Comparison of Dirt and Hydroponics

farmergiles · 07-20-2010, 03:46 AM

Which is best, dirt or hydro?

Dirt
By which I mean any grow medium which contains all or some of the nutrients needed for the plant to grow and flower.

This could be soil or what is known as a soil-less mix- usually based on sphagnum moss. Soil-less mixes are less likely to contain pests.

A mix might contain-
Sphagnum moss
Soil and or compost
Coco coir
Perlite for drainage
Fertiliser- could be guano, mineral fertiliser, bone meal, kelp meal, compost and or many others.
Epsom salts, dolomitic lime and or other supplements.

The medium must have good characteristics for the plants- good drainage and a stable pH slightly below neutral.

You could add all the nutrients needed into the medium right from the start. This could be tricky to get right as the Ec (how hot or rich the soil is) will be high with everything in, maybe too hot, especially for young plants.

Or, more likely if you are growing indoors or in a greenhouse, the medium will have some nutrients at the start and you will supplement this by feeding as and when necessary. Most people use liquid feeds but you can top dress with solid fertiliser.

Advantages-
Dirt, in one form or another, is freely available.
The set up costs are minimal.
A good medium will act as a pH buffer- shielding the plant (to a certain extent) from pH fluctuations in the water.
The medium will probably hold enough water to keep the plants going for a few days if need be (though more frequent watering is probably better).
The plant can, with the aid of symbiotic bacteria, store nutrients in the soil ready for use, so if there is a nutrient issue it will tend to happen slowly giving you the grower a chance to remedy it.
Soil growing can be very environmentally friendly but really you need to be doing a lot of composting and things to achieve this- it's fairly easy on a farm but harder in inner cities.
The medium can be reused for your potatoes, brassica or whatever.
Many claim the taste of soil grown grass is better than hydro, others disagree. IMO organics give better taste and are more forgiving of mistakes than mineral fertilizers; it is easier to use organics in dirt than in hydro as they tend to clog the pipes.
Growing in dirt is fairly intuitive and a lot of people have prior experience with veg, fruit, flowers etc.

Disadvantages-
Dirt is heavy, you have to lug it around.
Store bought mixes may not be organic- it may be based on harsh mineral ferts.
Store bought mixes may not be very environmentally sound- sphagnum moss is being depleted from many habitats. Many mixes are transported large distances before being sold. Dirt is bulky- bringing the associated energy costs of transport.
You have to get rid of it somehow- which brings me on to...
Stealth- if you are often seen lugging bags of dirt around this may cause interest. Disposing of soil injudiciously could also attract undesired suspicion.
Dirt can harbour pests and diseases.
The plants need watering frequently. Handwatering a lot of plants is a time consuming and laborious task.
Setting up an autowatering rig requires quite a lot of the set up required for hydroponics.
In many cases you'll be supplementing the nutrients with feeding as you go along. So you'll want to monitor and control the pH, Ec and composition of the nutrients. Not that much easier than hydro really.
A lot of growers struggle with watering technique- this causes surprisingly many issues. It is possible to harm the roots with over or under watering.

farmergiles · 07-20-2010, 04:44 AM

Hydroponics
By which I mean growing plants using nutrient solution- in our case usually rooted in an inert medium.

Typical Hydro Mediums-
Rockwool- slabs or shredded
Coco Coir (this does have some soil like properties but I'm ignoring them for the sake of simplicity)
Clay pebbles
Vermiculite or Perlite.

The nutrients are not provided by the medium- we provide them in nutrient solution, directly to the roots.
The medium is generally re used for future grows at least twice.

Hydroponics Systems
Wick
Ebb and Flow
Top Drip
Bubbler
Aeroponic
Nutrient Film Technique

The nutrient composition, pH and strength will need to be monitored and controlled to provide the plants with what they need. The nutrient mix is held in a tank (sometimes remote from the plants, sometimes under the pots). This mix is usually recirculated although it can be drained to waste. The nutrient solution must be aerated, usually be means of an air pump and airstone.
The systems mentioned above require varying amounts of equipment and effort to set up, a wicking system is very simple, some of the other systems can get fairly complex.

