How do you respond to deficiencies organically?

I'm getting some bad n def. After keeping a clone in 1 gallon of soil mix for 3 weeks. I amended with more ewc, and repoted into 5 gallons of amended soil, but I'm still showing signs of n def. How do you respond quickly and minimize stunting

papa canna said:

I'm getting some bad n def. After keeping a clone in 1 gallon of soil mix for 3 weeks. I amended with more ewc, and repoted into 5 gallons of amended soil, but I'm still showing signs of n def. How do you respond quickly and minimize stunting

Click to expand...

Fish hydroslate or fish emulsions, alfalfa tea/topdress/foliar.

Most immediately available would be the fish.

this round I ran a long veg while mainlining and had multiple deficiencies as I wasn't really prepared for how long mainlining actually took, out of option I grabbed some jobes organic granular 2 7 4 and 4 4 4, I made a "tea" out of the 2 7 4 and it bounced back pretty quickly, I almost gave up on them

from now on I will keep these in my arsenal with my soil mix if they need a boost going into flower or late veg

Liquid fish fertilizers are great. so is top dressing of bat guano, and chicken manure. those are the fastest. alfalfa meal is right behind them. earthworm castings and compost are good too but they are better for long and steady release in N in smaller amounts, if your plants need a boost youll want one of the other ones.

Coffee will green up leaves over night. You can dilute fresh coffee in equal parts water or just mix the spent grinds with as much water as you would when making coffee but then just stir the grinds around and pour into the soil.

papa canna said:

I'm getting some bad n def. After keeping a clone in 1 gallon of soil mix for 3 weeks. I amended with more ewc, and repoted into 5 gallons of amended soil, but I'm still showing signs of n def. How do you respond quickly and minimize stunting

Click to expand...

if the ph was off a lock up would happen and report as deficiencies, adding more ferts wont help then
If you over watered same thing could happen
If its truly spent soil simply add more grow formula fertilizer, skip the game next time and check this out;


5 steps to perfection(in your controlled room)

1) place (per)1 gallon of dry promix peat moss into container that has drainage

2) Add Organicare dry fertilizer per instructions on package

3) Add (only) 1 quart of water all at once.(per gallon of promix)

4) when the container is light and dry, before plant wilts, repeat #3

5) see # 2

Nutrient teas. Or topdress worm castings where worms have been fed amendments and grains and veggies.

chemphlegm said:

if the ph was off a lock up would happen and report as deficiencies, adding more ferts wont help then
If you over watered same thing could happen
If its truly spent soil simply add more grow formula fertilizer, skip the game next time and check this out;


5 steps to perfection(in your controlled room)

1) place (per)1 gallon of dry promix peat moss into container that has drainage

2) Add Organicare dry fertilizer per instructions on package

3) Add (only) 1 quart of water all at once.(per gallon of promix)

4) when the container is light and dry, before plant wilts, repeat #3

5) see # 2

Click to expand...

Just wanted to second this post. In my experience any sort of deficiency and/or toxicity is typically related to problems with your soil and/or your watering practices/schedule. Most problems we will experience with organics has more to do with your soil being properly balanced as opposed to having too little/too much of something.

If you over-water your soil it will cause all sorts of issues that look like deficiencies. Too much water in your medium can throw off your pH over time because the constant supply of water will be reacting with the nutrients/elements within your soil medium, as a result you'll start seeing false "deficiencies" or "toxicities" that is usually your pH being out of whack 9/10 times.

The idea of organics regulating the pH itself is often misunderstood and is the reason why many people believe they do in fact have deficiencies/toxicities. Yes, a living organic soil is definitely able to regulate it's own pH, but only when the soil itself is properly balanced. A properly balanced soil doesn't just have to do with the types of amendments that are in it, but also the quality of the compost/EWC in the mix, the amount of aeration/oxygen in your soil, and the amount of water as well.

