Homemade soil recipe on a strict budget

Grow from Home DIY Do It Yourself
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Being a relative newbie, I’ve made the mistake of getting over complicated making my soil and have burned/ruined several plants. I am growing in a tent and, right now, going to use Jack’s Part A + Part B + Epsom salts for nutrients because it’s inexpensive, easy to use and seems to be difficult to mess up. I will use 5 gallon fabric pots.

I’m on a very strict budget and the stuff below is what I have on hand. What combination should I use for my planting medium?

Top soil, composted cow manure, worm castings, sphagnum peat moss, perlite, kelp meal, crushed crab/crustacean shells, chicken manure.

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Well you’re not going organic and using Jacks salts, so…..just Sphagnum and pearlite, leave the rest for an organic grow.

Marty

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Great advice Marty, but why not consider to try an organic vs salts grow @ArtVandalay . Here is a recipe that could help you:

This soil mix taken from Reefermans soil recipe and added a couple extras.

1 part composted horse manure
1 part coir and perlite mix
1 part top soil mix

I also added potash, biochar and worm castings. Sweated like a pig on a hot first of spring day. I got about 30 x 20 litre bags filled with the soil mix and letting it chill for a couple weeks. Lined up in the orchard where it gets good sun and easy access to water.

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Just perlite and moss? There’s nothing good in those. Isn’t that just like using beach sand?

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100%, although they assist with root aeration, water retention by reducing soil compaction, like sand would do.

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Chris he said he was going to use Jacks salts for nutes, why would he need to put in expensive organic components? My take is either do one or the other, as both use a base of pearlite/coco/sphagnum moss then either organic or salt fertilizers. Just my take.

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Very right, I misread the original post.

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Organic amendments feed the soil biome, whereas salt-based nutrients directly feed the plant. For a strict budget, the most cost-effective approach is the inert base and salt method.

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Using the jacks will kill any biome you are building and the plant will not uptake organic nutrients while the salt based ferts are being forced into it

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So Jack’s nutrients are basically salt(s)? Why is Epsom salt also necessary to use with Jack’s A and B?

What do you mean by doing an “organic grow?” Does that not use nutrients? Is that primarily for outside growing?

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Pretty sure that is exactly what I said.

Marty

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Come on Art you been around here long enough to know the difference. It is just synthetic versus organic inputs that make the fertilizer, either organic input or synthetic input. Jacks is synthetic, Gaia Green is organic. I wasn’t saying that you can’t amend either/or, just saying that you can do either or,……or you can do a combination and amend either with the other. Just be careful. Some play nice together and some don’t. I have never used Jacks, nor bought it. I would assume that if folks reccommend that you use Epson salts with Jacks that it is deficient in sulfur or magnesium.

Marty

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I have often wondered if synthetic nutes kill the biome, and no matter which way I grow organic or synthetic, I always amend with a good inoculant, every week or so. Obviously a sterile medium such as just coco and pearlite can benefit from several organic inputs for different reasons. But as he asked a dirt cheap soil is just a base with aeration and then a rounded nutrient program that provides everything necessary to grow the plant without all the frills.

Marty

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Synthetic/salt ferts/nutes most definitely kill the micro biomes in the soil/medium. It is what they are by nature. It’s like oral steroids are 7 akylated to arrange the carbon molecule so it will convert in the liver to the targeted hormone. It destroys the liver by this process of forcing it through and conversion. It is the same with synthetic nutes for plants.