My First No-Till Soil - Advice/Feedback Pls

H

Hazephase

Active Member
Hello Everyone,

This is my first time and a few people have given me guidance and I have done some reading and I should have what I need for a water only garden in which I can start 7 days after mixing roughly -- here we go:

20 gallons perlite
20 gallon peat moss
10 gallons EWC
10 gallons Compost -- still need to find a good one (in Canada)

then 4 cups of each:
- organic neem / karanja
- kelp meal
- alfalfa Meal
- crab Meal

32 cups of Rock dust:
-------- 22 cups of glacier rock
--------5 cups of bentonite ------is there anything else I can replace this with - told it would clump
------- 5 cups of oyster shell

Or I could go with this blend for Rock Dust - 32 cups but more expensive:

Rock blend – Basalt, Carbontite, Oyster, Soft rock and Woolastonite $51/ 10 lbs

Please give me feedback as I want to ensure I am on the right track.
I was told to wet this and mix it and let it sit for a week and then top with 2" of EWC and good to go.

Feedback please :)
 
Wilderb

Wilderb

Well-Known Member
Looks like you have a pretty good list. I don't use near that many amendments so I can't say much on most. I start with a bagged organic mix. Then I amend.
I use:
ewc (I use bagged and fresh)
kelp meal
alfalfa meal
biochar
blood & bone meal
lime
DE

I soak it and let it set as long as you can, watering about once a week or so. You'll see when you mix it how it feels. I go by this to decide how much drainage it needs. My last mix I was worried it was too clumpy but it seems it's the best so far, almost spongy. Plants are two weeks ahead of normal so clumpy it is!

Someone else will chime in and give you better answers on alot of that other stuff. Remember to keep your soil moist to keep it healthy.
Good Luck
WE
 
MistaRasta

MistaRasta

Well-Known Member
Hazephase said:
Hello Everyone,

This is my first time and a few people have given me guidance and I have done some reading and I should have what I need for a water only garden in which I can start 7 days after mixing roughly -- here we go:

20 gallons perlite
20 gallon peat moss
10 gallons EWC
10 gallons Compost -- still need to find a good one (in Canada)

then 4 cups of each:
- organic neem / karanja
- kelp meal
- alfalfa Meal
- crab Meal

32 cups of Rock dust:
-------- 22 cups of glacier rock
--------5 cups of bentonite ------is there anything else I can replace this with - told it would clump
------- 5 cups of oyster shell

Or I could go with this blend for Rock Dust - 32 cups but more expensive:

Rock blend – Basalt, Carbontite, Oyster, Soft rock and Woolastonite $51/ 10 lbs

Please give me feedback as I want to ensure I am on the right track.
I was told to wet this and mix it and let it sit for a week and then top with 2" of EWC and good to go.

Feedback please :)
Click to expand...
Your mix looks good, a couple of suggestions;

Organic Matter-
You have 60 gallons of soil which equals 8 cu ft.
So 4 cups would equal out to 2 cups of amendments per Cubic foot. IMO this is a bit much, 1 cup of amendments per cu ft is plenty. I personally go with a half cup on my inputs as it's always been plenty.

The alfalfa isn't needed as you're already toying with really high N levels coming from the Neem meal. I used to mix it (alfalfa) into my soil and only found problems with lockouts due to high N and K. I'd go with the neem/crab/kelp combo and hit with an alfalfa tea when you see fit as you'll indefinitely get more even coverage with it and it will go a lot further.

Remember, the more organic matter (crab meal/kelp meal/alfalfa meal) the less room their will be for oxygen. Especially after a run or 2 when your soil is nice and rich.

Minerals-
Forget the bentonite, with your high cec soil it will only make things muddy. The glacial and oyster are great. Your amounts of glacial look good, around 3 cups per cu ft, again, a little much but should do just fine. You'll have to up the amount of oyster shell flour to 8 cups (1 cup per cu ft) to get your base saturation of Ca up to at least 65% and add 1 cup gypsum per cu ft to get some immediately available calcium as the CaCo3 takes a little while to break down and become useable.

