I Finally Understand SuperSoil !!!

[MustangStudFarm]

I've been seriously contemplating going to a 3 or 5 gallon square pot, having quicker vege times, and just topping to get four colas, packing more plants in there, getting a faster turnaround..
The 15s and the 12s that I have take up a bunch of room, and being round theres wasted space...
Anyways... nothing wrong for the 15s if you like big plants, I just hate moving those bitches around.
plus I think I can pack more colas in with smaller containers... if anything the shorter vege times will get me an extra harvest each yr

This is the same plant from before, it has gone to shit! I have not added anything, just an AACT every 2 weeks...It might not be the exact plant, but the same clone from the same run.

 

[greasemonkeymann]

This is the same plant from before, it has gone to shit! I have not added anything, just an AACT every 2 weeks...It might not be the exact plant, but the same clone from the same run.

gone to shit? Whats wrong? I see a speck of maybe some heat damage, but the nugs look nice, does it normally fill out more?
Doesn't look bad to me man...
"I wouldn't kick her out of MY bed for eating crackers"

 

[Dr.Pecker]

This is the same plant from before, it has gone to shit! I have not added anything, just an AACT every 2 weeks...It might not be the exact plant, but the same clone from the same run.

I don't see anything wrong. You might have a root bound problem like you said. Can you pull the whole thing out like a cork? This plant was root bound in super soil. 1 gallon pot

 

[hillbill]

Don't worry be happy. Maybe alfalfa tea or ec tea or top dress. Light P supplement maybe and looks a bit like it's trying to hold on to water.

 

[Wetdog]

I think that I used too much dolomite lime last year and it finally broke down. Now I am having all kinds of issues, probably PH too high? It looks like my old flood table!

I just gotta call BS on the too much dolo, unless you're like 3cups+/cf of mix. It's fucking ground up rock for christsakes!

An ACCT every 2 weeks!? I think it's been about three years since I've used any sort of tea. Between the comfrey and my own VC there just hasn't been any need.

I'm really not trying to rude you out, but when benign stuff like dolo gets blamed and much more 'potent' stuff is not even being considered ..... Stuff like alfalfa, kelp, and neem are great ... in small, spread out doses. VOE here. Even with 40+ years of growing 'stuff', I did the "if a little is good, more would be great', fuck up. At least all those years of experience clued me in right quick to what I did.

The two biggest things you can do is start a worm bin (but I think you have, yes?), and start a comfrey patch next spring. GMM spreads his around, I mainly feed it to my worms due to laziness, but the VC is amazing! However you use it, it's amazing stuff. Bocking 14 cultivar. Got mine from Horizon Herbs, 6 crown cuttings are plenty.

I also do leaf compost, but they are part of my raised beds and only in the second year, so nothing really harvested, yet.

Anyway, relax, quit overthinking it and enjoy the garden.

Wet

 

[greasemonkeymann]

I don't see anything wrong. You might have a root bound problem like you said. Can you pull the whole thing out like a cork? This plant was root bound in super soil. 1 gallon pot View attachment 3593765 View attachment 3593761

hahah rootbound eh?
Are you SURE??
Damn.. looks like a ball of twine

 

[Dr.Pecker]

hahah rootbound eh?
Are you SURE??
Damn.. looks like a ball of twine

View attachment 3594513

she bounced back this is the same exact plant

 

[greasemonkeymann]

she bounced back this is the same exact plant View attachment 3594521View attachment 3594524

curious.... did you "prune" the rootball?
I never do, and I always have huge roots, some swear by it, but I never understood the scientific reasoning behind it..

 

[Dr.Pecker]

curious.... did you "prune" the rootball?
I never do, and I always have huge roots, some swear by it, but I never understood the scientific reasoning behind it..

No, I just broke it up a bit put it into a five then a fifty gallon hole. Something like dwc or hydro might need to be trimmed because it can clog drainage holes or choke its self. More root mass in the water means less water. Pruning the roots causes it to grow smaller feeder roots. also if your roots have dead spots they can create pathogens. There's a lot of info on the subject. Think about smart pots, they air prune roots and I've seen some monster plants in smart pots.

