Biochar

[hecno]

400X plus is best . I am pure soil based , But I would think your mix would be hard to work with , in saying that someone will know more about it with your base than me . @Eyes on Fire .

 

[Dudeski]

Oh shoot. That sucks. I am using Advanced Nutrients Sensi nutes. Right now my substrate is HP Promix (peat base) with coco and perlite amended. And mycos, worm castings, biochar. So the nutes I'm using would harm but not kill the microbes and fungi?

I have access to a lab optical microscope which I used to look at trichomes. I believe it goes up to 60X's magnification. Is there a way to look my growing medium (and possibly pull part of the root from the pot) with a microscope and see microbes and tell how they are doing like I can do with trichomes?

The salt base nutes don't help the life at all as the plants don't do their part in the cation exchange. Worm castings are very, very good for the soil. @calliandra uses a microscope to look at her soil

 

[Pops]

Good day stoner
Are you chasing any PH problems??/
mixing Advanced Nutrients Sensi nutes with can do to much.
feed with org soil you just water the soil does the work for you.
the only thing I add to my soil after 5 weeks is worm castings and Bio char mix that has been. that for the plants last run to Med.
Good base soil + biochar and worm castings and reuse your soil, I do add rice baby food to the soil.
Over time as you keep reusing it, the better it gets.
I have use the same soil for over a yr now.I just paid for some new soil to replace loss over time.I just added it to my old soil.
I do three step.
1 after I cut down a plant I leave it in the pot for a mo. keep it moist.
2 mix 50-50 old potted soil to mix thats been sitting for time span of grow.
3 mix worm casting and bio-char and rice baby food some other small things.
place in fab bag and grow.
IT's the only way I can keep up with the Hydro. growers.
The cost for 6, 3.5 gal fabric bags is 20.00 or less for the Whole grow. + ele and water.
Hope this helps.
these girl are 3 weeks old in pic

@Pops

 

[Rev. Green Genes]

Most anything organic feeds the life in the soil but provides it different NPk. Alfalfa, kelp, and malted barley. if you used enough of these you don't need the bottles. The bottles tend to make the plant roots lazy, only feeding from the nute water and not the soil.
I am still learning but I hope that made sense

Here is how to figure it out.

•The ratio of C/N affects decomposition rate
•Some C goes to new microbial biomass and some to CO2
•N will be needed for new biomass

If not in the residue must come from soil microbial biomass which has an average carbon to nitrogen ratio of 7.5:1

this graph shows higher C:N ratios taking longer to decay. (break up the carbon chains)

•Added substrate = Green manure (C/N = 15/1), assume 45% Carbon retained by soil,

•For every 100 kg of Green Manure substrate added to the soil:
•
» (0.45)(100 kg) = 45 kg of carbon added to soil
•
» 45/15 = 3 kg of N added to the soil (i.e. the plant contains 3% N by wt.)
»
» (0.65)(45) = 29.25 kg is given off as CO2 and doesn't enter into the rest of the calculation.
•
» (0.35)(45) = 15.75 kg of carbon will be incorporated into microbial biomass.
»
» 15.75/7.5 = 2.1 kg of N will be needed by microbes (immobilization)
»
» 3 kg N - 2.1 kg N = 0.9 kg of excess N is contained in 100 kg of substrate.

Therefore there will be a net mineralization of N in the amount of .9 kg per 100 kg of green manure.


___________________________________________________________________________________

mineralization = transformation of organic to inorganic (plant available)
immobilization = transformation of inorganic to organic (not plant available)

So for every substrate you add to soil, given the C:N ratio, you can determine it's effect on the Carbon and Nitrogen pool. The

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________

Biochar is not necessarily a source of carbon for microlife. It depends on the temperature and duration of the pryrolosis and the starting materials chemical composition. Biochar is useful for soil texture, water holding, aggregation, Nutrient capacity, and other physical properties of soil. It may or may not directly effect microbes.

 

[Rev. Green Genes]

The more complex the molecule the more specific the enzymes needed to break it down. This is what microbes do for a living.


this is a lignin molecule. Very hard for an enzyme to find it's way in there and dissolve a bond.

here is cellulose, it is relatively easy compared to lignin.

Basically, if it is soluble in water it gets broken down first, followed by things that are alcohol soluble.

 

[lunarman]

Good day stoner
Are you chasing any PH problems??/
mixing Advanced Nutrients Sensi nutes with can do to much.
feed with org soil you just water the soil does the work for you.
the only thing I add to my soil after 5 weeks is worm castings and Bio char mix that has been. that for the plants last run to Med.
Good base soil + biochar and worm castings and reuse your soil, I do add rice baby food to the soil.
Over time as you keep reusing it, the better it gets.
I have use the same soil for over a yr now.I just paid for some new soil to replace loss over time.I just added it to my old soil.
I do three step.
1 after I cut down a plant I leave it in the pot for a mo. keep it moist.
2 mix 50-50 old potted soil to mix thats been sitting for time span of grow.
3 mix worm casting and bio-char and rice baby food some other small things.
place in fab bag and grow.
IT's the only way I can keep up with the Hydro. growers.
The cost for 6, 3.5 gal fabric bags is 20.00 or less for the Whole grow. + ele and water.
Hope this helps.
these girl are 3 weeks old in pic
View attachment 872023 View attachment 872024 View attachment 872025
@Pops

My first grow was DIY organic mix but I had issues with bugs and such so I switched to 100% coco and Remo nutes on the second grow and I had PH issues and lockout with that. So I'm changing things with my third grow.