Edit:
The gypsum is also important as it adds sulfur to your soil, a necessary anion needed for a multitude of processes. Please don't skimp out on this cheap amendment, it is very necessary. I believe their is a thread on it a few clicks down, check it out.
 
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MistaRasta

MistaRasta

Well-Known Member
iHearAll said:
that much peat moss wont allow drainage boi
Click to expand...
It's not the peat, but the compost/worm castings and organic matter that hold the water.

This is what no till growers are looking for as this is a hybrid soil or living soil so their is no reason to drain as all cations/anions and trace minerals are balanced and available in the soil which are fed by the fungi and bacteria present, which need moisture at all times to thrive.

I personally use less compost as I've found Lots of Water + Lots of OM+ high Cec= no oxygen for the roots. Not to mention, when talking about cec in particular, I've found that having everything there isn't necessarily a good thing at certain times.
 
iHearAll

iHearAll

Well-Known Member
MistaRasta said:
It's not the peat, but the compost/worm castings and organic matter that hold the water.

This is what no till growers are looking for as this is a hybrid soil or living soil so their is no reason to drain as all cations/anions and trace minerals are balanced and available in the soil which are fed by the fungi and bacteria present, which need moisture at all times to thrive.

I personally use less compost as I've found Lots of Water + Lots of OM+ high Cec= no oxygen for the roots. Not to mention, when talking about cec in particular, I've found that having everything there isn't necessarily a good thing at certain times.
Click to expand...
so you keep the sides of the container completely saturated? and the plant is a bit drier in the center grabbing at the water?
 
MistaRasta

MistaRasta

Well-Known Member
iHearAll said:
so you keep the sides of the container completely saturated? and the plant is a bit drier in the center grabbing at the water?
Click to expand...
Not exactly. The idea behind no till is to keep the soil moist. Not wet, or damp, not dry, or on a wet/dry schedule. The whole volume of soil should stay constantly moist as to let the soil biology do its job working to give the plant what it needs.
 
NaturalFarmer

NaturalFarmer

Well-Known Member
Amshif87

Amshif87

Well-Known Member
According to coot and bluejay the basalt is the most important of the rock dusts. Gypsum also for the sulphur as previously mentioned. I believe coot is now omitting the oyster shell flour as the crab meal has calcium in abundance. I'll look through the no til revisited thread on GC but I can't make any promises as it's 360 pages long. 1/2 cup each of kelp, neem and crab are good so you're on track there. I also feel like the alfalfa is not necessary, but it wouldn't hurt to make a tea out of it and either foilar or water it in. I would get malted barley powder instead. Any home brew shop will carry malted barley. Buy whole and grind yourself. Coot an BJ don't even do SSTs anymore. Just put in your initial soil mix and topdress ass needed. Sorry for the rambling and lack of solid references. I'll pop back in after I look for those posts and sober up a bit. Stay safe and happy farming.
 
Amshif87

Amshif87

Well-Known Member
This is a question posed to Bluejay/MountainOrganics and then Coot/Lumper/AgnesDawgs response and lastly Bluejay's response

"I see you removed the oyster shell flower from your recipe. do you consider the crab meal to be your lime now?"

Coot,
"There's seems to be some confusion about crab meal (per se) and other crustacean meals, i,e, lobster, shrimp, crawdad and crab meals. They are 96.x% calcium carbonate just like oyster shells or limestone which is from ancient shell deposits from millions of years ago.

The chitin content in arthropods is found in thin layers between the layers of calcium carbonate. When microbial action begins to degrade chitin, this process is driven by bacteria producing the enzyme chitinase and it's this enzyme that is the pesticide and fungicide source - not the chitin itself."

Bluejay

"Same as AD mentioned above & the idea of using something specifically as a liming agent in this type of potting soil went out the window a long time ago.

The fact that most inputs we use have a wide range of benefits is definitely a topic of conversation...."

Hope this helps. I don't know if I'm breaking rules here but this thread invaluable when setting up your beds. And if you can read all 366 pages all of your no till questions will be answered. Stay safe and happy farming.

https://forum.grasscity.com/threads/no-till-gardening-revisited.1400505/
 
Kind Sir

Kind Sir

Well-Known Member
Good info dude, fuckin dig it. I also left alfalfa out of my mix, and have lower amendment ratios.