Too much water will make your medium's pH out of whack, depending on what the water was reacting with in your soil at the time will make your pH either too acidic or too alkaline. Either way this is a problem because if your pH isn't in the 6.5-6.8 range you will experience lock outs that will manifest themselves in the form of "deficiencies". Like your nitrogen problem for instance; you had a clone in the soil for 3 weeks, I highly doubt that a 6-12in clone used up all of the nitrogen in the soil. The only way you could actually be out of nitrogen in your soil is if you used something like blood meal and/or guano in the soil and let things go anaerobic when you let it cook. If your soil goes anaerobic, that nasty smell it gives off is actually ammonium gas and that smell is literally your nitrogen evaporating from the soil. This could also be an issue even with a plant in the medium, as if your soil has too much water then there isn't enough oxygen and therefore only anaerobic microbes can survive, meaning your nitrogen is all being lost in the form of ammonium gas. If you haven't smelled any ammonium, this likely isn't your issue, and you would know if you smelled it believe me!

So, if you still have nitrogen in your soil, but your plant isn't getting any of it then the only explanation here is that you're actually experiencing a lock out due to too much water and/or too little drainage. If I may recommend, get yourself a moisture tester and a Chapin sprayer as that will allow you to water as optimally as possible aside from maybe Blumats or something. Unless the plant is completely rootbound I NEVER water until I see runoff. Only water like that when you know you have a rootbound plant, otherwise there will likely be way too much water in your soil with such a tiny clone. Remember, the roots are what uptake the water in the soil, so if you only have 1g of rootmass and 5 gallons of soil you only need to provide enough water for the microbes to survive and for your roots to uptake. With that in mind, the amount of water you give will be directly proportional to the size of your root mass. I've been growing on and off for nearly 7 years, the last 2-3 years have been living organic soil. I've only just now started to realize just how important properly watering is because I've been messing it up for that long. Most of the problems I've ever had as well as many of the problems I see people on here have are almost always related to watering.

If I may, allow me to ask a few questions? I'll be able to help much better when I have an idea of what your exact situation is instead of continuing to type out a miniature novel xD

1) You said you just transplanted the 1g to a 5g pot. How often have you been watering the 5g pot and how much water do you give your clone when you do water?
2) You said your 5g pot has amended soil in it, could you tell me more about what is in your soil exactly? How long did you let it sit and "cook" for? What, if anything, was used to inoculate the soil?
3) What ratios are in your soil in terms of peat/aeration/compost? 33% of each? 50% peat, 30% aeration, and 20% compost? What ratios did you use?

Get back to me with the answers to those questions and I'll do my best to help you out.

For what it's worth, unless you're in flower you shouldn't be too concerned about stunting. When you're in veg, the worst case scenario with mistakes is that you have to veg for longer than normal so they can recover.. but they are more than capable of recovering from just about anything in veg. My air conditioning went out for 6+ hours one time before I noticed, my girls were in 122 degree heat in a sealed room with zero air conditioning or ventilation. Fortunately I was running CO2 and supplement with silica, otherwise they likely would have died for sure. 6 hours in 122 degree heat and they weren't even droopy. I did experience mediocre yields with that grow, but it was due to errors I made in flower, not the heat stress from veg. When you're in veg, unless the plant is 100% dead you can bring it back with enough time and care. Hopefully you're in veg as that will allow us to take our time with this issue and allow you to properly troubleshoot not just this issue, but hopefully provide you with enough information that will allow you to have a seamless grow come flower. Come flower, there are no second chances unfortunately..

kratos015 said:

Just wanted to second this post. In my experience any sort of deficiency and/or toxicity is typically related to problems with your soil and/or your watering practices/schedule. Most problems we will experience with organics has more to do with your soil being properly balanced as opposed to having too little/too much of something.

