find what they did back in the day to grow food properly before chemicals. With all this being said...
Your first round should cook per instructions with 20-30lbs of worm castings for at least 30 days. If you are able to tune this first run soil feel free to do so. If not save your trim.
You can just let the 2nd run rip if you wish. I did it was fantastic. However, if you tune it....it'll be 100% better.
After the second run. This is where things get good. I tune it and add 20lbs worm castings and a small bag of pro-mix + the 2nd amendment. Cook it for 30 days.
Third run tune it, cook it 30 days.
Fourth run tune it, cook it for 30 days.
Fifth run tune it, cook for 30 days.
To be continued at my discretion
Just a footnote. There are a few variables in this methodology. Pots are the biggest variable imo. I use smarties they allow for thin roots and loads of soil to recycle. I will not guarantee it will work with anything else. Remember this is just what has worked for me.
Also I usually only have about half of my soil in use at a time as well. So I constantly have some cooking.