MistaRasta said:
Your mix looks good, a couple of suggestions;

Organic Matter-
You have 60 gallons of soil which equals 8 cu ft.
So 4 cups would equal out to 2 cups of amendments per Cubic foot. IMO this is a bit much, 1 cup of amendments per cu ft is plenty. I personally go with a half cup on my inputs as it's always been plenty.

The alfalfa isn't needed as you're already toying with really high N levels coming from the Neem meal. I used to mix it (alfalfa) into my soil and only found problems with lockouts due to high N and K. I'd go with the neem/crab/kelp combo and hit with an alfalfa tea when you see fit as you'll indefinitely get more even coverage with it and it will go a lot further.

Remember, the more organic matter (crab meal/kelp meal/alfalfa meal) the less room their will be for oxygen. Especially after a run or 2 when your soil is nice and rich.

Minerals-
Forget the bentonite, with your high cec soil it will only make things muddy. The glacial and oyster are great. Your amounts of glacial look good, around 3 cups per cu ft, again, a little much but should do just fine. You'll have to up the amount of oyster shell flour to 8 cups (1 cup per cu ft) to get your base saturation of Ca up to at least 65% and add 1 cup gypsum per cu ft to get some immediately available calcium as the CaCo3 takes a little while to break down and become useable.

Edit:
The gypsum is also important as it adds sulfur to your soil, a necessary anion needed for a multitude of processes. Please don't skimp out on this cheap amendment, it is very necessary. I believe their is a thread on it a few clicks down, check it out.
Click to expand...
 
ShLUbY

ShLUbY

Well-Known Member
MistaRasta said:
Your mix looks good, a couple of suggestions;

Organic Matter-
You have 60 gallons of soil which equals 8 cu ft.
So 4 cups would equal out to 2 cups of amendments per Cubic foot. IMO this is a bit much, 1 cup of amendments per cu ft is plenty. I personally go with a half cup on my inputs as it's always been plenty.

The alfalfa isn't needed as you're already toying with really high N levels coming from the Neem meal. I used to mix it (alfalfa) into my soil and only found problems with lockouts due to high N and K. I'd go with the neem/crab/kelp combo and hit with an alfalfa tea when you see fit as you'll indefinitely get more even coverage with it and it will go a lot further.

Remember, the more organic matter (crab meal/kelp meal/alfalfa meal) the less room their will be for oxygen. Especially after a run or 2 when your soil is nice and rich.

Minerals-
Forget the bentonite, with your high cec soil it will only make things muddy. The glacial and oyster are great. Your amounts of glacial look good, around 3 cups per cu ft, again, a little much but should do just fine. You'll have to up the amount of oyster shell flour to 8 cups (1 cup per cu ft) to get your base saturation of Ca up to at least 65% and add 1 cup gypsum per cu ft to get some immediately available calcium as the CaCo3 takes a little while to break down and become useable.

Edit:
The gypsum is also important as it adds sulfur to your soil, a necessary anion needed for a multitude of processes. Please don't skimp out on this cheap amendment, it is very necessary. I believe their is a thread on it a few clicks down, check it out.
Click to expand...
your math is off my man. if he has 8 cu.ft of soil, and 4 cups of each amendment... that's 1/2 cup of each amendment per cu.ft. .5 x 8 = 4 :)
 
MistaRasta

MistaRasta

Well-Known Member
Kind Sir said:
Good info dude, fuckin dig it. I also left alfalfa out of my mix, and have lower amendment ratios.
Click to expand...
Thank you Kind sir, a couple things..


I would never see happy plants with alfalfa in the mix. This is because the N levels in the coot mix are already sky high with neem alone. Put alfalfa in and you're locking out B and Ca from the get-go with all that N. Not a good way to start a plant, especially when lots of K is also involved..

Lower amendment ratios are key, more amendments, less oxygen.. as well as compost. The coot crowd puts around 30% compost in their soil which is ok, but I prefer to take it down to around 10-15%.
 
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natureboygrower

natureboygrower

Well-Known Member
sorry to stray a bit off topic guys.I followed coots mix last year and made up 6 35gallon bags.so I have one grow season with that soil.what should I amend with come spring when everything thaws out?I would imagine my soil mix is a bit depleted from last year's grow?this soil mix produced awesome results btw.
 
