All Natural Organics. The Dons' Summaries + FAQ Thread. <2017-'18>

Dear ol" Thankful Grower!

Well-Known Member
The small plants are really cheap and they grow decently quick if you don't over water..
plus they make babies once established..
there is powder and flakes thatre 200 x concentrated too I wouldn't mind any of them

Pleasure though!
Aloe Vera make copies of themselves can you point me in the right direction for that brother time for me to study up
 

Joe Blows Trees

Well-Known Member
Thanks @DonTesla I plan on doing a popcorn tea in a couple weeks. Also going to do a cannabis sst as well. I might just add the flaxseeds to my cover crops and see how it'll affect the soil life. I'll read up on that after work.
 

SSGrower

Well-Known Member
:peace::bigjoint:I like aloe cause it helps with burns which happens more often in my shop than I'd like to admit! Had to get 2nd plant to be sure I didn't cut back one too much during one of "those" phases.

So not advertising here just posting what I'm trying. Here's a pic of a few labels. Typicslly I try a few new things each time I reamed or mix a new batch of soil. It's not as consistent as starting with a fixed batch recipient but it provides its own form of entertainment by having to read the plants. I do such a mix of genetics and rarely run same strain mire than a few times needs vary quite a bit.

Buffaloam, apologies not fully in line with the dons techniques but I like animals and and unapologetic that I am not a vegan or vegitarian. Not that there's anything wrong with that, it's not how I choose to live.
20180108_080821.jpg

This time I used a Roots microbes, check the price, that's why I like to at least try to propogate them before watering into the soilmix. Pics won't imbed so you'll have to click below

Best wishes and
Peace Out
:hug:
 

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firstnamelast

Well-Known Member
You will enjoy the journey then..

Hope the font shades / bullets helped to separate the levels into 2 or 3 sets of tangible priorities..its a really fun journey just take a plunge and get pragmatic.. one step at a time.

Speaking of which, what is shipping for you to buy amended soil from BAS (Build a soil).. they sell it good to go by the cubic foot, I'm curious!

As for frass, I can send you a sample whenever checking out at, so you can see how awesome it is before investing in it, and don't have to search to find it. One less worry for the organic start always helps.

Here's a Bubba Meltdown that was what I swore was dead it was so damn thirsty it was wilted in a hump..... I hit it with some frass. Few hours later I returned and was shocked to see this:
View attachment 4069799
https://buildasoil.com/collections/soil/products/living-organic-soil-vegan-mix?variant=10349458373
This one? If that's it then they want $100 in shipping lol making my $120 purchase $220
 

DonTesla

Well-Known Member

DonTesla

Well-Known Member
I plan on doing a popcorn tea in a couple weeks. Also going to do a cannabis sst as well. I might just add the flaxseeds to my cover crops and see how it'll affect the soil life. I'll read up on that after work.
Pleasure, Joe
Looking forward to your SST trials.
Have you tried frass yet to see how easy it is, to compare?


Aloe Vera make copies of themselves can you point me in the right direction for that brother time for me to study up
Just from experience Ive seen it many times.. once a plant gets sizeable, new shoots pop out, and then another and another, and essentially a whole new plant develops one leaflet at a time, a mini version though..

all you gotta do at this point is untangle the roots, and repot, and in this way, there will be endless aloe vera plants eventually.. we know someone who gives them away every year and does nothing to let them grow, except ensure they dont die from drought.. pretty cool

:peace::bigjoint:I like aloe cause it helps with burns which happens more often in my shop than I'd like to admit! Had to get 2nd plant to be sure I didn't cut back one too much during one of "those" phases.
Yeah aloe is awesome stuff for burns. You can have bad burns feel pain free the next morning with that stuff, its incredible.

No worries about the animals products, I still eat meat and I still like to compare the soil recipes a lot.. My girl is vegetarian now so I do try make half the soil vegan ish .. the interesting thing is that I'm liking the results and will have to continue tinkering cause its getting really exciting, smooth, expressive, colourful and terpy, so if the favour is up on my next round too it might be hard to go back..
 