If you over-water your soil it will cause all sorts of issues that look like deficiencies. Too much water in your medium can throw off your pH over time because the constant supply of water will be reacting with the nutrients/elements within your soil medium, as a result you'll start seeing false "deficiencies" or "toxicities" that is usually your pH being out of whack 9/10 times.

The idea of organics regulating the pH itself is often misunderstood and is the reason why many people believe they do in fact have deficiencies/toxicities. Yes, a living organic soil is definitely able to regulate it's own pH, but only when the soil itself is properly balanced. A properly balanced soil doesn't just have to do with the types of amendments that are in it, but also the quality of the compost/EWC in the mix, the amount of aeration/oxygen in your soil, and the amount of water as well.

Too much water will make your medium's pH out of whack, depending on what the water was reacting with in your soil at the time will make your pH either too acidic or too alkaline. Either way this is a problem because if your pH isn't in the 6.5-6.8 range you will experience lock outs that will manifest themselves in the form of "deficiencies". Like your nitrogen problem for instance; you had a clone in the soil for 3 weeks, I highly doubt that a 6-12in clone used up all of the nitrogen in the soil. The only way you could actually be out of nitrogen in your soil is if you used something like blood meal and/or guano in the soil and let things go anaerobic when you let it cook. If your soil goes anaerobic, that nasty smell it gives off is actually ammonium gas and that smell is literally your nitrogen evaporating from the soil. This could also be an issue even with a plant in the medium, as if your soil has too much water then there isn't enough oxygen and therefore only anaerobic microbes can survive, meaning your nitrogen is all being lost in the form of ammonium gas. If you haven't smelled any ammonium, this likely isn't your issue, and you would know if you smelled it believe me!

So, if you still have nitrogen in your soil, but your plant isn't getting any of it then the only explanation here is that you're actually experiencing a lock out due to too much water and/or too little drainage. If I may recommend, get yourself a moisture tester and a Chapin sprayer as that will allow you to water as optimally as possible aside from maybe Blumats or something. Unless the plant is completely rootbound I NEVER water until I see runoff. Only water like that when you know you have a rootbound plant, otherwise there will likely be way too much water in your soil with such a tiny clone. Remember, the roots are what uptake the water in the soil, so if you only have 1g of rootmass and 5 gallons of soil you only need to provide enough water for the microbes to survive and for your roots to uptake. With that in mind, the amount of water you give will be directly proportional to the size of your root mass. I've been growing on and off for nearly 7 years, the last 2-3 years have been living organic soil. I've only just now started to realize just how important properly watering is because I've been messing it up for that long. Most of the problems I've ever had as well as many of the problems I see people on here have are almost always related to watering.

If I may, allow me to ask a few questions? I'll be able to help much better when I have an idea of what your exact situation is instead of continuing to type out a miniature novel xD

1) You said you just transplanted the 1g to a 5g pot. How often have you been watering the 5g pot and how much water do you give your clone when you do water?
2) You said your 5g pot has amended soil in it, could you tell me more about what is in your soil exactly? How long did you let it sit and "cook" for? What, if anything, was used to inoculate the soil?
3) What ratios are in your soil in terms of peat/aeration/compost? 33% of each? 50% peat, 30% aeration, and 20% compost? What ratios did you use?

Get back to me with the answers to those questions and I'll do my best to help you out.

For what it's worth, unless you're in flower you shouldn't be too concerned about stunting. When you're in veg, the worst case scenario with mistakes is that you have to veg for longer than normal so they can recover.. but they are more than capable of recovering from just about anything in veg. My air conditioning went out for 6+ hours one time before I noticed, my girls were in 122 degree heat in a sealed room with zero air conditioning or ventilation. Fortunately I was running CO2 and supplement with silica, otherwise they likely would have died for sure. 6 hours in 122 degree heat and they weren't even droopy. I did experience mediocre yields with that grow, but it was due to errors I made in flower, not the heat stress from veg. When you're in veg, unless the plant is 100% dead you can bring it back with enough time and care. Hopefully you're in veg as that will allow us to take our time with this issue and allow you to properly troubleshoot not just this issue, but hopefully provide you with enough information that will allow you to have a seamless grow come flower. Come flower, there are no second chances unfortunately..

