100 gallon smart pots indoors

[Rasta Roy]

I'm curious about why you felt you needed such deep containers. Why wouldn't 6" deep trays have worked?

While the beds were a thought over decision, the containers themselves were an impulse buy. Why did I feel I needed them so deep? In all honesty I didn't put any thought into it, just went for it. In hindsight, do I wish I had something a little more shallow? Oh yeah. But here I am lol.

Now I'm just hoping for deep roots and big fruits!

 

[ttystikk]

While the beds were a thought over decision, the containers themselves were an impulse buy. Why did I feel I needed them so deep? In all honesty I didn't put any thought into it, just went for it. In hindsight, do I wish I had something a little more shallow? Oh yeah. But here I am lol.

Now I'm just hoping for deep roots and big fruits!

And here I was digging for a DEEP discussion about hidden subterranean processes...

 

[NaturalFarmer]

Were you successful with just Neem on your mothers? My condolences on the Borg. That sucks, but I am very interested if you get rid of them this way.

 

[Rasta Roy]

And here I was digging for a DEEP discussion about hidden subterranean processes...

Haha sorry my man! I try to have a reason for most things I do but I also jump into some things and think about them later. After these girls are done though we can see if the roots made it down all the way.

I'm working on building a trough bed for another room, that one will have a more traditional depth and I'll be able to post some comparisons.

 

[Rasta Roy]

Were you successful with just Neem on your mothers? My condolences on the Borg. That sucks, but I am very interested if you get rid of them this way.

To just say yes would undersell the amount of work that went into it. Cause I will say for most people, you should probably go buy some avid or other sure to work miticides.

I sprayed with neem twice a day, I also by hand, every three days would wash every inch of the plant with dish soap (no scents) and water. I kept strong fans blowing on them. I played "You Can Call Me Al" over and over again until they couldn't take it anymore.

Persistence is the key.

 

[Rasta Roy]

This was over the course of a month of doing this every single day without respite.

 

[gotkush?]

Broad mites are hell, especially in flower. Raising the temps to 100+ is about the only way to hamper them at that point.
I like to spray my plants periodically with Neem through out veg for a number of reasons, but I believe it also helps deter mite infestation during flower as well.
For fungus gnats, "Gnat-rol" works great.

 

[Rasta Roy]

Broad mites are hell, especially in flower. Raising the temps to 100+ is about the only way to hamper them at that point.
I like to spray my plants periodically with Neem through out veg for a number of reasons, but I believe it also helps deter mite infestation during flower as well.
For fungus gnats, "Gnat-rol" works great.

When they first showed up I thought I was seeing signs of heat stress, they are some tricky fuckers. I've yet to see them return but I still do biweekly neem sprays on my mothers and I just stopped spraying my flowering plants five or six days ago. Unless I need to of course, but I'm hoping to leave em untouched from here on out.

I've had a few different things work well for gnats, most effective definitely being the mosquito dunks but lately I just make little slurries with some munched rosemary leaves and water with that everyonce and a while.

 

[Amshif87]

I'm curious about why you felt you needed such deep containers. Why wouldn't 6" deep trays have worked?

I can't speak for @Rasta Roy but for me I feel that while growing from seeds the tap root takes advantage of the extra depth. Plus in a no til where keeping moisture levels right, the extra soil gives a larger buffer before you're harming your benneficials and microherd. Josh's Steensland is running shallower 4x8 no tills on his YouTube channel but he uses blumats so moisture level is at a constant.

 

[Rasta Roy]

Here is some pics of the buds right now.

Six weeks into flower.

Blueberry


Opium



Bubba Kush

LA Pure Kush

 

[Rasta Roy]

I've been bad about updating this!

I didn't even document the last round I grew in these big ol pots!

I'm currently just running three 1000w lights. One 100 gallon smart bed under each, some 10 gallon pots and 20 gallon tubs in the in between areas catching the spill over light.

I didn't add any fertilizers for resending in the beds, I just added castings from my worm bin and compost from my yard when I replanted. Every three weeks I harvest castings from my worms and mulch the beds with them. The 10 gallon pots have used soil that I used for worm bin bedding, the bin had a bunch of food scraps and rabbit shit. I planted the plants directly into this with no additional components.

The 20 gallons tubs are used soil mixed with compost, castings, and uncomposted rabbit manure.
Here is everything on initial planting. September 3rd.



A few days later on September 6th.

September 8th

September 13th, day I switched to flower


A few from September16th


September 22

September 27th

 

[Rasta Roy]

These are all from September 30th

 

[cindysid]

How much yield did you get last time? Looks like a thicket!

 

[Rasta Roy]

How much yield did you get last time? Looks like a thicket!

It gets pretty thick! I run my lights wide open and the way i have them and the plants arranged I get side growth like im growing vertical.

I'm actually still finishing trimming shit from my last round lol, so I don't have a complete total yet! I'm on my way to average about a pound and a half. I did run some of my lower yielders, and I was in Europe for half their life cycle. The friend I had take care of them let them get a little tall so they were a little closer to the light then i would have liked in flower. this definitely reduced some of the yield for my top nugs. This round I'm only running one strain and i'll be here for all of it. My biggest curiosity is how big my yield will be with the short veg time I did this time around.

 

[cindysid]

It gets pretty thick! I run my lights wide open and the way i have them and the plants arranged I get side growth like im growing vertical.

I'm actually still finishing trimming shit from my last round lol, so I don't have a complete total yet! I'm on my way to average about a pound and a half. I did run some of my lower yielders, and I was in Europe for half their life cycle. The friend I had take care of them let them get a little tall so they were a little closer to the light then i would have liked in flower. this definitely reduced some of the yield for my top nugs. This round I'm only running one strain and i'll be here for all of it. My biggest curiosity is how big my yield will be with the short veg time I did this time around.

Please post your results! I will definitely be watching.

 

[Rasta Roy]

Please post your results! I will definitely be watching.

Will do! I'll try to stay on top of posting pics as they go.

 

[Rasta Roy]

And here they are at present.

October 3

 

[calliandra]

Ah wonderful, Rasta Roy - thanks for updating!
Just lately I've been conundering more intensely about our pot cultures again, haha
And from that, I'm thinking your regimen of adding VC every 3 weeks is exactly what is essential - even in big pots, the environmental stresses our soils are exposed to in our growrooms probably do require regular restocking, as a fundamental measure. I no longer believe a perennial cover crop - while it can be helpful in quite a few ways - can fully buffer the effects of isolating a chunk of soil from the rest of the Earth. Maybe we just haven't found the perfect companions yet? Possibly, but pending that, whatever we do, mulch, cover crop, amend or no (while we have seen our soils tend to get totally overcharged with everything the rate we're adding amendments lol).. we've gotta re-innoculate, and the extremer the conditions, the more often.
I'm going to be doing time course microbial observations of my pot soil in the next few months, hoping for a bit more insight from that!

Have you perchance had your composts checked for microbiology?! I'd be really excited to hear about the balance you have in there!!
Cheers!!

 

[swedsteven]

Wow i love this .perfect look tasty!!!

 

[Rasta Roy]

October 7th