MistaRasta

MistaRasta

Well-Known Member
natureboygrower said:
sorry to stray a bit off topic guys.I followed coots mix last year and made up 6 35gallon bags.so I have one grow season with that soil.what should I amend with come spring when everything thaws out?I would imagine my soil mix is a bit depleted from last year's grow?this soil mix produced awesome results btw.
Click to expand...
Very subjective question..

What most people will tell you when following coots mix is to throw some neem and kelp meal on top then a layer of straw or a cover crop to get things going while waiting on potting the plant.

All depends on what you're wanting to achieve.
 
ShLUbY

ShLUbY

Well-Known Member
natureboygrower said:
sorry to stray a bit off topic guys.I followed coots mix last year and made up 6 35gallon bags.so I have one grow season with that soil.what should I amend with come spring when everything thaws out?I would imagine my soil mix is a bit depleted from last year's grow?this soil mix produced awesome results btw.
Click to expand...
i also think that some greensand is a great addition to the coots mix as it does not have very much K for bloom. I had much better results with that mix when I had greensand in it, and when I ran out i started having some K def in my plants that were growing fast and consuming a lot in flower
 
W

Wetdog

Well-Known Member
ShLUbY said:
i also think that some greensand is a great addition to the coots mix as it does not have very much K for bloom. I had much better results with that mix when I had greensand in it, and when I ran out i started having some K def in my plants that were growing fast and consuming a lot in flower
Click to expand...
Yeah, the greensand really seems to compliment the kelp meal, a real slow release of K.

Because it's so slow, what I'm doing as an experiment is adding some to the worm bin bedding. Not so much for the worms benefit as to let the 'crobes in there start it breaking down.

In my mixes, I really don't see much benefit till the second, or later, runs of the mix with the greensand, because it's so slow to release.

No results on the VC yet as those bins haven't been harvested yet. The worms are certainly thriving though. They'll get harvested in April or so, ~8 months from the last harvest, when the greensand bedding was added.

Wet
 
W

Wetdog

Well-Known Member
MistaRasta said:
Thank you Kind sir, a couple things..


I would never see happy plants with alfalfa in the mix. This is because the N levels in the coot mix are already sky high with neem alone. Put alfalfa in and you're locking out B and Ca from the get-go with all that N. Not a good way to start a plant, especially when lots of K is also involved..

Lower amendment ratios are key, more amendments, less oxygen.. as well as compost. The coot crowd puts around 30% compost in their soil which is ok, but I prefer to take it down to around 10-15%.
Click to expand...
Yeah buddy! Totally with you on the 10-15% compost bit, PLUS, fewer amendments and smaller amounts of amendments.

This is from experience and observation over the last 7 or so years when I went to organic inputs. Have ~45 years experience making the basic mix (peat, perlite, pine bark fines, lime), and using Jacks Classic.

The biggest thing I noticed following 'recipes' was, that the mix was entirely too dense and poorly aerated. Especially when using homegrown VC. Mine anyway, is dense as hell. No experience with any other, but much more than 10% just made mud. Very rich mud for sure, but still mud. Use of seed meals just added to the density.

*I* think this is where inexperienced growers run into problems, following these recipes to a "T", rather than a starting point or suggestion and not knowing how a well aerated/draining mix should look and act.

Wet
 
Kind Sir

Kind Sir

Well-Known Member
Oh wow, I have about the same amount of SPM as compost in my mix, but more aeration than anything else. Can I still cut a little SPM in it?

[
QUOTE="MistaRasta, post: 13374046, member: 115067"]Thank you Kind sir, a couple things..


I would never see happy plants with alfalfa in the mix. This is because the N levels in the coot mix are already sky high with neem alone. Put alfalfa in and you're locking out B and Ca from the get-go with all that N. Not a good way to start a plant, especially when lots of K is also involved..

Lower amendment ratios are key, more amendments, less oxygen.. as well as compost. The coot crowd puts around 30% compost in their soil which is ok, but I prefer to take it down to around 10-15%.[/QUOTE]
 
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