Click to expand...

Wow thats a lot of info. Great stuff. I dont recall smelling any ammonia. I didn't quite do exact measurements, so i'm going to do my best to answer you're questions as accurately as i can.

1) They seem to want water about twice per week. giving each pot I would say roughly half a gallon. some spills through the sides per my aeration and fabric pot but never excessively through the bottom. a small amount though.

2) The soil is as follows. one bag of FF HF one bag FF OF one bag of GO ancient forest alaskan humus ~30% aeration 10-15 cups wiggle worm EWC 3 cups pulverized dolomite, 2 cups happy frog general 5-5-5 dry nutrients, 2 cups 0-12-0 high p bat guano, 2 cups kelp meal. I think that was everything. To the best of my knowledge that was what i mixed. No innoculant (what's that?) let it cook for about 8-9 weeks.

3)I would say 70% peat 30% aeration. plus amendments. No specific ratios. Just mixing it up until I felt it looked and felt right.

also, I'd like to report, my plants look great at the moment. taking to the new soil nicely

papa canna said:

Wow thats a lot of info. Great stuff. I dont recall smelling any ammonia. I didn't quite do exact measurements, so i'm going to do my best to answer you're questions as accurately as i can.

1) They seem to want water about twice per week. giving each pot I would say roughly half a gallon. some spills through the sides per my aeration and fabric pot but never excessively through the bottom. a small amount though.

2) The soil is as follows. one bag of FF HF one bag FF OF one bag of GO ancient forest alaskan humus ~30% aeration 10-15 cups wiggle worm EWC 3 cups pulverized dolomite, 2 cups happy frog general 5-5-5 dry nutrients, 2 cups 0-12-0 high p bat guano, 2 cups kelp meal. I think that was everything. To the best of my knowledge that was what i mixed. No innoculant (what's that?) let it cook for about 8-9 weeks.

3)I would say 70% peat 30% aeration. plus amendments. No specific ratios. Just mixing it up until I felt it looked and felt right.

also, I'd like to report, my plants look great at the moment. taking to the new soil nicely

Click to expand...

1) So if I'm understanding properly, you're currently in 5g pots at the moment after having transplanted from a 1g pot correct? I have the same issues with the aeration pots, a lot of the water tends to fall out the side and as a result doesn't completely saturate the soil because most of your water is becoming run off. This will only become more of an issue once the pots get root bound as you'll have to water slowly or else all of the water will just rush out of the sides of your pot. It's entirely possible that your plants aren't actually getting the full 1/2 gallon of water which makes me think that maybe they weren't getting enough water at first, on top of that fact it was a new transplant, so the roots of your 1g transplant haven't had enough time to get in sync with your living soil. You're reporting that your plants are looking healthy at the moment (awesome!!), so my thinking is that it just took the plant a little while to get settled. Before a plant really starts showing any growth, it has to establish it's roots first but once they're readily established then watch out! I recommend looking into a pump sprayer for watering, I just got one for the first time myself and I can't see how I lived without it before. It is so much easier to control the amount of water your plants get when it comes out as a fine mist as opposed to a shower head. This way you can water nice and slowly, allowing you to evenly moisten your entire medium and ensuring that there is minimal to no run off coming out of the sides of your pots. The other thing to consider about improper watering is that it will leave "dry spots" in your soil. If the water flows out the sides as run off, then certain spots inside of your soil are getting zero water because it actually runs out the sides before it can be absorbed by the soil. These dry spots can cause issues and inhibit your roots ability to completely fill the pot as well as inhibit your microbiology. It takes a lot longer to water with a pump sprayer than it does a hose, but taking the extra time to water with a pump sprayer will give you a noticeable improvement almost over night.

