ShLUbY's Garden

Exciting developments!!
The way I see it, genetics is going to play an increasing role in the future, for all sorts of things! First "mainstream" ecosystemic approaches to the microbial populations of the soil look like they're going to start relying on genetic markers to follow the development of microbial group balances more and more, and it's likely not to be the only area where this is the case. So I suspect it'll be great for you to have that solid foundation there, way beyond "just" per se breeding!
Wohoo! So you're on it!!!! Congrats! Last time we talked, the greenhouse takeover was still up in the air! haha, you go man!!!

At the mo, I'm mainly rethinking my tea brewing, next Tuesday my biochar friend is dropping by and bringing me something I hope to make into a nice clean tank. I'm coming to the conclusion that my ACT woes were due to biofilms accumulating in diverse parts of my improvised setups, plus have been learning a thing or two regarding the brewing process that make me hopeful.

With the new brewer in place, I just have to find a good compost with a fungal:bacterial ratio of 2-5 (haha I suspect I'm going to have to make that myself first and postpone to next year), then I could be starting my proof of concept project this year!
An acquaintance from the local permaculture circle is allowing me to try remediating a severe downy mildew problem in a little vinyard nearby using the microbial approach. He's going to help trying to source that compost (and I may get hooked up with a good wood chips source for myself too in the process!), will probably be willing to help with any heavy lifting needed, and seems disposed to earnestly consider anything I may recommend in terms of management practices. But otherwise, I'm pretty much alone on it, which has its downsides, but also is getting me into the hands-on implementation side of things, raising specific questions I haven't been aware of to now. So a great learning opportunity, no matter how it pans out!

Cheers!

Hey SHluby I just got around to getting a few of my smaller vegging plants into the pseudo sips containers style you showed me. I just noticed after rereading your information that you use plastic pots in veg and then switch to fabric for larger plants...probably to flower?? Any reason for this? I use all fabric pots for the most part now until flower and then switch to plastic. Just curious if you have any input....

CaptainSnap said:

Hey SHluby I just got around to getting a few of my smaller vegging plants into the pseudo sips containers style you showed me. I just noticed after rereading your information that you use plastic pots in veg and then switch to fabric for larger plants...probably to flower?? Any reason for this? I use all fabric pots for the most part now until flower and then switch to plastic. Just curious if you have any input....

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Well sometimes, it just depends on what I have available at the time regarding the containers. for small plants that i'm planning on transplanting like solo's and 1 gals, ALWAYS plastic. easiest to transplant. Also, with a fabric pot as small as a one gallon, I feel like osmosis would have a hard time keeping with evaporation, so i'd be afraid of the 1 gal drying out too much around the sides, greatly limiting root space. this is mainly why i've been doing the SIPs in plastic containers.

For flower, again, typically i just use what I have available, which is a mix of plastic and fabric containers. I'm still trying to decide which i like better for 10 gal and under containers. fabrics are nice because they don't allow the roots to spiral in the container, and make them put out a more fibrous root system, utilizing the entire medium. where plastic pots i worry the roots just spiral too much (for larger containers) and don't use the entire substrate properly. So i'm still experimenting which I like better for those sizes. for No till 20 gal and larger, fabric all the way. there's enough soil to combat evaporation and still provide a large rhizosphere.

Thank you for summing up your reasons and explaining where your at with the fabric vs plastic containers. I've been contemplating the same thing for awhile now. I agree that anything 1 gallon and under isn't worth putting into fabric and is best in plastic. I was struggling to transplant my larger vegging plants in 3 and 5 gallon plastic containers so then I made some 3 and 5 gallon transplantable fabric pots! And I wish the larger fabric pots where easier to move around or that I had the height to put them on rollers...but for now plastic 20 gallon no tills is my only option!! Thanks again for clearing things up.

This plant is looking AMAZING. No-tilling away in veg. Just did a light defoliation and supper cropping trying to bush her out a bit. I'm thinking two more weeks and these two no tills will be ready to flip.



