Jraven's New Soil. Time to dig in.

[Jraven]

Gotcha man sounds good. Hey do think since I'm only growing in the summer, my soil will be like used 4 months and resting 8 months of the year maybe I could keep it going perpetually. Theoretically speaking of course

 

[Eyes on Fire]

sure ya can,just dont let it freeze or ideally go below 45-50F.but I do it all the time.past few years Ive brought in batchs of used and new soil from outdiirs to grow indoors and use it and to go back outside next year and used either in my canna soil and/or my annuals and/or per-annuals .just after a cpl months it'll settle and you'll need to check the moisture levels as well as a small boost of food similar to worms essenitally also you'll wanna stir it once time to the bottom and break up clumpos and let it breath for a morning or afternoon or so and back to it. easy.

 

[Jraven]

Ok, kind of working on the math for my soil since it looks like in spite of all good intent I don't have exactly what it takes for any of the recipes. Not really trying to reinvent the wheel just want to get a good mix. I'll just say I'm WAY out in the sticks and I've got what I've got at this point, hoping to make something logical
My first question is about my base soil. My recycled bulk is Promix bx and wondering if I can include a percentage of composted steer manure and/or composted chicken manure as components of the base soil or should I consider these as part of the amendments. I guess quantities would be the key difference here. I see some recipes for both approaches.
Also, i have lots of this and wondering if a little bit of it could be included in the base.

Cheers

 

[Sourdough]

A huge ℅ of my soil is steer manure. I don't use a recipe exactly. Just try to put the amendments in evenly and not to much and I'm happy.... Lol why make it complicated

 

[Joe383]

One thing I just learned in one of my organics books I did not know is that if you add lime to a fresh nitrogen source to correct the PH before the item has broken down like fresh manure or grass clippings that you loose more nitrogen than if you let it break down and then correct PH as the lime and nitrogen source has a reaction and converts the nitrogen to ammonia gas and evaporates off. I don't think you loose all nitrogen but you end up with less than you would have if you let the compost sit and break down for a while before correcting PH. You might already know this but it was new to me so though I would share it.

 

[trailanimal]

Yep it's right outside the door, piles up in long windrows along the high tide line. Fucus is the most common. I'll get some composting eventually.
For now I have a commercial kelp meal product for my first batch of tlo
Joe, what part of the state are you thinking about?

great gardening resource

 

[trailanimal]

View attachment 535383 View attachment 535383 View attachment 535382
My soil ingredients are starting to arrive.
Earthworm castings (bought some extra cause it looks like we don't have enough homemade) I'll be using both
Composted steer manure.
Bat guano 9-3-1
Bat guano 0-7-0
Fishbone meal 3-16-0
Neem seed meal
Garden Lime
Alfalfa meal
EM-1 Bokashi
Azomite
Still coming is:
Rock phosphate
Kelp meal
Perlite
Haha now I'll have to figure out the math since I probably don't have the exact ingredients for any one recipe.

just ordered some of that guano

 

[trailanimal]

hey guys, NW Arctic AK here. Nothing that a gardener would call "soil". Started with very fine river silt, piles up when spring flood recedes. The mountains are right here, this is fresh building block minerals, no organic material, no biotic bloom. So, what to do? Compost: our humanure, that's right grow my shit in my shit, fish waste from the drying rack, garden waste, hack down the jungle around compost and compost that. The catch? Too cool and too short growing season for thermophilic composting. It's a slow mouldering process, but it gets there. Been growing compost at this site for 4 yrs now, and getting an acceptable garden soil. grows stuff real good, starting to tweek for more production.

 

[Eyes on Fire]

depending on how you harvest you compost i like to add lime half way once im adding to it.not right off.but thats just my style.lots of ppl use lime right off.

do you have an amended products list? just curious but as for the steer manure did you get bokashi ?you have EWC i assume so i'd just add saaayyyy.... 1.5 cups to roughly 35 or so gallons of soil. 1 cup to about 20 roughly.work nice as an inoculate boost and if you kick it off with a heavily fed tea with myco;s it';ll do even better. can ya get any of this? the basmati rice,its good stuff but kinda hard to find.

but if you take like 2 cups steer manure and a cup rounded of bokashi and mix them up really good and spray them with a light mist that contains a quality Wettable powder and a small touch of sugar and/or molasses too.WOW,seal it up for 36 hours with a sprinkle of rice on top prior to closing and setting it in a dark warm corner O da room?holy liviing fuzz balls fat man!! its on then.hardcore inoculate city ready for a 35 gallon mix or 40.

 

[Jraven]

Yea man I think I have all that stuff, got some em-1 bokashi and some composted steer manure..some myco innoculant ( wettable powder) is that what you mean?.that sounds exciting i can do that.
I'm going to post my list of ammendments here soon with my guestimated quantities and see what you all think. I'll be hoping for comments on that lol.

One thing I just learned in one of my organics books I did not know is that if you add lime to a fresh nitrogen source to correct the PH before the item has broken down like fresh manure or grass clippings that you loose more nitrogen than if you let it break down and then correct PH as the lime and nitrogen source has a reaction and converts the nitrogen to ammonia gas and evaporates off. I don't think you loose all nitrogen but you end up with less than you would have if you let the compost sit and break down for a while before correcting PH. You might already know this but it was new to me so though I would share it.

You guys think i should wait awhile before adding lime to my soil mix? Or in this case everything is composted already?

hey guys, NW Arctic AK here. Nothing that a gardener would call "soil". Started with very fine river silt, piles up when spring flood recedes. The mountains are right here, this is fresh building block minerals, no organic material, no biotic bloom. So, what to do? Compost: our humanure, that's right grow my shit in my shit, fish waste from the drying rack, garden waste, hack down the jungle around compost and compost that. The catch? Too cool and too short growing season for thermophilic composting. It's a slow mouldering process, but it gets there. Been growing compost at this site for 4 yrs now, and getting an acceptable garden soil. grows stuff real good, starting to tweek for more production.

Hey Trail, I've actually grown in humanure too. It was decades ago but we lived in western Washington then and had soil conditions where we lived that made really quick work of it. I'd just move the outhouse each year and a year later youd have some good shit
It's not so easy here lol as a matter of fact we're way behind right now. It doesnt look like I'll have any for this batch. The soil isn't very good or plentiful either, so i'm thankful for Promix