Joe Blows Trees

Well-Known Member
I haven't tried frass yet but I plan to. I have done both the popcorn and cannabis SST before with great results. I'm trying to come up with teas for flowering. I know a regular compost tea is good, but there has to be a few other ingredients that'll give the ladies an extra boost by boosting the life in my soil. Most of my amendments are not water soluble so trying to add them to a tea doesn't work. From what I understand, popcorn tea is great for veg which is when I did mine the first time. Maybe I'll give the cannabis SST to them in bloom and see what happens. I've planted cover crops in my mother plants pots in order to start my no till gardening. I have ordered some more worms and will be putting some in all the pots as well. My end goal is to be running a perpetual grow that only needs water with an occasional aloe foliar and some molasses in bloom. I'll definitely be in this thread regularly to continue learning and sharing things I learn in return.

Quick question; Have you used a milk/water mixture to help fight powdery mildew? I have some og kush plants and one pineapple haze plant about two to three weeks into bloom and they're starting to show spots. I've used baking soda and water mixed about three weeks ago and it seemed to work for awhile but it's back and a little bit more than before. Trying to salvage as much as possible. Thanks.
 

DonTesla

Well-Known Member
Great to her, the more sharing findings, the better.

Haven't used milk / water to fight PM tbh, but I have never had to worry about it.. selecting strains resistant to it is a big pro active step that has to be considered, and the frass helping a lot in that regard too, I've just been fortunate to avoid it these last 12 rounds

If I was having issues with a strain, I would apply
  • AACT for its biofilm, right after hitting it with
  • milk 6:4 water
  • LABS,
  • frass foliar
Apparently sodium bicarbonate (baking soda) can affect its ph and kill it but I don't dig carbonates much.

Regarding the teas, though, which I am open to them on smaller pots if need be, or whenever need be, I just don't like adding P to the soil during flower, if I can avoid, or rhizospheres more so, it can negatively affect the beneficial "bite" the myco have going on, which are the real champion workhorses in a finish. Nevermind ph fluxes so much.. in a high humus that's well buffered.

If messing around with flowering teas, I would consider trying this though :

pre feed a fungal dom bit of soil with fungal food, and get it highly fungal, and use that to give fungi a head start for brewing .. since they cant multiply like bacteria boost their numbers so they can all start growing one cell at a time .. then use that fungal super tea to up the fungals for the finish.. they're the heavy decomposers and can get those water insolubles broken down.. be it rock minerals or softer, there's your big eaters right there.

A flowering ferment may be big too, I've Never felt the need for one yet, but with the SIP designs coming up, it might be something I consider myself for once.

That'd be my approach anyway, to give you a bit different perspective!

Blazing up the gravy,

DT
 

ShLUbY

Well-Known Member
I haven't tried frass yet but I plan to. I have done both the popcorn and cannabis SST before with great results. I'm trying to come up with teas for flowering. I know a regular compost tea is good, but there has to be a few other ingredients that'll give the ladies an extra boost by boosting the life in my soil. Most of my amendments are not water soluble so trying to add them to a tea doesn't work. From what I understand, popcorn tea is great for veg which is when I did mine the first time. Maybe I'll give the cannabis SST to them in bloom and see what happens. I've planted cover crops in my mother plants pots in order to start my no till gardening. I have ordered some more worms and will be putting some in all the pots as well. My end goal is to be running a perpetual grow that only needs water with an occasional aloe foliar and some molasses in bloom. I'll definitely be in this thread regularly to continue learning and sharing things I learn in return.

Quick question; Have you used a milk/water mixture to help fight powdery mildew? I have some og kush plants and one pineapple haze plant about two to three weeks into bloom and they're starting to show spots. I've used baking soda and water mixed about three weeks ago and it seemed to work for awhile but it's back and a little bit more than before. Trying to salvage as much as possible. Thanks.
potassium bicarbonate lasts longer than sodium, and is less harmful to the plant because it contains no sodium. however, once a plant is systemically infected, it's hard to stop the spread. I battled PM for a year and it's a bitch. I ended up getting a sulfur burner to cleanse my environment of spores (because once you have spores in the air dispersing... infections can reoccur easily). It takes a lot of hard work and cleanliness to get it out of the environment.