Just picked up this Pre-98 Bubba Kush from a friend. Can't wait to see how she looks once she acclimates to the living soil (rescued her from canna and coco grow LOL) too soon?



Just flipped the 5-gal pumice SIPs today, 3 Confidential Cheese. Defoliated them a bit and slight super cropping yesterday for these ladies. The pumice SIPs are working great. If this works well... I have an idea for a flood and drain pumice SIP table with living soil... how sick would that be?!?!





I'll be back with more tomorrow. Until next time....

ShLUbY said:

This plant is looking AMAZING. No-tilling away in veg. Just did a light defoliation and supper cropping trying to bush her out a bit. I'm thinking two more weeks and these two no tills will be ready to flip.

View attachment 4095735

Just picked up this Pre-98 Bubba Kush from a friend. Can't wait to see how she looks once she acclimates to the living soil (rescued her from canna and coco grow LOL) too soon?

View attachment 4095736

Just flipped the 5-gal pumice SIPs today, 3 Confidential Cheese. Defoliated them a bit and slight super cropping yesterday for these ladies. The pumice SIPs are working great. If this works well... I have an idea for a flood and drain pumice SIP table with living soil... how sick would that be?!?!

View attachment 4095737

View attachment 4095738

I'll be back with more tomorrow. Until next time....

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Rescued might be just a little bit of an strong word, now if it were AN or GH, I'd certainly say rescue would apply. Now you did certainly upgrade their living condions, no doubt about that. Maybe you cold convince them to transition to canna bio? Or you could just give them a bud wrapped in a cost summary of the no-till.

SSGrower said:

Rescued might be just a little bit of an strong word, now if it were AN or GH, I'd certainly say rescue would apply. Now you did certainly upgrade their living condions, no doubt about that. Maybe you cold convince them to transition to canna bio? Or you could just give them a bud wrapped in a cost summary of the no-till.

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no joke about the cost. Here, this plant cost me 6$ to grow start to finish (minus light obviously). LOL. shit, i'd be surprised if it was even that much in no-till... only cost is about 1.5 cups worth of topdressings other than water and light. I actually have not done a price breakdown on a home made soil. I think that'll be a fun project to do later this year. buy everything and mix from scratch, measure it all out and get a number per cu. ft. of soil... gotta be cheap AF.

More pumice SIP exciting action! Here's a little about my process for doing these... really really easy. They've been working awesome, i'm seeing more of this kinda stuff in my future.... really makes things easy. This is basically my procedure for any container size, even solo cups.

To start out, i took clean containers and filled them with rinsed pumice up to the top of the drainage holes, and packed it down firmly with the back of my hand so it was level and stable to put soil on top. once the pumice looks good, fill with soil to the depth you need to set in your transplant.






Next, unpot the plant, and I tickle out all the pumice from the previous SIP out from the roots, which leaves the roots free and unbound to quickly start growing out into the new container. note the size of that plant for such a small volume of soil. Honestly i'm impressed because they were showing no signs of malnutrition whatsoever.



Last, dust the hole and roots with benes, place the plant in the soil, backfill in the sides and top, and LIGHTLY water in the new soil just to settle the transplant a bit, but not enough to get runoff. the recycled soil was already at a good moisture content and didn't need much water at all. Lastly I topdressed with a pumice mulch and that was that!



I also did a 7 gal, along with the 5 gals just to see if there will be a difference in the end. I will take the weight of the 7 gal, and compare it to the average of the three 5 gals and see which has the better performance. I have a feeling the 7 gal is going to win lol. We shall see though! I'll include analysis when it's all done. Plants are going to veg for a couple more weeks and then i'll be flipping them.

Flower room updates tomorrow

By far one of the best methods for growing organic! Those plants are large for a 1 gallon...I'll be transplanting my 2 gallon sips containers this next week. Thanks for the quick tutorial as I wasn't sure if I should knock off the rocks before transplanting into the new sips.