First phase of 3rd grow was amended coco with 10% biochar and 10% worm castings and some mycos fungi and liquid kelp/nitrozyme plus a known to be good autoflower nute schedule using Advanced Nutes. I think this is causing issues but I don't know exactly how or why. I am reducing the nutes for the ones in this first phase.

Second phase of 3rd grow I mixed in the amended coco with as 30% and HP Promix Mycor at 70%. I wanted to reduce the coco substrate, but wanted to keep the bennies that are mixed in the coco. I haven't put any plants in these pots yet so I don't know how this is going to work.

So is mixing biochar and worm castings and mycos and liquid in to a soil-less substrate and using synthetic nutes not a good idea? I figured I'd call this a hybrid medium and hopefully get the bennies of organics and artificial nutes.

I would like to go back to all organics. I'm going to mix up a super soil this spring and let it cook and use it in the fall. But for now I need to make this hybrid approach work.

 

[Dudeski]

My first grow was DIY organic mix but I had issues with bugs and such so I switched to 100% coco and Remo nutes on the second grow and I had PH issues and lockout with that. So I'm changing things with my third grow.

First phase of 3rd grow was amended coco with 10% biochar and 10% worm castings and some mycos fungi and liquid kelp/nitrozyme plus a known to be good autoflower nute schedule using Advanced Nutes. I think this is causing issues but I don't know exactly how or why. I am reducing the nutes for the ones in this first phase.

Second phase of 3rd grow I mixed in the amended coco with as 30% and HP Promix Mycor at 70%. I wanted to reduce the coco substrate, but wanted to keep the bennies that are mixed in the coco. I haven't put any plants in these pots yet so I don't know how this is going to work.

So is mixing biochar and worm castings and mycos and liquid in to a soil-less substrate and using synthetic nutes not a good idea? I figured I'd call this a hybrid medium and hopefully get the bennies of organics and artificial nutes.

I would like to go back to all organics. I'm going to mix up a super soil this spring and let it cook and use it in the fall. But for now I need to make this hybrid approach work.

Did I read right, 30 coco and 70 promix? Thats ok to amend and grow in. I used coco in my current mix, let work about 45 days. It has done well, using some recharge and topdressing along with a couple teas

 

[lunarman]

Did I read right, 30 coco and 70 promix? Thats ok to amend and grow in. I used coco in my current mix, let work about 45 days. It has done well, using some recharge and topdressing along with a couple teas

Yes that's right. I did some searching online and found very little on mixing HP Promix peat and coco. But I did find one thread/post that seemed to make sense to me and the recommendation was 70% HP Promix and 30% coco. But my coco is amended with the worm poop and biochar. I have 2 Meph sour livers in solo cups now and will drop them in to the autopots on Monday. The autopots have my HP/coco in them now and I'm charging them a bit with calmag and very light nutes and nitrozyme. Hoping this batch of stuff I made up performs well. I'll have to play around with how much nutes to use.

 

[Dudeski]

Yes that's right. I did some searching online and found very little on mixing HP Promix peat and coco. But I did find one thread/post that seemed to make sense to me and the recommendation was 70% HP Promix and 30% coco. But my coco is amended with the worm poop and biochar. I have 2 Meph sour livers in solo cups now and will drop them in to the autopots on Monday. The autopots have my HP/coco in them now and I'm charging them a bit with calmag and very light nutes and nitrozyme. Hoping this batch of stuff I made up performs well. I'll have to play around with how much nutes to use.

I think it will work well , the biochar is said to help regulate the salts in bottle ferts. With the peat I wouldn't worry about precharging, you got beneficial in there. Biochar needs a N charge, slight, to help it come work.

 

[Eyes on Fire]

well lemme see. if your starting out I would say look into a worm bin and Bokashi bin too. compost piles if your region and weather can handle that.indoors for the worm bin and bokashi bin probably. but those two will do excellent for your organic gardens. But in all honesty you might want to get a pack of the KIS soil makers pack.15LB pack for 50 USD free shipping in the US anyways I think. or even make a 2.1 recipe from scratch with a few alterations and that is a good way to start the soil building with certain parameters followed. watch the organics works and learn more then while learning the soil building and doing worm bins and bokashi bins mix and see what soils act like,smell like and so on. its a good way instead of hitting the ground crawling and mixing various components and having an off balance. thats where I would start personally. but with the worm castings(Inoculate or compost essentially) biochar binds with it like other foods and life present in a proper soil. any good and healthy inoculate does this for the most part.