A4
11th Year Anniversary
So there have been more than a few people asking about living soil products in the UK. Some have a difficult time putting together something comparable to what we have in the States. I wanted to post this up along with some links of where you can purchase products. This is very loosely based on my soil recipe. Keep in mind, there are tons of different ways to create soil and there is no ONE right way to do it. Soil is all over the world and everyone's location varies. There will always be something in your area you can substitute for these products and if you have some questions then shoot me a PM. I am around pretty much every day at some point throughout the day.
So the basic breakdown for your base soil is like this:
1) 30% Peat
2) 30% Perlite, rice hulls, buckwheat hulls, hydroton pebbles, anything for porosity
3) 15% Compost - I like a good mushroom compost but manure based will work. Any type of compost, all you want to do is get some carbon in there. Carbon is life!
4) 15% Vermi-Compost - A good earthworm compost. The fresher the better! If you have problems finding EWC buy some worms and a rubbermade bin and start your own worm farm. They are easy to keep and provide constant fresh FREE EWC!
5) 10% Topsoil - I use local topsoil from the woods near my home. Go looking around some fallen trees for some decaying matter, the nice black stuff that smells like dirt smelled when you were a kid! That is the good stuff with lots of life.
That is it for your base! Now to that you want to add some amendments.
I am going to give you a breakdown for 30 gallons of soil because that is how I make it. You will need to adjust accordingly. If you mix up 15 gallons of the base, then cut this in half. You get the idea.
1) 4 cups crustacean meal, crab meal or the like
2) 6 cups kelp meal, seaweed meal or the like
3) 2 cups comfrey
4) 8 cups fish meal
5) 8 cups bone meal
6) 1 cup potash, langbeinite, su-pol-mag (something with potash in it)
7) 4 cups neem meal
8) 2 cups alfalfa
9) 1 or 2 cups rock phosphate (too much won't hurt with this)
10) 1 cup rock dust, glacial rock dust, azomite, there are tons to name. Once again, the name isn't important just get some minerals into the soil
All of this above can be swapped out for other things. You can use bat guanos if you want, you can use sea bird guano. There is nothing set in stone with this stuff. If you want to substitute something, just do a google for it and nutrient analysis. That will tell you a breakdown of the NPK and trace minerals and look for something along the same breakdown. I will say some stuff is very important for me. Fish meal for instance has a lot of trace minerals and amino acids and the neem meal is an excellent pest management meal. The plant will absorb the neem and and bugs will not want to eat at the plant. That is a good deterrent as you will find that full on organics brings on a lot of pest problems compared to synthetics. Once you get your soil cook and used a few times you will begin to see less and less pests though and you will begin to have better production on your flowers. Yes, don't throw your soil away! Set it aside once you have harvested and let the roots break down, about a month, then pull the main stem. It will come out easy by then and get ready to transplant into it again.
So that is the basic fertilizer recipe. Now you want a good buffer solution. Mine is below. Mix that and use 2 cups to 30 gallons.
1 1/2 cups Garden Lime
1 1/2 cups Gypsum
3 cups Powdered Oyster Shell
Lastly you will want to add some mycos. Endo and Ecto and start your soil with a good EWC tea to kickstart the life. Man, that is it! I know it looks like a lot but it is simple and I promise you, you won't be adding a bunch of junk along that way. Water and some teas, some foliar calcium if you like, some SST if you like but all of that is just added fun. You won't HAVE to add anything except water and an occasional EWC tea.
So now the 3 million dollar question everyone seems to be asking, where can we get this in the UK? Well I did the research for you! Links provided below. Think outside the box! You will find stuff you need at tack barns, farmer supply stores, fishing stores, the places are limitless and believe it or not most people will just about give it away because most of what we use are waste products to them. Shells and such. No one is eating that but THAT is what makes good soil and has for millions of years. Decaying animal and plant matter that our ancestors have thrown on the ground has turned to good stuff. So, the links.
http://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/sis.html?_nkw=Westland Irish Moss Peat 100L&_itemId=250901596620
****://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/SEER-Rockdust-Garden-Minerals-20-KG-Bag-Re-mineralisation-The-Soil-/261126578758?pt=UK_Home_Garden_Garden_Plants_Fertiliser_CV&hash=item3ccc5b6246
****://www.organiccatalogue.com/Soil-Care-and-Feeds-Fertilisers/c60_167/p465/ORGANIC-POTASH-4kg/product_info.html
****://www.organiccatalogue.com/Soil-Care-and-Feeds-Fertilisers/c60_167/p467/ROCK-PHOSPHATE-4kg/product_info.html
****://www.organiccatalogue.com/Soil-Preparation-and-Feeding-Fertilisers/c60_167/p2338/COMFREY-PELLETS-1-litre/product_info.html
****://www.organiccatalogue.com/p1253/CHASE-SEAWEED-MEAL-2.5kg/product_info.html
****://www.organiccatalogue.com/Soil-Preparation-and-Feeding-Soil-Improvers/c60_166/p458/GYPSUM-3kg/product_info.html
****://www.millbryhill.co.uk/equestrian-530/horse-feed-583/all-horse-feed-593/dengie-alfalfa-pellets-2029.htm
****://www.thenaturalgardener.co.uk/mycorrhizal_fungi.php
****://www.thenaturalgardener.co.uk/neem_natural_fertilizer.php
****://www.thenaturalgardener.co.uk/seaweed_granules.php
****://www.chicken-house.co.uk/acatalog/Crushed_Oyster_Shell_25_KG_Bag.html
****://onlineshop.aabaits.co.uk/bait-product/Fishmeal%20LT-94/
****://onlineshop.aabaits.co.uk/bait-product/Shrimp%20Meal/
So the basic breakdown for your base soil is like this:
1) 30% Peat
2) 30% Perlite, rice hulls, buckwheat hulls, hydroton pebbles, anything for porosity
3) 15% Compost - I like a good mushroom compost but manure based will work. Any type of compost, all you want to do is get some carbon in there. Carbon is life!