i recommend keeping a treatment on all of your plants from now on until you know for sure the problem is eradicated. i would spray them every 7 days to keep a film on them. never tried the compost tea route before, but any film is helpful. i just chose to keep using K bicarb because i knew with the adjusted pH of the leave that the spores could not germinate and infect the plants. just be sure when you spray the plants down with the K bicarb to put something over your soil so the mixture doesn't drip into it because it will affect the pH of your upper soil horizon and slow plant growth (learned this the hard way). i just used a piece of panda film that draped over the edges of the container.

this product looked interesting to me, i never got the chance to use it but i'm gonna order some incase i see infection again one day, and also use it in my veggie garden for my cucurbits. https://www.amazon.com/Dr-Earth-Concentrate-Fungicide-24/dp/B00I4TD50G/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1515686517&sr=8-2&keywords=dr+earth+fungicide. It's likely neem + K bicarb.

be diligent. PM can get out of control very very quickly and can be hell to get rid of and set you back for much longer than i'd like to admit (like i said, it took a year for me to figure out how to break the life cycle for good and cleanse the room). the sulfur burner in the end is what saved me (along with foliar treatments).
 

firstnamelast

Well-Known Member
Bubba's Meltdown, different pheno, also from seed, also extremely resinous and dense with thick frost

Looking like a keeper

@ 8 weeks
View attachment 4071227

Bubba dom pheno! @thccbdhealth @fumble @Azoned @giglewigle @firstnamelast
Your personal garden? Wow very nice!! I asked my friend his opinion on no-till methods and he claims they are no good lol I'll have to show him these. He finally broke down and took a look at what you gave me for a soil recipe and strongly strongly recommended I do the following for every 5 gal - 7.5 gal / 1 cu ft:

Compost 2.5 gal - 1/3 cu ft
.83 gal - 1/9 cu ft Mushroom 10%
.83 gal - 1/9 cu ft Leaf mold 10%
.83 gal - 1/9 cu ft Worm castings 10%

Aeration 2.5 gal - 1/3 cu ft
1.25 gal - 1/6 cu ft Pumice 15%
1.25 gal - 1/6 cu ft Organic rice hulls 15%

Base 2.5 gal - 1/3 cu ft
2.5 gal - 1/3 cu ft Sphagnum peat moss 30%

Meals/nutes (3 cups)
1 cup Kelp meal
1/2 cup Neem meal
1/2 cup Fish meal
1/2 cup Fish bone meal
1/2 cup Black soldier fly frass
Alfalfa meal - veg mostly, use mainly in tea or top dress
Langbeinite - at flower flip mostly, top dress

Minerals (3-4 cups)
2 cups Basalt
1/2 cup Glacial rock dust
1/2 cup Green sand
1 cup Diatomaceous earth

Liming/calcium (2 cups)
3/4 cup Gypsum
3/4 cup Lime
1/2 cup Oyster shell powder/flour

And he's suggesting I start with
https://www.planetnatural.com/product/sunshine-mix-4/
to get a proper liming and pH. Anything you see in all this as unnecessary, overkill, redundant, or non organic? I already have my seedlings in 4" square pots in some low nute baby soil. Thanks again!
 
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DonTesla

Well-Known Member
Your personal garden? Wow very nice!! I asked my friend his opinion on no-till methods and he claims they are no good lol I'll have to show him these. He finally broke down and took a look at what you gave me for a soil recipe and strongly strongly recommended I do the following for every 5 gal - 7.5 gal / 1 cu ft:

Compost 2.5 gal - 1/3 cu ft
Mushroom 10
Leaf mold 10%
Worm castings 10%

Aeration 2.5 gal - 1/3 cu ft
1.25 gal - 1/6 cu ft Pumice 15%
1.25 gal - 1/6 cu ft Organic rice hulls 15%

