Growing Organic Tips - First time Grower

C

CannaR05!

Active Member
Hi this will be my first time growing cannabis organically and I was wondering if i could get a few tips from the growing community.

I will not be using my own super soil recipe for this grow.

I will be using a pre mixed bag of Fox Farm Ocean Forest soil mixed with Fox Farm Light warrior and Perlite.

I will be growing 3 Pineapple Express Sativa Dom Feminized Photoperiod plants.

I will be Vegging for a month since this strain takes 10-12 weeks in flower to harvest.

Since Fox Farm ocean forest soil can feed the plants for up to a month. Here is what i need to know:

Do I use dry amendments to feed the soil during the end of Veg? If so what dry amendments would you recommend?

are adding dry amendments and top dressing the soil the same thing?

What amendments do i add during flowering?

Should I use teas and dry amendments during both stages of growth or only one or the other and why?

What plant training techniques would you recommend for this strain?

Do i have to worry about ph and ppm as much as i do growing with synthetic nutrients?

Can you give your plants too many organic nutrients when feeding?

Do you think its easier or harder to grow organic vs synthetic?
 
H

Hash Hound

Well-Known Member
I just posted this to a conversation a fellow grower asked me about Dr Earth products. It has some of your questions and I'll try to address more.

I amend my soils with a cup+ of DrE and some worm castings sometimes minerals like azomite or dolomite etc. lightly water and let it cook for a month. I've used DrE Bud and Bloom and Tomato Veg together or alone alone all the way with no problems. My ratio is usually what ever's on hand. Sometimes I layer the B&B on the bottom half and T&V on the top half then let it cook right in the bag. It's a good product easy to use decent price.
I've grown using the multiple bottles and bloom additives things too, not worth the expense, problems, and to much hassle for an old guy any more.
I usually water only but approx every three weeks I make a tea with DrE and that's it. I use mostly 7g bags, if I use 5's I have had to top dress on occasion if the plant is a heavy feeder. I do the same for my friend and leave the ingredients in the tea jug so it's like a top dress too for what ever nutes were left in the ingredients. I don't use as much tea now that I'm using swicks.
It's even easier growing now that I'm using swicks. sub irrigated planter, using wicks.
Most people use a large tub of perlite and set the bag on top and let the water wick up.
I set the bag on top of a plant riser about 3 inches and have wicking rope draped over it wicking up the water. More water in the reservoir and no perlite. Some of my healthiest problem free grows lately.

heres a link to sips, not many swick users on here but same principal only a small cup of soil in the bottom is the wick. I learned about swicks on another thread.
https://www.rollitup.org/t/sip-thread-sub-irrigated-planter.904886/

I don't normally top dress. You might find some guys here top dressing. this a recent DrE thread. I think someone makes mention of being hard to use to much DrE, but I'm one who has always gone on the lighter side of nutes and my buds burn nice and clean.
https://www.rollitup.org/t/new-grow-dr-earth.1044345/


I grow using Black Gold or Promix Organic soil, but My friend uses Ocean Forest and the same DrE mixing minus the swicks, and he may top dress cause he may veg longer and grow bigger plants.
I rarely use bottled nutes now unless I use Roots organics to brew as a tea on occasion.
My friend uses Super Thrive, bottled bloom boosters etc and has occasional problems but he doesn't measure anything,
I messed with my ph twice and regretted it.
I use a lot of LST, super cropping and topping. Topping can slow a plant down a bit but make for a more manageable plant.

It doesn't get any easier, like I mentioned above, why mix a bunch of over priced bottles compared to mixing up a soil and watering.

heres a PE I did an LST on

G10 PE hrv cola 2 trim hand.jpg
 
C

CannaR05!

Active Member
Sweet thank you for all the helpful advice and that’s an awesome bud! I am also growing PE but since this is my first grow I am using synthetic nutes ha! Big mistake having soo many ph issues at a crucial time in the plants life! That’s why I am switching to organic but I am sticking with FFOF becuase I just bought another bag and I will be doing 3 3 gal pineapple expresses next grow! Cant wait!

here are some pics of my PE I am currently growing. She’s in week 9 of flower.
she’s in a 3 gal fabric pot and I’ve LST’d her since week 1 of Veg and everytime I need to tend to her up to week 2 of flower. I also defoliated her 4 times. At what week did you harvest your PE? Just want to see how close I am to harvesting her.
 

Attachments

C

CannaR05!

Active Member
Hash Hound said:
Looking good. I think she went 9 weeks
Click to expand...
she looks kinda small though in my opinion like she doesn't have thick buds. I know shes a sativa dom. I just thought they would be bigger :/. My goal is 2-3 oz at least. i do not think i will get there with this grow. I might with the next grow because I will incorporate super cropping with the LST and Defoliation. I am indifferent when i comes to topping.
 