2) Your mix looks pretty solid to me, I only asked about it because I wanted to consider the possibility that something went wrong there just to eliminate all possibilities. Soil looks pretty damn good to me, I used to mix OF+HF all the time before I would mix my own soil, your amendments look good and you cooked it for well over the recommended 30 days so I'm quite confident your soil is not the issue and likely won't ever be an issue for you. An inoculant is pretty much just anything that already have beneficial microbes in it that can be put into your "cooking" soil to speed things along; it could be a compost tea, a worm casting tea, or pretty much anything that already has microbes in it. I've been using a product called Grower's Recharge for this purpose, it's a jar filled with water soluable microbes that can be watered into your soil and/or compost pile to jump start the process. Without an inoculant, you keep your soil moistened and aerated until eventually microbes start to find their way into your soil and get to work on decomposing everything. An inoculant just makes sure there are always microbes in your soil, it absolutely isn't mandatory by any means though, especially when you let the soil cook for 8+ weeks!

3) Are you going the ROLS route when you'll be dumping the soil at harvest and re-amending and remixing? Or will you attempt to go the no-till route? The reason I ask is because of your 70% peat/30% aeration mix. If you're going the ROLS route and only plan on growing in that soil for 3-4 months you should have absolutely no issues. Past 4 months in those pots though the 30% aeration/drainage may not cut it. 30% aeration has always given me great results in pots that are under 7 gallons. However if I use pots larger than 15 gallons, grow outdoors (5-7 month cycle instead of 3-4), or go the no-till route I use 40% aeration at a minimum.

If you're growing indoors for 3-4 months in pots under 7-10 gallons, 30% aeration will be totally fine. However, if you're growing outdoors for 6+ months or in pots larger than 15 gallons then 30% aeration/drainage simply will not cut it for a variety of reasons. The main reasons being soil compaction/erosion as well as the fact that your peat moss and organic amendments will eventually decompose and become compost instead of peat. While compost is amazing for water retention and pretty much everything else.. it sucks at drainage and without good drainage you will run into some huge problems. However this will only be an issue if you are growing in a 15+ gallon pot and/or running a no-till pot that will be used for longer than a single harvest.



So as far as I can tell my man, you look pretty solid. It sounds like you just needed to wait for the roots of the plant to take hold, just keep at it and you should be well on your way to a good harvest. Your mix has a lot of stuff in it and you shouldn't need to do anything but water for a solid 3-4 months with the ingredients you're using. Absolute worst case scenario is some of your strains are heavy feeders and you need to top dress with the Happy Frog 5-5-5 (amazing stuff by the way!) one or twice at the absolute most, and again that assumes you have strains that are heavy feeders. Look into getting yourself a pump sprayer for sure though because for $15 it is utterly game changing and will give you instant results. I will never use a hose to water again unless I'm in 10+ gallon pots that are completely root-bound. Just remember, if you have any issues with nutrient deficiency and/or toxicity that you should look into how well your soil is draining and analyze your watering techniques before thinking you need to dump more nutrients into the mix. Almost every problem I've had with deficiencies has actually been a problem with my soil being out of whack or improper watering, once I fix those I don't see deficiencies. Occasionally I'll run into a strain that is a heavy feeder and I actually have a deficiency to deal with, but it's very rare that happens.

I recommend this to everyone, but consider getting a grow journal going. This way if you have any issues you can post them on your journal and someone will help you troubleshoot things. The other great thing about a journal is you can constantly go back to it and use it to re-evaluate certain things you did and so forth. You can also PM me any time and I'll do my best to help out in any way I can. And as always, I apologize for the wall of text. Happy growing!

kratos015 said:

