Foxfarm Happy frog or ocean forest ???

NightbirdX

NightbirdX

Well-Known Member
Sorry got tired of reading all the jibber jabber so I just skipped ahead to post. I am using Happy Frog soil at the moment. At first when I started adding the low end of my BioCanna nutes and it burned my plants. I fed water for 2 weeks and then started feeding again in flower, it burned my plants. In the second week of Flowering am I finally comfortable using a regular dosage of nutrients. Happy Frog is very hot, I cut it with Pro-Mix now in a 1:1 ratio and the plants love it. The problem I was having with Happy Frog was that it wasn't absorbing water well. The water was just running off and then sitting in the pan at the bottom, then it would soak it up over night. I never felt that my plants were totally dry. When I started adding Pro-Mix to it, it started absorbing the water perfectly and drying out much better and evenly.

I would not advise using ANY straight up fertilized soil by itself. I would cut it with a soilless medium at least 1:1. Especially if you plan on using a nutrient line. I could have just added water during veg for my plants in 100% Happy Frog and they would have been fine. Whether you choose HF or OF, cut it with something.

I didn't end up going with OF because I had read a bunch of people stating that it can be buggy and they had gnat and other pest infestations when switching to OF. Subcool himself says that he will not use it or advise anyone to use it due to its buginess. That sealed the deal for me. I haven't had any bug issues with my HF. I am sure that they will both probably perform similarly it is just going to be up to your personal preference

To say that one is better than the other or that one is cheaper than the other is just an ignorant comment. Both companies are internationally know for quality products. Some people had a bad experience and burned the piss out of their plants or did something wrong and rather than admitting that they made any mistakes or that there are any flaws in their grow, they blame it on poor soil.

Do your research, make your choice on how you feel. You will change your mind again in a few months, lol.

I personally was thinking about using OF and Light Warrior just to see how it was. I think either way you will be happy once you dial it in to how you grow.
 
H

Harry Sachs

Member
I use both Happy Frog and Ocean Forest with great results. I use the frog on young plants and transplant with the forest right before flowering.

Last veg transplant i ran out of happy frog on the last pot and used ocean forrest. Three weeks later that plant is almost 25% larger than the rest with no burning at all. I guess next time I will try that again with all.

So my suggestion is use both depending on the stage of growth.
 
A

Alex Farnsworth

New Member
Happy frog is great and anything but low end, it's sold in nurseries because it's a living land soil with lots of good microbs and fungi, all that help break down organic matter increasing the roots intake of nutrients! Ocean floor is good too, it's called ocean floor because there are various fish meals added to the compost pile. I have used both by them selfs and a mix, I find that with OF I need to add microbes myself... In conclusion all I added for vegg was calling mag for both (aside from the fungi and living microbes for ocean) all the way to flower!!!! Depending on the strain I haven't about three oz per plant, these soils are both excellent and you really can't go wrong... If I had any suggestions it would be to use ff products because the are tested and 100 percent compatable with one another, and as always, ENJOY YOUR GROW! that's what's it is about after all. Happy growing.
 
tstick

tstick

Well-Known Member
I've used them both and also Roots Organic and then I've ended up with leftovers of each and mixed them all. I always stress to people they should cut the FF soils with at least 50% perlite when using it for indoor cannabis. I get the chunkiest perlite I can find. Otherwise, the FF soils tend to be very dense and heavy, imo.
 
Zipoa334

Zipoa334

Member
anberlinaddict said:
I HATE the soil I use now.

which is called thunderhead from my hydro shop.


Ill be growing 3 snow white Feminized plants.

Should I use happy frog or ocean forrest?
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mix just a little of the happy frog like a quarter of a 5gallon pot, helps with the plants that feed on nitrogen more so.
 
FirstCavApache64

FirstCavApache64

Well-Known Member
Try Roots Organic potting mix. It has all the perlite you need already mixed in unlike Fox Farms which you need to add perlite to which is a pain in the ass. Also after using both HF and OF for the last three years I have had a bunch of bad batches of soil from Fox Farms in the last year that have come with fungus gnat larvae and PH way out of whack so I just gave up on them and tried the Roots stuff. It was way better quality I could see in the actual soil. Less big sticks and chunks of huge bark and more broken down soil. Just my two cents as everybody seems to have a favorite but the difference between the two was big and the Roots was cheaper at the garden center.
 