Richard Drysift

Richard Drysift

Well-Known Member
A lot to unpack here....
I’ll go Q by Q and then I got some Qs for you:

1. No need to amend a bagged soil with anything but worm castings to start; up to 1/3 or your mix. FFOF soil will feed for much longer than 30 days if you keep it active. Adding vermicompost in solid or tea form helps maintain viability and prolongs sustainability of your mix. Amend the soil heavily after each run to recharge it.
What amendments you decide on depends upon what is available to you and your own preference really but at the very least you want npk and mineral inputs along with a form of active compost and/or a slow release fertilizer like cow or chicken manure. Having a worm bin or compost pile makes this much easier. I suggest to begin with get some kelp meal, fish bone meal, oyster shell flour and dolomite lime. Insect frass, neem seed meal, and blood meal are also good choices.

2. Not exactly the same but sort of the same idea... Top dressing is for when you cannot transplant right away; amending is done when there’s no plants growing in the mix. Amendments of any kind need time to be decomposed by microbial activity in order to become available the to root system.

3. Use same mix same amendments regardless of growth stage. Their needs do change but the idea is to put everything in the mix before it is needed and then you just water them. Naturally feeding plants only take what they need as needed.

4. You can but may not even need to. Teas maintain microbial activity which helps keep ph in range and prolongs sustainability. There are different recipes for different stages of growth but a simple all purpose worm tea will do much the same thing. No need to change recipes during each phase but if that is your desire that’s ok too.

5. LST, super cropping, monster cropping

6. No; if you keep your mix highly active by adding worm castings regularly in a tea or solid form that is enough for ph to remain in range for absorption.

7. Not impossible but because organic amendments are such slow release it’s real hard to burn the plants unlike synth nutes.

8. It is really a matter of preference. I think organic growing is much easier because the just water my plants and go to work. No checking ph or ppms or trying to figure out what the problem is. I switched to living soil because my weed always tasted funny but then again I used cheap nutes. Once you care for the soil and treat it as a living thing the plants take care of themselves.


So here’s my question to you:
Why are you mixing a weak soil with ocean forest? Use FFOF as is for mid size plants. Light warrior is good for seedlings and clones. Mixing together just makes an overall weaker soil.
 
Last edited:
Richard Drysift

Richard Drysift

Well-Known Member
CannaR05! said:
Sweet thank you for all the helpful advice and that’s an awesome bud! I am also growing PE but since this is my first grow I am using synthetic nutes ha! Big mistake having soo many ph issues at a crucial time in the plants life! That’s why I am switching to organic but I am sticking with FFOF becuase I just bought another bag and I will be doing 3 3 gal pineapple expresses next grow! Cant wait!

here are some pics of my PE I am currently growing. She’s in week 9 of flower.
she’s in a 3 gal fabric pot and I’ve LST’d her since week 1 of Veg and everytime I need to tend to her up to week 2 of flower. I also defoliated her 4 times. At what week did you harvest your PE? Just want to see how close I am to harvesting her.
Click to expand...
3-4 weeks maybe longer...
 
Richard Drysift

Richard Drysift

Well-Known Member
CannaR05! said:
she looks kinda small though in my opinion like she doesn't have thick buds. I know shes a sativa dom. I just thought they would be bigger :/. My goal is 2-3 oz at least. i do not think i will get there with this grow. I might with the next grow because I will incorporate super cropping with the LST and Defoliation. I am indifferent when i comes to topping.
Click to expand...
Don’t set a goal; yields come w/exp
 
C

CannaR05!

Active Member
Richard Drysift said:
A lot to unpack here....
I’ll go Q by Q and then I got some Qs for you:

1. No need to amend a bagged soil with anything but worm castings to start; up to 1/3 or your mix. FFOF soil will feed for much longer than 30 days if you keep it active. Adding vermicompost in solid or tea form helps maintain viability and prolongs sustainability of your mix. Amend the soil heavily after each run to recharge it.
What amendments you decide on depends upon what is available to you and your own preference really but at the very least you want npk and mineral inputs along with a form of active compost and/or a slow release fertilizer like cow or chicken manure. Having a worm bin or compost pile makes this much easier. I suggest to begin with get some kelp meal, fish bone meal, oyster shell flour and dolomite lime. Insect frass, neem seed meal, and blood meal are also good choices.
The above amendments are used to add to the FFOF after the first run to recharge the soil correct?

2. Not exactly the same but sort of the same idea... Top dressing is for when you cannot transplant right away; amending is done when there’s no plants growing in the mix. Amendments of any kind need time to be decomposed by microbial activity was n order to become available the to root system.