ShLUbY said:

More pumice SIP exciting action! Here's a little about my process for doing these... really really easy. They've been working awesome, i'm seeing more of this kinda stuff in my future.... really makes things easy. This is basically my procedure for any container size, even solo cups.

To start out, i took clean containers and filled them with rinsed pumice up to the top of the drainage holes, and packed it down firmly with the back of my hand so it was level and stable to put soil on top. once the pumice looks good, fill with soil to the depth you need to set in your transplant.

View attachment 4099218
View attachment 4099219

View attachment 4099222

Next, unpot the plant, and I tickle out all the pumice from the previous SIP out from the roots, which leaves the roots free and unbound to quickly start growing out into the new container. note the size of that plant for such a small volume of soil. Honestly i'm impressed because they were showing no signs of malnutrition whatsoever.

View attachment 4099220

Last, dust the hole and roots with benes, place the plant in the soil, backfill in the sides and top, and LIGHTLY water in the new soil just to settle the transplant a bit, but not enough to get runoff. the recycled soil was already at a good moisture content and didn't need much water at all. Lastly I topdressed with a pumice mulch and that was that!

View attachment 4099228

I also did a 7 gal, along with the 5 gals just to see if there will be a difference in the end. I will take the weight of the 7 gal, and compare it to the average of the three 5 gals and see which has the better performance. I have a feeling the 7 gal is going to win lol. We shall see though! I'll include analysis when it's all done. Plants are going to veg for a couple more weeks and then i'll be flipping them.

Flower room updates tomorrow

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I think you are probably right about the 7gal, but I also think any difference will be highly dependant on veg time and wether or not the 5 gallon gets filled to capacity but not rootbound. What I wonder is if unrestricted root growth might not be desired because that energy to develop the roots could have been used to generate new vegitative growth. I belive the plant will develop excessive roots as a survival mechanism, Seems to me that some restricion on roots is actually a good thing, so long as the root mass can keep up with the nutrional demands of the plant.

SSGrower said:

I think you are probably right about the 7gal, but I also think any difference will be highly dependant on veg time and wether or not the 5 gallon gets filled to capacity but not rootbound. What I wonder is if unrestricted root growth might not be desired because that energy to develop the roots could have been used to generate new vegitative growth. I belive the plant will develop excessive roots as a survival mechanism, Seems to me that some restricion on roots is actually a good thing, so long as the root mass can keep up with the nutrional demands of the plant.

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but also the extra couple gallons of soil will mean more nutrition for the above soil portion of the plant. root growth and canopy growth go pretty hand in hand... although if you feed from a bottle, you can actually have a much smaller root zone then necessary, because of delivering readily available nutrients, it just has to be delivered often. I have no doubt the 5 gals won't even be close to capacity in 2 weeks time... it'll be just enough time for roots to be well recovered, colonizing effectively and meristematic growth will be peaking. this is going to be a fun little experiment and if it goes well, i have a plan to try a flood and drain table with pumice SIPs and living soil.

CaptainSnap said:

By far one of the best methods for growing organic! Those plants are large for a 1 gallon...I'll be transplanting my 2 gallon sips containers this next week. Thanks for the quick tutorial as I wasn't sure if I should knock off the rocks before transplanting into the new sips.

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hell, the actual root mass is more like a half gal... the pots i had them in aren't even really 1 gal in volume!

Always amazes me... 50 days and she is quite ready. no new budding sites for almost a week. Getting the chop.

Confidential Cheese




I think these would have benefitted from a larger container. the 10 gal fabrics didn't seem to be quite enough. VERY root bound. I can barely stick my finger into the soil! Have to run those big ones like that in the no-tills only. Interested to see how the three in the 5 gal plastic SIPs are going to do. They're much smaller lol

Beautiful grow ShLUbY! I’m late to your party but just read all 32 pages and love what you’re doing!