 

[greasemonkeymann]

r

No, I just broke it up a bit put it into a five then a fifty gallon hole. Something like dwc or hydro might need to be trimmed because it can clog drainage holes or choke its self. More root mass in the water means less water. Pruning the roots causes it to grow smaller feeder roots. also if your roots have dead spots they can create pathogens. There's a lot of info on the subject. Think about smart pots, they air prune roots and I've seen some monster plants in smart pots.

I just never prune anything, seemed to me like defoliating...
But my roots are always white, fuzzy, and hairy too.
But I just plop them in the soil and they poof out in like hrs
also my "honeymoon" with the smartpots is about over... I had an extra clone that I didn't have a smartpot leftover for, and so I put it in a 2 gallon square plastic container.. and i'll be damned if that clone didn't outperform it's sister in the 5 gal smartpot.
same recycled soil, water only.
Less of a "footprint" too...
I'm gonna do arun with oldschool plastic containers and see if my suspicion is right..

 

[Wetdog]

r
I just never prune anything, seemed to me like defoliating...
But my roots are always white, fuzzy, and hairy too.
But I just plop them in the soil and they poof out in like hrs
also my "honeymoon" with the smartpots is about over... I had an extra clone that I didn't have a smartpot leftover for, and so I put it in a 2 gallon square plastic container.. and i'll be damned if that clone didn't outperform it's sister in the 5 gal smartpot.
same recycled soil, water only.
Less of a "footprint" too...
I'm gonna do arun with oldschool plastic containers and see if my suspicion is right..

Heh. I was thinking about starting a thread asking who was moving away from smartpots. It seems more than a few after using them for a number of years are going back to the 'old school' containers. I tried them once, years ago, but they proved to be a PITA to move around (no handles then), and transplanting. Most of the complaints I hear now involve watering/maintaining moisture levels. IDK, haven't paid much attention to them after seeing they didn't fit my style.

Have used the square pots for years and recently another sq pot user pointed out that you don't get the roots circling around like in round pots.... Something I had never noticed.

I don't root prune either, but might score the root ball if it's really root bound. Razor knife with just a bit of the tip exposed works great. Like 1/8" or so of exposed blade, enough to cut the surface.

Wet

 

[greasemonkeymann]

Heh. I was thinking about starting a thread asking who was moving away from smartpots. It seems more than a few after using them for a number of years are going back to the 'old school' containers. I tried them once, years ago, but they proved to be a PITA to move around (no handles then), and transplanting. Most of the complaints I hear now involve watering/maintaining moisture levels. IDK, haven't paid much attention to them after seeing they didn't fit my style.

Have used the square pots for years and recently another sq pot user pointed out that you don't get the roots circling around like in round pots.... Something I had never noticed.

I don't root prune either, but might score the root ball if it's really root bound. Razor knife with just a bit of the tip exposed works great. Like 1/8" or so of exposed blade, enough to cut the surface.

Wet

I don't know if it's because they absorb water differently or what, but I do have a theory..
A plastic pot doesn't flex when moved right? I mean we all know that, so, when the smartpots are moved at all, the "settle" and it I think THATS where the problems is, when I reamend I notice the soil in the smartpots are a lil denser, which is why I abandoned the strict no-till, because of soil compaction.
In the plastic containers, it seems to me that the soil hold it's original "fluffy" texture.
Or the other theory is the way you need to water the smartpots may be settling the soil also.
SOMETHING is making the soil more dense.
The times I've seen smartpots perform VERY well are in bigass containers, for outdoor plants.
But those things never move.
But outdoor in the 100+ temps, with wet cardboard on the soil surface and they don't even slow down, in fact they seem to excel..
JUST keep the roots cool..
Honestly the biggest thing that pisses me off are those "corners" of unuseable floor space.. each smartpot is round and the corners drive me nuts... if they were square, I could fit three more plants in there...
Good to know that another veteran grower has been on the same thought process though...
Good to know..