Advantages
The nutrients come in a concentrated form- there are no heavy sacks to heave to and from your growspace. This can aid stealth.
A good hydro set up, especially aeroponics and NFT can give better yields and shorter flowering times than dirt grows.
Once set up, running a hydro table can be cheaper than buying soil.
If you like to tinker, perfecting your set up can be very interesting.
You could argue that hydro is more environmentally sound than most dirt grows- lower transport costs, no depletion of sphagnum moss. Coco coir has gained much popularity recently as an environmentally friendly alternative to rockwool.
Because you are supplying all the nutrients you can (in theory) tailor to the exact requirements at any given moment.
With practise and skill, a hydro grower can leave the grow to run on it's own for a week or more between maintenance visits.
For large grows hydroponic techniques can save much labour- hand watering a 100 plants takes a long time, changing the reservoir for 100 plants takes around the same time as for 1 plant.
As long as everything is kept clean and algae is not allowed to develop hydro could well provide a less welcoming environment to pests than dirt. Also there is less opportunity for pests to be introduced in the first place.

Disadvantages
There is no buffer between the nutrients and the plants- get the strength, pH or composition wrong and the plants will suffer quickly.
Organic nutes are tricky as they tend to block pipework, also because they are not inert organic hydro can go badly out of whack quite unexpectedly.
Especially when plants are growing or flowering most vigorously they can take up certain nutrients very quickly, changing the pH and composition of the nutrient solution unexpectedly
Set up costs can be be high- water pumps, pipework, reservoirs, air pumps, valves etc. You'll almost certainly need a good pH/EC meter.
Mineral nutes can be harmful to the environment if dumped irresponsibly.
Many grows, especially commercial ones, use rockwool. Rockwool is bad for the environment, also potentially hazardous to handle.
Hydroponics are not as intuitive as dirt.

farmergiles · 07-20-2010, 05:09 AM

Thoughts anyone?

**Pharm Girl** · 07-20-2010, 09:50 AM

Quote:

Coco Coir (this does have some soil like properties but I'm ignoring them for the sake of simplicity)

That medium mixed with perilite is the only indoor one I've ever tried....successfull y.

farmergiles · 07-20-2010, 11:47 AM

Someday I'd like to set up a top drip coco grow.

I had good results with an Atami mix with coco and no perlite/vermiculite. Dried out quite quickly so you had to be on the ball with watering.

Coco seems fashionable ATM, maybe with good reason I think.

Dandaweedman · 08-18-2010, 07:15 PM

Coco is supposed to not need any larger particles to help with oxygenation.
You have to buffer coir for 48 hours prior to use, no?

Peat moss you can get at any garden centre or lumberyard/borg for that matter.
Coir is more of a specialty item, at least around here.

I actually have a big pail full that I am using on the plants outside...
Yep, I added perlite anyways

If you have a plumbing mishap with the hydro it could get interesting fast

That's a good couple of posts and should help someone decide which way thier boat floats.

farmergiles · 09-02-2010, 04:24 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dandaweedman

Coco is supposed to not need any larger particles to help with oxygenation.

It works

.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dandaweedman

You have to buffer coir for 48 hours prior to use, no?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Canna's blurb

COGr Buffer Agent for soaking the coco substrate.
COGr nutrition also contains pH-stabilisers, silicon, humic and fulvic acids.

So reading between the lines a bit the important ingredient is a wetting agent.

The pH buffering should only be necessary if pH of the coco is out of whack when reusing it, not with fresh coco.

Edit- though that depends on the coco manufacturers washing it properly in the first place of course..

Jenna_Grows · 09-04-2010, 09:52 AM

I love watching the results of hydro...man.. i saw some pics yesterday of massive trees..indoors in buckets...30+ oz per.. amazing. It would be fun to try but I wonder if the flavour is there.

Tried the coco.. I don't like the feel of it. My preference is definately soil..umm a soiless peat mixture.

Nice thread Farmer!