3. Use same mix same amendments regardless of growth stage. Their needs do change but the idea is to put everything in the mix before it is needed and then you just water them. Naturally feeding plants only take what they need as needed.


4. You can but may not even need to. Teas maintain microbial activity which helps keep ph in range and prolongs sustainability. There are different recipes for different stages of growth but a simple all purpose worm tea will do much the same thing. No need to change recipes during each phase but if that is your desire that’s ok too.
Should I top dress the soil as well or would that be too much? I've heard adding more P-K during flowering helps bud production . that is why I was wondering about the recipe change in teas or top dressings.

5. LST, super cropping, monster cropping
What exactly is Monster Cropping vs Super Cropping?

6. No; if you keep your mix highly active by adding worm castings regularly in a tea or solid form that is enough for ph to remain in range for absorption.
When you say regularly what do you mean by this? I heard when growing organic you dont need to constantly feed the plants and just water for like 2-3 week in between feedings. is this true?

7. Not impossible but because organic amendments are such slow release it’s real hard to burn the plants unlike synth nutes.
Then how do organic growers run into nutrient deficiencies?

8. It is really a matter of preference. I think organic growing is much easier because the just water my plants and go to work. No checking ph or ppms or trying to figure out what the problem is. I switched to living soil because my weed always tasted funny but then again I used cheap nutes. Once you care for the soil and treat it as a living thing the plants take care of themselves.
Makes sense.


So here’s my question to you:
Why are you mixing a weak soil with ocean forest? Use FFOF as is for mid size plants. Light warrior is good for seedlings and clones. Mixing together just makes an overall weaker soil.
Click to expand...
I am a new grower and I have heard mixed reviews about using FFOF and FF Light Warrior with Seedlings and even early Veg plants. People have mentioned that FFOF is hot soil and can burn the plants or even kill them. In fact my sister's husband just used a 50/50 mix of FFOF and Happy frog and it killed 3 of his auto flowering strains. So i used the mix I did becuase i did not want to kill my first grow so I mixed the FFOF with a decent amount of perlite and more FF Light warrior than the FFOF. I did this when I grew my 2 plants in solo cups to begin with and then did the same thing when i transplanted into 3 gal. fabric pots. Also since this is my first grow I did not know anything about organics so I went with synthetic nutrients. Definitely regretting it....constantly checking ph and ppm and fighting with it is a pain in the ass. If i wanted this much of a headache i would have just grown Hydro XD.

Anyway though I appreciate all of the advice and the nice order you answered my questions in. It will help me alot when I start my next grow with pure organic material.

P.S i posted a few follow up questions to your answers if you don't mind answering those too.
 
Southernontariogrower

Southernontariogrower

Well-Known Member
CannaR05! said:
Hi this will be my first time growing cannabis organically and I was wondering if i could get a few tips from the growing community.

I will not be using my own super soil recipe for this grow.

I will be using a pre mixed bag of Fox Farm Ocean Forest soil mixed with Fox Farm Light warrior and Perlite.

I will be growing 3 Pineapple Express Sativa Dom Feminized Photoperiod plants.

I will be Vegging for a month since this strain takes 10-12 weeks in flower to harvest.

Since Fox Farm ocean forest soil can feed the plants for up to a month. Here is what i need to know:

Do I use dry amendments to feed the soil during the end of Veg? If so what dry amendments would you recommend?

are adding dry amendments and top dressing the soil the same thing?

What amendments do i add during flowering?

Should I use teas and dry amendments during both stages of growth or only one or the other and why?

What plant training techniques would you recommend for this strain?

Do i have to worry about ph and ppm as much as i do growing with synthetic nutrients?

Can you give your plants too many organic nutrients when feeding?

Do you think its easier or harder to grow organic vs synthetic?
Click to expand...
Check out LABS lactic acid bacterium, good for organic growing. And non organic alike.
 
OSBuds

OSBuds

Well-Known Member
Korean Natural Farming aka: KNF
naturalfarminghawaii.net

KNF Police – LAB Lacto Bacillus (Recipe)

KNF Police are some of the toughest microbes around. They can live with or without oxygen, they persist at nearly boiling, and they multiply faster at room temperature than almost any other microbe…
naturalfarminghawaii.net naturalfarminghawaii.net

www.redbudsoilcompany.com

KNF Inputs

Using Korean Natural Farming practices in your no-till organic soil garden can reduce the use of fertilizers and pesticides. Buy KNF inputs for simple natural solutions to a healthy and happy grow.
www.redbudsoilcompany.com www.redbudsoilcompany.com

 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top