1) So if I'm understanding properly, you're currently in 5g pots at the moment after having transplanted from a 1g pot correct? I have the same issues with the aeration pots, a lot of the water tends to fall out the side and as a result doesn't completely saturate the soil because most of your water is becoming run off. This will only become more of an issue once the pots get root bound as you'll have to water slowly or else all of the water will just rush out of the sides of your pot. It's entirely possible that your plants aren't actually getting the full 1/2 gallon of water which makes me think that maybe they weren't getting enough water at first, on top of that fact it was a new transplant, so the roots of your 1g transplant haven't had enough time to get in sync with your living soil. You're reporting that your plants are looking healthy at the moment (awesome!!), so my thinking is that it just took the plant a little while to get settled. Before a plant really starts showing any growth, it has to establish it's roots first but once they're readily established then watch out! I recommend looking into a pump sprayer for watering, I just got one for the first time myself and I can't see how I lived without it before. It is so much easier to control the amount of water your plants get when it comes out as a fine mist as opposed to a shower head. This way you can water nice and slowly, allowing you to evenly moisten your entire medium and ensuring that there is minimal to no run off coming out of the sides of your pots. The other thing to consider about improper watering is that it will leave "dry spots" in your soil. If the water flows out the sides as run off, then certain spots inside of your soil are getting zero water because it actually runs out the sides before it can be absorbed by the soil. These dry spots can cause issues and inhibit your roots ability to completely fill the pot as well as inhibit your microbiology. It takes a lot longer to water with a pump sprayer than it does a hose, but taking the extra time to water with a pump sprayer will give you a noticeable improvement almost over night.

2) Your mix looks pretty solid to me, I only asked about it because I wanted to consider the possibility that something went wrong there just to eliminate all possibilities. Soil looks pretty damn good to me, I used to mix OF+HF all the time before I would mix my own soil, your amendments look good and you cooked it for well over the recommended 30 days so I'm quite confident your soil is not the issue and likely won't ever be an issue for you. An inoculant is pretty much just anything that already have beneficial microbes in it that can be put into your "cooking" soil to speed things along; it could be a compost tea, a worm casting tea, or pretty much anything that already has microbes in it. I've been using a product called Grower's Recharge for this purpose, it's a jar filled with water soluable microbes that can be watered into your soil and/or compost pile to jump start the process. Without an inoculant, you keep your soil moistened and aerated until eventually microbes start to find their way into your soil and get to work on decomposing everything. An inoculant just makes sure there are always microbes in your soil, it absolutely isn't mandatory by any means though, especially when you let the soil cook for 8+ weeks!

3) Are you going the ROLS route when you'll be dumping the soil at harvest and re-amending and remixing? Or will you attempt to go the no-till route? The reason I ask is because of your 70% peat/30% aeration mix. If you're going the ROLS route and only plan on growing in that soil for 3-4 months you should have absolutely no issues. Past 4 months in those pots though the 30% aeration/drainage may not cut it. 30% aeration has always given me great results in pots that are under 7 gallons. However if I use pots larger than 15 gallons, grow outdoors (5-7 month cycle instead of 3-4), or go the no-till route I use 40% aeration at a minimum.

If you're growing indoors for 3-4 months in pots under 7-10 gallons, 30% aeration will be totally fine. However, if you're growing outdoors for 6+ months or in pots larger than 15 gallons then 30% aeration/drainage simply will not cut it for a variety of reasons. The main reasons being soil compaction/erosion as well as the fact that your peat moss and organic amendments will eventually decompose and become compost instead of peat. While compost is amazing for water retention and pretty much everything else.. it sucks at drainage and without good drainage you will run into some huge problems. However this will only be an issue if you are growing in a 15+ gallon pot and/or running a no-till pot that will be used for longer than a single harvest.