 

[greasemonkeymann]

was just going to add that really, in my experience soil compaction is something cannabis HATES... that and "wet feet"
you can have the soil ingredients just PERFECT, but if the soil isn't aerated right they'll be pissed off..
And low amounts of aeration/oxygen creates alllll sorts of shit...
Keep the soil a light fluffy aerated "humid" like environment and they go CRAZY... even with very, VERY, little food...
a good FRESH Humus is the key to it all... and somehow the most overlooked

 

[Kaptain Kronic]

just tweak the ingredients, tweak the method, don't layer, and you'll be golden.
build the soil different and you don't need any calmag...

i have been studying amendments, but i'm certainly not an "amendment know it all" also ... so having said that, what amendments are good for calcium and magneseum? i want my soil to take care of everything, and me only hafta water, so i like this idea.

 

[greasemonkeymann]

i have been studying amendments, but i'm certainly not an "amendment know it all" also ... so having said that, what amendments are good for calcium and magneseum? i want my soil to take care of everything, and me only hafta water, so i like this idea.

cal and mag are available in a bunch of stuff, but I rely on comfrey, the ratio between the two seems to be a good mix.
black strap molasses has it, langbeinite does as well (cant remember if it has calcium too)
neem seed meal has it.
Oyster shell or flour would have the cal
Comfrey is awesome though, BUT I also have well water, and i'm sure I have a good amount of minerals in that as well.
careful using molasses as the source though, I think the potassium is too high in it

 

[Kaptain Kronic]

Sub cool you ever seen the Goof before ??? i mean really almost every dam grower that tried his soil , has had nothing but problems ,, really curious if anyone made his so called soil and then took it in for testing ??? i bet its out of wack. to much of everything. I mean really How hard is it to make a soil

well, it appears to be doing well with what my friend is doing. he's getting nice yields and tasty buds. i think alot of times people could be using too much supersoil, sub talks about different strains liking more or less depending on the strain, and i think that needs to be taken into consideration.

 

[Kaptain Kronic]

just tweak the ingredients, tweak the method, don't layer, and you'll be golden.
build the soil different and you don't need any calmag...

thinking about replacing the blood meal in the recipe with feather meal, and the cattle bone meal with fish bone meal, and maybe tweaking a couple of other things to help build the biologics of the plant. what do you think of this?

 

[greasemonkeymann]

thinking about replacing the blood meal in the recipe with feather meal, and the cattle bone meal with fish bone meal, and maybe tweaking a couple of other things to help build the biologics of the plant. what do you think of this?

the feather meal is super slow release probably nothing available until at least a good 6 months or more., and is also loaded with arsenic, for blood meal the best replacement is probably alfalfa meal, with crab meal as the slower release nitrogen input" behind" it. Also I have neem and insect meal in my mixes as well as fish meal, so my nitrogen comes from different areas, and in different cycling rates.. You want slow, med, and fast releases of it to support your plants growth, cannabis takes a BUNCH of nitrogen
And fishbone meal is a GOOD replacement for bovine bonemeal.
Feather meal is awesome, but with the arsenic I don't use it, apparently they use it to strip the feathers off.

 

[Wetdog]

i have been studying amendments, but i'm certainly not an "amendment know it all" also ... so having said that, what amendments are good for calcium and magneseum? i want my soil to take care of everything, and me only hafta water, so i like this idea.

Hmmmm ... When I want both Ca and Mg Dolomite lime comes to mind. Especially when I'm liming for tomatoes and to a lesser degree peppers. I do use more than one liming agent and several Ca sources.

But dolo is a good twofer when you want both.

Wet

 

[PapaT]

I'm on my first small indoor grow from mexican bag seed. I have a good soil mix (Premium Top Soil, Perlite, Lime, Bone and Blood Meal, and worm castings. Plants are doing well (healthy) and are 4 weeks old. My question is do I need to add nutes to the plants in this soil mix? I read that this soil mix is all the plant will ever need. I don't have time for a second grow and I'm trying really hard not to screw this up. Thanks in advance.