Your garden is Efficient,thoughtful and productive... all with sustainable methods that don’t require daily fiddling... what else are you looking to do to improve things?

(Subbed)

elkamino said:

Beautiful grow ShLUbY! I’m late to your party but just read all 32 pages and love what you’re doing!

Your garden is Efficient,thoughtful and productive... all with sustainable methods that don’t require daily fiddling... what else are you looking to do to improve things?

(Subbed)

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@elkamino, thank you so much man. I love sharing the journey and I love when people enjoy it! It is so much fun to grow things and I just love it. I might start looking into some permaculture for a business when I can get some land.

I have a lot of goals for the year for the garden...

- switch to all LED for flower room (currently leaning towards HLG 550 LED)
- start playing around with some breeding (have a couple crosses in mind already)
- tinker with the soil mix a bit and try to improve it
1. gonna start some new mixes and add some coco to them for retention: 75% peat, 25% coco for that portion
2. gonna try and push the soil a bit more, try a batch with 1.5x strength amendments.
- been toying with the pumice SIPS as you can see... thinking about trying a flood and drain with them if all goes well.
- get more/better control over my environment
- get on some tester lists, gonna try for Ocean Grown, Greenpoint, and maybe one more
- pondering starting a youtube vlog/grow channel for organics and seed/strain journals/reviews as well as experiments
- incorporate more no-tills

that's what I can think of off hand. I'll share more ideas as I continue to tinker with things. Will definitely be starting to add some analysis and comparison between a few methods once i get all my genetics figured out. i've acquired quite a few strains here recently and I need to sort through them all and narrow it down for the year. Currently in house: TGA's Dairy Queen and Jinxproof Shangri-La. DNA's Confidential Cheese. Sin City's Platinum DeLights. Local strain called Brainwreck. Pre-98 Bubba Kush. White Widow (can't remember the breeder at the moment). Bout to pick up TGA Agent Orange. Cherry Cream Pie (don't remember breeder). and I have Greenpoint's The Deputy and Texas Butter, but I won't get to popping seeds for at least a couple months.

TGA's Dairy Queen @ 35 days



Gorilla Glue @ 35 Days



Brainwreck 1 week from flip in 20gal no-till



Out of control aloe!!! Looks like it's time to thin this thing out and get some new pots going



SIPs are coming along well. Basically no transplant shock from what I can tell. Lollipopped them a bit, and planning on flipping them in 2 weeks as long as they stay on track!

More updates to come over the week. Spring Break! Not much more fun than gardening. Planning on tapping some maple trees tomorrow (I'm already late!)

Looking Impressive Man!! I just recently split my aloe but it wasn't nearly that out of control!! Thanks again for the pseudo sips suggestion for my veg tent....watering is way easier and growth is exploding!!

I also dig your list of goals for the coming year! Happy Gardening Shlub!!!!

I had an interesting discovery today. I've noticed my recent batch of plants in flower has stalled out after 3.5 weeks (they are like 5.5 now). They still look amazing and are frosting up like no other, but flower production is not progressing like what it should be. So I got my trusty Bluelab soil pH pen out... and both my no-tills are sittin at 7.3-7.5 in multiple testing sites. this was about 2 hours after a watering, so that should be the ideal time to test the pH (I would think). I had some elemental sulfur prills laying around from the sulfur burner (says soil sulfur right on the package). I found an agricultural institution page and they recommended a dosage per sq. ft. so I worked that out to approximately the size of my no till and figured out its about 1 oz. of sulfur to increase acidity by .5 . I went with about 3/4 of the application rate I figured out. I'm going to give it til the end of the weekend and test again and see what the meter reads. I have a feeling that the slightly alkaline soil is the reason for my stunted flower production. @DonTesla any ideas?