4) 15% Vermi-Compost - A good earthworm compost. The fresher the better! If you have problems finding EWC buy some worms and a rubbermade bin and start your own worm farm. They are easy to keep and provide constant fresh FREE EWC!
5) 10% Topsoil - I use local topsoil from the woods near my home. Go looking around some fallen trees for some decaying matter, the nice black stuff that smells like dirt smelled when you were a kid! That is the good stuff with lots of life.
That is it for your base! Now to that you want to add some amendments.
I am going to give you a breakdown for 30 gallons of soil because that is how I make it. You will need to adjust accordingly. If you mix up 15 gallons of the base, then cut this in half. You get the idea.
1) 4 cups crustacean meal, crab meal or the like
2) 6 cups kelp meal, seaweed meal or the like
3) 2 cups comfrey
4) 8 cups fish meal
5) 8 cups bone meal
6) 1 cup potash, langbeinite, su-pol-mag (something with potash in it)
7) 4 cups neem meal
8) 2 cups alfalfa
9) 1 or 2 cups rock phosphate (too much won't hurt with this)
10) 1 cup rock dust, glacial rock dust, azomite, there are tons to name. Once again, the name isn't important just get some minerals into the soil
All of this above can be swapped out for other things. You can use bat guanos if you want, you can use sea bird guano. There is nothing set in stone with this stuff. If you want to substitute something, just do a google for it and nutrient analysis. That will tell you a breakdown of the NPK and trace minerals and look for something along the same breakdown. I will say some stuff is very important for me. Fish meal for instance has a lot of trace minerals and amino acids and the neem meal is an excellent pest management meal. The plant will absorb the neem and and bugs will not want to eat at the plant. That is a good deterrent as you will find that full on organics brings on a lot of pest problems compared to synthetics. Once you get your soil cook and used a few times you will begin to see less and less pests though and you will begin to have better production on your flowers. Yes, don't throw your soil away! Set it aside once you have harvested and let the roots break down, about a month, then pull the main stem. It will come out easy by then and get ready to transplant into it again.
So that is the basic fertilizer recipe. Now you want a good buffer solution. Mine is below. Mix that and use 2 cups to 30 gallons.
1 1/2 cups Garden Lime
1 1/2 cups Gypsum
3 cups Powdered Oyster Shell
Lastly you will want to add some mycos. Endo and Ecto and start your soil with a good EWC tea to kickstart the life. Man, that is it! I know it looks like a lot but it is simple and I promise you, you won't be adding a bunch of junk along that way. Water and some teas, some foliar calcium if you like, some SST if you like but all of that is just added fun. You won't HAVE to add anything except water and an occasional EWC tea.
So now the 3 million dollar question everyone seems to be asking, where can we get this in the UK? Well I did the research for you! Links provided below. Think outside the box! You will find stuff you need at tack barns, farmer supply stores, fishing stores, the places are limitless and believe it or not most people will just about give it away because most of what we use are waste products to them. Shells and such. No one is eating that but THAT is what makes good soil and has for millions of years. Decaying animal and plant matter that our ancestors have thrown on the ground has turned to good stuff. So, the links.
http://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/sis.html?_nkw=Westland Irish Moss Peat 100L&_itemId=250901596620
****://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/SEER-Rockdust-Garden-Minerals-20-KG-Bag-Re-mineralisation-The-Soil-/261126578758?pt=UK_Home_Garden_Garden_Plants_Fertiliser_CV&hash=item3ccc5b6246
****://www.organiccatalogue.com/Soil-Care-and-Feeds-Fertilisers/c60_167/p465/ORGANIC-POTASH-4kg/product_info.html
****://www.organiccatalogue.com/Soil-Care-and-Feeds-Fertilisers/c60_167/p467/ROCK-PHOSPHATE-4kg/product_info.html
****://www.organiccatalogue.com/Soil-Preparation-and-Feeding-Fertilisers/c60_167/p2338/COMFREY-PELLETS-1-litre/product_info.html
****://www.organiccatalogue.com/p1253/CHASE-SEAWEED-MEAL-2.5kg/product_info.html
****://www.organiccatalogue.com/Soil-Preparation-and-Feeding-Soil-Improvers/c60_166/p458/GYPSUM-3kg/product_info.html
****://www.millbryhill.co.uk/equestrian-530/horse-feed-583/all-horse-feed-593/dengie-alfalfa-pellets-2029.htm
****://www.thenaturalgardener.co.uk/mycorrhizal_fungi.php
****://www.thenaturalgardener.co.uk/neem_natural_fertilizer.php
****://www.thenaturalgardener.co.uk/seaweed_granules.php
****://www.chicken-house.co.uk/acatalog/Crushed_Oyster_Shell_25_KG_Bag.html
****://onlineshop.aabaits.co.uk/bait-product/Fishmeal%20LT-94/
****://onlineshop.aabaits.co.uk/bait-product/Shrimp%20Meal/
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