using soil that was used during last grow. good idea? bad idea?

Hey, quick question - Can you reuse organic soil? I mean, its still in the pot.. that had my 'Pandora's Box' cross in it. Well, I harvested her last week.. and now I've got two new young sprouts that need to be transferred into bigger pots.. but I'm out of gas and out of soil. Can't get any gas until Sunday or Monday of next week probably...

so, could I reuse the organic soil I used during last grow? I'm sure its got roots in it though.. from the plant that last inhabited the container.. but yeah, would this be alright?

Thanks in advance for any answers.

peace.

i am trying this myself at the moment. i just rinsed the shit out of it and made sure the water was running clear (no leftover nutes) and so far so good. it has been 3 days now for my transferred vegging plants but i haven't tried it with clones or from seed.

Bump it nubs! I wanna know!

You can, but you have to becareful. Reusing soil increases chance of salmonella contamination. Most outbreaks recently have been coming from organic farrs who fail to do proper crop rotation. Even if salmonella doesn't develop, other diseases can develop too. A safe way to do this is by growing legumes. I like to grow peas myself. It has the added benefit of adding nitrogen into the soil and they need little to no fertilizer.

I wouldn't recommend it but I'm sure you can. Just like you can trim with your fingers if you want to but it is easier to use scissors

If you are growing organic, it gets better with age... Check out the best of Skunk mag vol 3 for thoughts from the Rev. He rocks the organic world.

you can if you want. i would replace the top half of the dirt

You can't typically rinse organic nutrients out of soil, although the more soluble anions (certain nutrients in ionic form) will leach easily. This is one of the reasons soil recycling is a good idea; lots of amendments provide nutrition for several months even a year or longer. What you'd really want to do is dump the used soil into a tote or kiddie pool, break up the root ball as much as you can and 'recharge' the soil with dolomite lime, all purpose plant food, blood & bone meal, greensand, guano, etc. keep it moist and optionally add in some redworms along with dried and ground organic matter (trim, coffee grounds, kitchen scraps). After several weeks the soil should be perfect for another grow.

you can re use it i do all the time but i found that once i was done with my soil once i shaked the hell out of my root system there wasnt alot of soil left ) but your goin to still need new soil and yes blend the old stuff in also adding your cow manure , sheep manure what ever

i like to add shrimp compost , sheep manure and a touch of peatmoss blended in porportion my yields are insane

I have to agree with the reuse, however I don't usually take a plant out, clean the soil and immediately reuse it. I recycle all soil back into my new compost pile for the next grow, over the years keeping and making new soils for the grow has given me a 3 cycle supply of soil. 1 cycle for the current grow, 2nd cycle is ready for the next crop and the 3rd get the finished plants (mixed with all the amendments) soil into the active compost. This allows the soil to rest and get reenergized for the next grow.
I have used soil over immediately when I was in a pinch like you are now, it works if your soil is healthy and it depends on how long your plant was in your soil as to what is left in there nutewise. Good Luck and keep recycling dirt for your grows it will save you a bunch of money.

A lot of you guys have great ideas on recharging the soil and letting it sit a bit I especially like the compost pile idea. But, if you don't have those options available and in a pinch I would reuse the soil but add some guano, wormcastings and a little lime. I would avoid adding more green sand as green sand takes years to break down.

To keep on the safe side of fungus and bugs I wouldn't do this all the time. I also never considered that there might be salmonella in organic soil, good looking to who mentioned that!

Terry0129 said:

i am trying this myself at the moment. i just rinsed the shit out of it and made sure the water was running clear (no leftover nutes) and so far so good. it has been 3 days now for my transferred vegging plants but i haven't tried it with clones or from seed.

Click to expand...

yeah, I actually just finished up sifting through the old soil I used during the last grow.. got 90% of the roots out of it. I actually came up with a very quick but yet efficient way to clean the old soil of old roots and anything else that might be left behind from the last plant/grow. I cut out a square piece of screen (like you use for windows on your house).. then underneath the screen.. I placed the bottom plastic part from my 'plant incubator' there.. so it would catch all the soil that got sifted through the screen. As you gently shake the screen to get the soil to fall through the screen and into the bottom plastic catcher.. you'll notice that all you have left.. up on the top part of the screen.. is nothing but old roots (from the previous plant/grow) and other debri and unusable parts. It's a great way to clean the old soil.. so you can use it again.

I'm happy though.. my 'Afghani #1' from Sensi Seeds has about 2 maybe 3 weeks at the most before she'll be ready for harvest.. and today, I finished transplanting both of my new sprouts/strains that I will be growing and putting into the flower room.. in 2 to 3 weeks once the Afghani #1 gets harvested. That way, I have a vacant flowering room/area that will be free and open for when I move the new sprouts into the room to begin flowering.

This way, once the new sprouts I have started now... once they start flowering and get into about their 4th or 5th week of flowering, I can then start a new pair of seedlings.. this way, I will have a constant flow of smoke. In other words, I will always have something in flower.. and I'll always have something going.. instead of growing a few, harvesting.. then starting a new pair of seedlings. I think it will be better this way.. plus I'll always have something to smoke on. That's the best part of it.

So again, I currently have the 'Afghani #1' which is in its final 2 or 3 weeks of flowering.. and I've got two new seedlings which both are on their 4th day of their veg. cycle. The two new strains.. are 'Snow White' (Nirvana) and one 'Ice Kush' (Ice Berry [x] Blue Kush F2).. and their doing absolutely wonderful!

peace.

ah, almost forgot.. thanks to everyone that helped me out with this question. It saved me a lot of stress and agony! Appreciate it..



peace.

Been using the same dirt for over a year now.
See sig thread for how I do it.