Week4@inCharge

Week4@inCharge

Well-Known Member
SBBCal said:
Happy frog w/ added perlite, mycorrhizae added when transplanting. I usually ph 6.6-7.0 due to the acid buffer they put in it.
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I have 1.5 cubic bag of the Ocean Forest and was thinking of mixing it with Happy Frog. And have a bag of the Perlite as well. And yeah, I've heard and read a lot of stories about the fungus Gnats. So airing out the soil at the moment. Will do the same for the Happy Frog after I mix in the Perlite. I am gonna look up this Roots Organics before going all in with the Happy Frog. Almost convinced to try this. oh. nevermind, it's a Coco based soil. I'm currently gonna go all organic grow soon so Coco is a no go at the moment (personal preference).. looks awesome though, might try that on my springtime grow.
 
FirstCavApache64

FirstCavApache64

Well-Known Member
Airing out the soil isn't going to get rid of the fungus gnats. They lay eggs in the soil and have an entire life cycle going on. You'll probably need to kill the larvae to interrupt the cycle as well as get rid of the adults. Also, Roots has a ton of different soil mixes/products not sure which one you're looking at but check out all of them before you decide between the two companies. Fox Farms stuff is junk the last year and I had several root issues because of it. I've been growing for only 5 years but it had always been HF to start and then into OF but since this past years issues I'm done. Good luck with whichever you choose. A good bag of HF is great when you add about a third more perlite by volume as is ocean forest with about 25 percent extra perlite. But you need to find good perlite and rinse the crap out of it to get all the damn dust off it and that gets old for larger volumes of soil.
 
Week4@inCharge

Week4@inCharge

Well-Known Member
FirstCavApache64 said:
Airing out the soil isn't going to get rid of the fungus gnats. They lay eggs in the soil and have an entire life cycle going on. You'll probably need to kill the larvae to interrupt the cycle as well as get rid of the adults. Also, Roots has a ton of different soil mixes/products not sure which one you're looking at but check out all of them before you decide between the two companies. Fox Farms stuff is junk the last year and I had several root issues because of it. I've been growing for only 5 years but it had always been HF to start and then into OF but since this past years issues I'm done. Good luck with whichever you choose. A good bag of HF is great when you add about a third more perlite by volume as is ocean forest with about 25 percent extra perlite. But you need to find good perlite and rinse the crap out of it to get all the damn dust off it and that gets old for larger volumes of soil.
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Good to know, thanks, I Googled Roots Organics and first thing up was the Coco mix. I'll take another look, thanks for info. My current grow, (almost ready for harvest) is with a similar soil (Vermisoil) and I had no idea it was Coco based...lol.. yeah, know your soil guys when growing. ( yes first grow for me so learning tons as I go here) good thing this stuff is weed, because you know, it grows like weed.

original-potting-soil — Aurora Innovations

www.aurorainnovations.com www.aurorainnovations.com
 
Week4@inCharge

Week4@inCharge

Well-Known Member
Three Berries said:
My current grow is one of each. OKush in Happy Frog and GDPurple in Ocean Forest. Happy Frog dries out faster and shows nute burn if you add any during Veg.
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Is that .. OG Kush? Interesting, You'd think the "hot" soil of the bunch would be giving you the Nute burn.. o_O and Happy Frog is reported to not drain as well ...well what da heck?
 
Three Berries

Three Berries

Well-Known Member
Week4@inCharge said:
Is that .. OG Kush? Interesting, You'd think the "hot" soil of the bunch would be giving you the Nute burn.. o_O and Happy Frog is reported to not drain as well ...well what da heck?
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Right now they are in too big of pots 3.5 gal. Probably only been watered three or four times in 7 weeks and then sparingly, 1 time to runoff. Been using it for about 5 years. Still haven't learned that it hardly needs any nutes.

This time I first time saturated it with limestone water.
 
Week4@inCharge

Week4@inCharge

Well-Known Member
Three Berries said:
Right now they are in too big of pots 3.5 gal. Probably only been watered three or four times in 7 weeks and then sparingly, 1 time to runoff. Been using it for about 5 years. Still haven't learned that it hardly needs any nutes.

This time I first time saturated it with limestone water.
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Have some OG Ksh peanuts stashed away, anxious to get them going but are in line behind the MAC1 at the moment, looking forward to your grow. Do you have a grow log going?
 
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