SO this has me wondering... I wonder if the worms have in some way neutralized the acidity of the peat from composting it... but then I think no they're not really divers so the lower portion of the peat should still be peat. So that has me wondering if I just have too much Ca++ in the soil (which seems weird being that I don't topdress much calcium other than crab shell, very little oyster shell in these no-tills), and the soil is staying slightly alkaline. I was considering sending this soil in for a test after this run just to get an idea of what exactly is going on in there so I can adjust my methods.

I also have some topdressing experiments going on with the 3 con cheese in the 5 gal SIPs that are in flower. they're about 11 days, i topdressed some compost and ferts. in one, i used 5 TBSP of bloom mix (a stand alone bloom), 1 TBSP of frass, and 2 TBSP of rock dust. In another i used 2 TBSP bio-live, 2 TBSP crab shell, 4 TBSP kelp, 1 TBSP fishbone meal, 1 TBSP frass, 2 TBSP oyster shell and 2 TBSP rock dust. and in the last one, i kinda made a blend of everything and thus a slightly heavier dose. I figured I'd see what individual mix performed better between the two, and the third being kind of a comparison control and just seeing how hard i can push them. I will be checking the pH of these containers next weekend to make sure they are staying slightly acidic.

There are specific instructions on the package of soil sulfer I use that say not for use in containers. That said I have used it for the last year and a half. I estimated the amount based on the surface area covereage if I used the soil I was mixing in a 1 foot deep outdoor bed. It was a pretty rough conversion because applicaion rate is 1-2 lbs per 100sq ft. Being that I was mixing roughly only 30 gallons of soil....same math as you did but for an amount to add initially as a suppliment, package dosent talk about pH. In my understanding it takes 6-8 weeks for the sulfur to begin to break down and become available as a nutrient and similarly for conversion by bacteria to sulfuric acid to affect pH.

I suspect along with pH impacts the reactivity of sulfur is another reason for the instruction not to use in containers.

SSGrower said:

There are specific instructions on the package of soil sulfer I use that say not for use in containers. That said I have used it for the last year and a half. I estimated the amount based on the surface area covereage if I used the soil I was mixing in a 1 foot deep outdoor bed. It was a pretty rough conversion because applicaion rate is 1-2 lbs per 100sq ft. Being that I was mixing roughly only 30 gallons of soil....same math as you did but for an amount to add initially as a suppliment, package dosent talk about pH. In my understanding it takes 6-8 weeks for the sulfur to begin to break down and become available as a nutrient and similarly for conversion by bacteria to sulfuric acid to affect pH.

I suspect along with pH impacts the reactivity of sulfur is another reason for the instruction not to use in containers.

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yeah i saw the same rate basically. The site had a neat chart for application amounts and how much you were trying to adjust the pH. 2lbs/100 sq ft to lower by .5 . my container is roughly 3 sq. ft. so i landed about about 1 oz. application. I didn't see anything that talked about the breakdown time. I'm hoping for a slight response in about a week lol. I just gave a compost tea here recently, so hopefully the microbes are very active and get to work on it.

I used gypsum with success prior to this... but it didn't last long (4-5 weeks for 1/4 cup), and i feel like it left the Ca behind and that's why i'm seeing the pH going back up. I'll report what I find out as it progresses. Thanks for your input though, greatly appreciated.

Today I mixed up a back to basics soil mix... time to start with one variable at a time again.

Base:
-1/2 part high quality coco, hydrated
-1/2 part hydrated peat
1 part pumice
1 part malibu's compost and what little castings I had left

Rock Dusts/Minerals:
- 2cup cu/ft basalt
- 1cup cu/ft glacial
- 1cup cu/ft greensand
- 1/2cup cu/ft oyster shell flour
- 1/2cup cu/ft gypsum

Amendments:
- 2/3cup cu/ft neem meal
- 2/3cup cu/ft crab meal
- 2/3cup cu/ft kelp meal
- 2/3cup cu/ft bio live
- 1/3cup cu/ft alfalfa

Going to start up a compost tea tomorrow, get it watered in by Sunday.