**~~Dantastic~~** · 09-04-2010, 10:34 AM

Quote:

Many claim the taste of soil grown grass is better than hydro, others disagree.

I think taste has a lot to do with genetics and weather or not the plant was flushed before harvest, also the drying and curing process from what I understand has a large influence on final taste.

Ive herd people say they can taste the difference but id be impressed if someone could tell me the difference in flavor between a properly flushed and cured hydro bud and its soil counterpart.

Obviously its hard to really pin it down because its a matter of peoples opinions, but I really think in the end you can have a great tasting product from either.

profit · 10-07-2010, 07:21 PM

What about DWC Yields? Is there an accurate Yield by grow method/ medium chart out there? if not how about a general consensus?

thanks!

Dandaweedman · 10-07-2010, 08:00 PM

If I ever find the ONE girlie I'll do what Heath Robinson does

He has a real interesting system, the fluid flows pretty quickly.

vaporedout · 10-11-2010, 12:12 PM

i can always taste soil or hydro through the vap

SmokeaJoint · 10-11-2010, 12:26 PM

I tried hydro once using the top feed method. It worked, got some good smoke out of it, but I have always preferred soil. Maybe its the additional trace elements, or the fact that the plant knows its in its natural environment, but soil just plain tastes better. Also, it acts as a nice buffer, allows for mistakes a lot easier. Hydro allows for more precise control, but I can run spaghetti tubes and nutrient mixture into a pot of dirt too, so its not like hydro gives more potent buds. Also, hydro is a bit challenging to do as an outdoor op, and natural sunlight makes happier plants.

Edit: I actually use Ocean Forest, so its a soiless peat mix, but pretty much same thing.

Dandaweedman · 10-15-2010, 08:22 AM

Combine them for the best of both worlds.
Use only perlite

Galt · 10-25-2010, 01:05 PM

Soil guys...do you sterilize your medium before use? I used to grow thousands of seedlings indoors for transplanting outdoors and used a soil block maker. The soil blocks were a mix of compost, sphagnum moss and topsoil. Large batches would be sterilized using clear poly over black pond liners for a couple of weeks and small batches were super heated in a microwave.

Don't know if this created a technically "sterile" medium but for large scale seedling propagation it was cheap and I never had any problems with surviving weed seeds or soil born pathogens.

Seedling trays were standard nursery trays on heat mats under floro's. Each tray had a piece of synthetic (usually poly) cloth laid across the entire bottom of the tray and up and over the one outer-most edge. From there the fabric was draped down the side of the tray into a slot cut in a piece of 1 1/2" PVC pipe, (ran it through a table saw). The PVC was hung with straps across the front of each run of shelves and capped on each end. Fittings and valves were installed to allow the pipes to be flushed and filled every other day and algae was never a problem.

Watering was from the bottom up through the cloth wicking moisture out of the PVC trough and the soil blocks were spaced to allow air flow between them. Eventually learned that we had to stack the blocks to keep the seedlings from rooting into the wicking material on the tray bottom.

Didn't have any high tech nutes back then (Dark Ages before cell phones and P.C.s) so we stuck with fish emulsion, liquid seaweed (some sort of kelp extract) and another liquid starter that was called Roots. Hardened off just like regular veggie plants in sunken cold frames and then moved to permanent beds. Worked well for the times (mongrel seed) until somebody decided that they liked our plants better than we did.

Also used to use beneficial nematodes from the local land grant university. They were watered in and the two types lived at different levels in the soil eating any bad juju that might try to set up house in our beds (where most pest insects begin their life cycle). The same stuff is probably for sale somewhere today but back then we used to get it for free from the ag grad students.

farmergiles · 10-25-2010, 01:29 PM

I had problems once from using a soil mix containing unsterilised compost- I introduced a plague of fungus gnats to an indoor grow.

Introducing unsterilised soil ingredients from outdoors to indoors could cause infestation as the conditions indoors are radically different.
For instance those carefully controlled heat and humidity levels some of us spend so much time, effort and money perfecting will be pretty rare in nature and ideal for certain critters.