So as far as I can tell my man, you look pretty solid. It sounds like you just needed to wait for the roots of the plant to take hold, just keep at it and you should be well on your way to a good harvest. Your mix has a lot of stuff in it and you shouldn't need to do anything but water for a solid 3-4 months with the ingredients you're using. Absolute worst case scenario is some of your strains are heavy feeders and you need to top dress with the Happy Frog 5-5-5 (amazing stuff by the way!) one or twice at the absolute most, and again that assumes you have strains that are heavy feeders. Look into getting yourself a pump sprayer for sure though because for $15 it is utterly game changing and will give you instant results. I will never use a hose to water again unless I'm in 10+ gallon pots that are completely root-bound. Just remember, if you have any issues with nutrient deficiency and/or toxicity that you should look into how well your soil is draining and analyze your watering techniques before thinking you need to dump more nutrients into the mix. Almost every problem I've had with deficiencies has actually been a problem with my soil being out of whack or improper watering, once I fix those I don't see deficiencies. Occasionally I'll run into a strain that is a heavy feeder and I actually have a deficiency to deal with, but it's very rare that happens.

I recommend this to everyone, but consider getting a grow journal going. This way if you have any issues you can post them on your journal and someone will help you troubleshoot things. The other great thing about a journal is you can constantly go back to it and use it to re-evaluate certain things you did and so forth. You can also PM me any time and I'll do my best to help out in any way I can. And as always, I apologize for the wall of text. Happy growing!

Click to expand...

Thanks for the tips, I'll get a pump sprayer soon. Hopefully it wont take forever to water my plants? Would you suggest I go from fabric to just plain plastic pots for side draining or is the pump going to fix my issue entirely?

papa canna said:

Thanks for the tips, I'll get a pump sprayer soon. Hopefully it wont take forever to water my plants? Would you suggest I go from fabric to just plain plastic pots for side draining or is the pump going to fix my issue entirely?

Click to expand...

That's actually why I recommend the pump sprayer, watering the fabric pots is a bitch with the water flowing out of the sides.. but the pots themselves are amazing. Rather than switch back to plastic pots to avoid that issue, I wanted to find a compromise that allowed me to continue to use the fabric pots because I don't even want to use anything else. The pump sprayer is mainly for until your pot gets rootbound, then you can get away with a hose no problem because by that point you'll struggle to water them enough if anything! The other thing about the pump sprayer is that I finally realized its best to just do multiple waterings/mistings of the top layer of soil to keep it moist, if you only have a 1 gallon root mass you dont want to water until you see runoff at that point.. you'll only drown the roots that are trying to grow and establish themselves as well as your microbes. This is especially true when you're dealing with seedlings and/or clones, they want moist soil so they can establish themselves at their own pace.. but if things get too wet and water doesn't drain properly the roots will die rather than grow.

The pump sprayer will carry you until you're rootbound, or until your 10+ gallon pot has at least a 5 gallon root mass. You have to consider that when the root mass is less than 5 gallons, they really don't need too much water.. especially not until you see runoff. Wait before the roots are established enough to withstand that amount of water before you bring out the hose. I know it sounds silly, especially since it takes longer, but when you see how much your plants respond to it you'll be just as surprised as I was. I mainly recommend the Chapin because I've been through various brands and this one is by far the most durable, despite it being cheaper.. probably my local store's markup though.

Ok. What pump would you recommend for 5 gallon fabrics, one with a hose and separate sprayer? or a smaller bottle style?

@kratos015 Great info!
In his soil mix. I'm not sure by the description of 1 bag each how much total soil he is mixing, I'm guessing it is about 1.5 - 2 cu ft .
Question: Is using 2 cups of 0-12-0 bat guano a good addition along with 2 cups of HF 5-5-5.
As a student to this I was guessing that maybe it was to much P to early.

Buba Blend said:

@kratos015 Great info!
In his soil mix. I'm not sure by the description of 1 bag each how much total soil he is mixing, I'm guessing it is about 1.5 - 2 cu ft .
Question: Is using 2 cups of 0-12-0 bat guano a good addition along with 2 cups of HF 5-5-5.
As a student to this I was guessing that maybe it was to much P to early.

Click to expand...