Base 2.5 gal - 1/3 cu ft
2.5 gal - 1/3 cu ft Sphagnum peat moss 30%

Meals/nutes (3 cups)
1 cup Kelp meal
1/2 cup Neem meal
1/2 cup Fish meal
1/2 cup Fish bone meal
1/2 cup Black soldier fly frass
Alfalfa meal - veg mostly, use mainly in tea or top dress
Langbeinite - at flower flip mostly, top dress

Minerals (3-4 cups)
2 cups Basalt
1/2 cup Glacial rock dust
1/2 cup Green sand
1 cup Diatomaceous earth

Liming/calcium
3/4 cup Gypsum
3/4 cup Lime
1/2 cup Oyster shell powder/flour

And he's suggesting I start with
https://www.planetnatural.com/product/sunshine-mix-4/
to get a proper liming and pH. Anything you see in all this as unnecessary, overkill, redundant, or non organic? I already have my seedlings in 4" square pots in some low nute baby soil. Thanks again!
Recipe is not too bad.. except you're back at over 20 ingredients, which I thought was the point to avoid, and for a 20 plus ingredient mix, it doesn't have biochar or myco or coco or aloe? only has 2 aerations? still has fish meal?
and the Ca/Liming menu has a bit of redundancy / insolubility .. plus its only 10% castings?

(Which isn't too bad if castings vs vermicompost, as they're more potent imo, and can always add a bit more on the go)

could def grow some dank! but I would still tweak the ratios a tad
 

firstnamelast

Well-Known Member
Recipe is not too bad.. except you're back at over 20 ingredients, which I thought was the point to avoid, and for a 20 plus ingredient mix, it doesn't have biochar or myco or coco or aloe? only has 2 aerations? still has fish meal?
and the Ca/Liming menu has a bit of redundancy / insolubility .. plus its only 10% castings?

(Which isn't too bad if castings vs vermicompost, as they're more potent imo, and can always add a bit more on the go)

could def grow some dank! but I would still tweak the ratios a tad
I appreciate your input. You're right it's way more than I wanted, I asked him for a recipe and I got one I guess lol this is as simple as he would make it. He doesn't believe I can get away without any of this stuff. Myco is in there just not listed yet. Biochar is a must? Pumice and biochar are both pretty expensive I've noticed. I trust his judgement because I see what he makes but I'm really not sure here
 

DonTesla

Well-Known Member
I appreciate your input. You're right it's way more than I wanted, I asked him for a recipe and I got one I guess lol this is as simple as he would make it. He doesn't believe I can get away without any of this stuff. Myco is in there just not listed yet. Biochar is a must? Pumice and biochar are both pretty expensive I've noticed. I trust his judgement because I see what he makes but I'm really not sure here
Its a pretty darn good recipe I like how there wasn't perlite / blood meal / factory bone meal in there, and there were some things in there to pop the potency and flavour...he's not too shy with kelp, didnt forget neem, endorses the BSF, just would have liked to see a couple nuances here and there. And to toss 20-25 ingredients right at ya, well, alright, I can surely go back to that! Just thought you wanted it simplified as much as possible is all, lol.

Re: Biochar
It can really help the micro life survive in a small or newer environment .. you have a couple major sources of Si but not too much support for the micro life.. which is the most important thing to support really.

Edit @firstnamelast
Biochar is free/cheap if you make it, lol, I have a lot of tutorials if you have the space, winter is no match,

also have a couple good sources with biochar for a good price too.

Pumice, bit trickier. But very worth it. Store owners will bring it in though if asked. They know you'll shop elsewhere if they don't
 
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firstnamelast

Well-Known Member
Its a pretty darn good recipe I like how there wasn't perlite / blood meal / factory bone meal in there, and there were some things in there to pop the potency and flavour...he's not too shy with kelp, didnt forget neem, just would have liked to see a couple nuances here and there. And to toss 20-25 ingredients right at ya, well, alright, I can surely go back to that! Just thought you wanted it simplified as much as possible is all, lol.

Re: Biochar
It can really help the micro life survive in a small or newer environment .. you have a couple major sources of Si but not too much support for the micro life.. which is the most important thing.
I asked him not to put so many ingredients in lol. He didn't listen. He's persistent. I'd much rather have the simplified version. Biochar would be the missing aeration then
 
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