Dandaweedman · 10-25-2010, 05:34 PM

That's exactly why we use peat

Damn bugs can get bad enough without doing on purpose kinda.
I know enough that if you are going to sterilise soil, don't do it in the house. It can get stinky

SmokeaJoint · 10-25-2010, 05:58 PM

Fungus gnats, ugh. Those fucks are all in my basil right now, annoying little bastards. Got some neem oil tho, heard its supposed to work ok. And with the new inline fan, the beasties will be super uncomfortable under the leaves.

TomaToe Farmer · 10-25-2010, 05:59 PM

Mmmm I personally prefer soil all the way, it serves as a great buffer hasn't failed me yet.

May try some hydroponics in the future but right now soil is quite good for my needs.

Galt · 10-26-2010, 06:13 AM

The gnat/fly problems can also be helped by using sticky traps. Greenhouse suppliers sell a goo that you can paint on plastic strips and just stick in the soil or on a wall. I seem to recall that yellow was a recommended color for the sticks. Kind of a DIY fly paper...only a shitload stickier. Works great on the bugs, just don't let it touch your plants.

Had a friend that used an old microwave out of doors to re-generate used carbon from his water filtration system. Now that was funky. As cheap as carbon is it seemed counterproductive (using all of that juice to salvage some burnt coconut husks) but that's just how he rolls.

I haven't searched yet but there might also be a beneficial insect predator available to control the gnat/fly problems. How about lady bugs loose in the grow room?

Just a thought.

07-20-2010, 03:46 AM	#1 (permalink)
farmergiles Yahookan Join Date: Sep 2006 Location: Sick of the hatred and the lies Posts: 7,791 Thanks: 2,280 Thanked 3,745 Times in 2,550 Posts	Comparison of Dirt and Hydroponics Which is best, dirt or hydro? Dirt By which I mean any grow medium which contains all or some of the nutrients needed for the plant to grow and flower. This could be soil or what is known as a soil-less mix- usually based on sphagnum moss. Soil-less mixes are less likely to contain pests. A mix might contain- Sphagnum moss Soil and or compost Coco coir Perlite for drainage Fertiliser- could be guano, mineral fertiliser, bone meal, kelp meal, compost and or many others. Epsom salts, dolomitic lime and or other supplements. The medium must have good characteristics for the plants- good drainage and a stable pH slightly below neutral. You could add all the nutrients needed into the medium right from the start. This could be tricky to get right as the Ec (how hot or rich the soil is) will be high with everything in, maybe too hot, especially for young plants. Or, more likely if you are growing indoors or in a greenhouse, the medium will have some nutrients at the start and you will supplement this by feeding as and when necessary. Most people use liquid feeds but you can top dress with solid fertiliser. Advantages- Dirt, in one form or another, is freely available. The set up costs are minimal. A good medium will act as a pH buffer- shielding the plant (to a certain extent) from pH fluctuations in the water. The medium will probably hold enough water to keep the plants going for a few days if need be (though more frequent watering is probably better). The plant can, with the aid of symbiotic bacteria, store nutrients in the soil ready for use, so if there is a nutrient issue it will tend to happen slowly giving you the grower a chance to remedy it. Soil growing can be very environmentally friendly but really you need to be doing a lot of composting and things to achieve this- it's fairly easy on a farm but harder in inner cities. The medium can be reused for your potatoes, brassica or whatever. Many claim the taste of soil grown grass is better than hydro, others disagree. IMO organics give better taste and are more forgiving of mistakes than mineral fertilizers; it is easier to use organics in dirt than in hydro as they tend to clog the pipes. Growing in dirt is fairly intuitive and a lot of people have prior experience with veg, fruit, flowers etc. Disadvantages- Dirt is heavy, you have to lug it around. Store bought mixes may not be organic- it may be based on harsh mineral ferts. Store bought mixes may not be very environmentally sound- sphagnum moss is being depleted from many habitats. Many mixes are transported large distances before being sold. Dirt is bulky- bringing the associated energy costs of transport. You have to get rid of it somehow- which brings me on to... Stealth- if you are often seen lugging bags of dirt around this may cause interest. Disposing of soil injudiciously could also attract undesired suspicion. Dirt can harbour pests and diseases. The plants need watering frequently. Handwatering a lot of plants is a time consuming and laborious task. Setting up an autowatering rig requires quite a lot of the set up required for hydroponics. In many cases you'll be supplementing the nutrients with feeding as you go along. So you'll want to monitor and control the pH, Ec and composition of the nutrients. Not that much easier than hydro really. A lot of growers struggle with watering technique- this causes surprisingly many issues. It is possible to harm the roots with over or under watering. __________________ Cultivate a stoic calmness *Fuck the Monkeys* Every Kind of Vice

