Originally Posted by babygro

It's certainly true that soil is the probably the best starting point for most newbie growers, but the rest of your advice here is unnecessary.

Not all soil is the same - some is much better than others and particularly Miracle Gro, which any newbie growing Canna should avoid like the plague due to its nasty time release fertiliser capsules.

A ph meter? Are you kidding me? You're advising a newbie to get a ph meter which is more than likely going to swallow up most of his budget when he doesn't even need one?

I would have thought you would have learnt and understood this by now Kieahtoka, but it seems not. Soil/compost/dirt whatever you want to call it is self-ph-buffering. That means in real terms that soil/compost contains ingredients with ph buffering capabilities. That means its going to take an awful lot of either very acidic or very alkaline irragation water to start moving the composts own ph value.

So if soil has the capability to buffer irrigation water very effectively why do you need to concern yourself with ph meters and phing your water when you don't need to? Thousands of growers grow perfectly healthy plants in soil without ever phing their soil or their irrigation water - I'm one of them - I've never ph'd my water once.

Newbies have enough to think about (and learn) without concerning themselves with ph or ph meters and ironically - that's why soil is so well suited to beginner growers - precisely because they don't have to concern themselves with ph or ph meters, like you would need to if growing in hydro.