It is at least 4 cu ft. 1 bag of happy frog is 2. 1bag of ocean forest is 1.5. The Alaskan humus is .5 which is 4.so its at least 5 then. Plus all my chunky perlite

papa canna said:

It is at least 4 cu ft. 1 bag of happy frog is 2. 1bag of ocean forest is 1.5. The Alaskan humus is .5 which is 4.so its at least 5 then. Plus all my chunky perlite

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LOL that makes sense. I messed up the math in my head when I said 1.5 - 2 cu ft.
I would still ask the same question. If adding the 2 cups of 0-12-0 bat guano is a good additional amendment to the 5 cu ft of soil. Seems like a lot of P when these are new soils not depleted used soils and 2 cups of HF 5-5-5 are being added.

Buba Blend said:

LOL that makes sense. I messed up the math in my head when I said 1.5 - 2 cu ft.
I would still ask the same question. If adding the 2 cups of 0-12-0 bat guano is a good additional amendment to the 5 cu ft of soil. Seems like a lot of P when these are new soils not depleted used soils and 2 cups of HF 5-5-5 are being added.

Click to expand...

I personally felt like 2cups wasn't a large amount, but what I feel doesn't really matter when I've never done this before LOL. But by ratio it didn't seem like a large amount. I was more worried about not amendingenpugh N because castings are only 1-0-0

papa canna said:

I personally felt like 2cups wasn't a large amount, but what I feel doesn't really matter when I've never done this before LOL. But by ratio it didn't seem like a large amount. I was more worried about not amendingenpugh N because castings are only 1-0-0

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You are doing great, just asking the others that are more experienced if they think it was a good addition. You will definitely make adjustments over time. I'm asking for both of us.

Buba Blend said:

LOL that makes sense. I messed up the math in my head when I said 1.5 - 2 cu ft.
I would still ask the same question. If adding the 2 cups of 0-12-0 bat guano is a good additional amendment to the 5 cu ft of soil. Seems like a lot of P when these are new soils not depleted used soils and 2 cups of HF 5-5-5 are being added.

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Hey man, sorry I didn't reply to this.. RIU seems to be pretty hit and miss with it's alerts as I never got an alert showing you replied to me!

As for the bat guano, I've shied away from the stuff in the last couple of years as it can be quite temperamental. If you decide to go with guano, err on the side of caution. If it's too little you can always add more via top dress, but too much guano will cause you all sorts of heartbreak in the long run.

Guano is fine to use, I just don't like it anymore personally and feel there are better ways to get P into your soil. Clackamas Coots is responsible for a lot of the information I know concerning organics, and he is why I've stopped using high P products. Apparently, if your soil gets too high in phosphorus it will actually inhibit the ability for certain microbes to live in your soil. An organic soil that has too much phosphorus in it won't allow for certain microbes to inhabit your soil. All I really use for my P in my soil is crab meal and supplement with fish hydrolysate as needed, has worked just fine for me thus far

kratos015 said:

Hey man, sorry I didn't reply to this.. RIU seems to be pretty hit and miss with it's alerts as I never got an alert showing you replied to me!

As for the bat guano, I've shied away from the stuff in the last couple of years as it can be quite temperamental. If you decide to go with guano, err on the side of caution. If it's too little you can always add more via top dress, but too much guano will cause you all sorts of heartbreak in the long run.

Guano is fine to use, I just don't like it anymore personally and feel there are better ways to get P into your soil. Clackamas Coots is responsible for a lot of the information I know concerning organics, and he is why I've stopped using high P products. Apparently, if your soil gets too high in phosphorus it will actually inhibit the ability for certain microbes to live in your soil. An organic soil that has too much phosphorus in it won't allow for certain microbes to inhabit your soil. All I really use for my P in my soil is crab meal and supplement with fish hydrolysate as needed, has worked just fine for me thus far

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So what are most folks primary source of N? Is it usually EWC? I was rolling over the idea of getting my own worm bin for fresh castings.