07-20-2010, 04:44 AM	#2 (permalink)
farmergiles Yahookan Join Date: Sep 2006 Location: Sick of the hatred and the lies Posts: 7,791 Thanks: 2,280 Thanked 3,745 Times in 2,550 Posts	Hydroponics By which I mean growing plants using nutrient solution- in our case usually rooted in an inert medium. Typical Hydro Mediums- Rockwool- slabs or shredded Coco Coir (this does have some soil like properties but I'm ignoring them for the sake of simplicity) Clay pebbles Vermiculite or Perlite. The nutrients are not provided by the medium- we provide them in nutrient solution, directly to the roots. The medium is generally re used for future grows at least twice. Hydroponics Systems Wick Ebb and Flow Top Drip Bubbler Aeroponic Nutrient Film Technique The nutrient composition, pH and strength will need to be monitored and controlled to provide the plants with what they need. The nutrient mix is held in a tank (sometimes remote from the plants, sometimes under the pots). This mix is usually recirculated although it can be drained to waste. The nutrient solution must be aerated, usually be means of an air pump and airstone. The systems mentioned above require varying amounts of equipment and effort to set up, a wicking system is very simple, some of the other systems can get fairly complex. Advantages The nutrients come in a concentrated form- there are no heavy sacks to heave to and from your growspace. This can aid stealth. A good hydro set up, especially aeroponics and NFT can give better yields and shorter flowering times than dirt grows. Once set up, running a hydro table can be cheaper than buying soil. If you like to tinker, perfecting your set up can be very interesting. You could argue that hydro is more environmentally sound than most dirt grows- lower transport costs, no depletion of sphagnum moss. Coco coir has gained much popularity recently as an environmentally friendly alternative to rockwool. Because you are supplying all the nutrients you can (in theory) tailor to the exact requirements at any given moment. With practise and skill, a hydro grower can leave the grow to run on it's own for a week or more between maintenance visits. For large grows hydroponic techniques can save much labour- hand watering a 100 plants takes a long time, changing the reservoir for 100 plants takes around the same time as for 1 plant. As long as everything is kept clean and algae is not allowed to develop hydro could well provide a less welcoming environment to pests than dirt. Also there is less opportunity for pests to be introduced in the first place. Disadvantages There is no buffer between the nutrients and the plants- get the strength, pH or composition wrong and the plants will suffer quickly. Organic nutes are tricky as they tend to block pipework, also because they are not inert organic hydro can go badly out of whack quite unexpectedly. Especially when plants are growing or flowering most vigorously they can take up certain nutrients very quickly, changing the pH and composition of the nutrient solution unexpectedly Set up costs can be be high- water pumps, pipework, reservoirs, air pumps, valves etc. You'll almost certainly need a good pH/EC meter. Mineral nutes can be harmful to the environment if dumped irresponsibly. Many grows, especially commercial ones, use rockwool. Rockwool is bad for the environment, also potentially hazardous to handle. Hydroponics are not as intuitive as dirt. __________________ Cultivate a stoic calmness *Fuck the Monkeys* Every Kind of Vice

07-20-2010, 05:09 AM	#3 (permalink)
farmergiles Yahookan Join Date: Sep 2006 Location: Sick of the hatred and the lies Posts: 7,791 Thanks: 2,280 Thanked 3,745 Times in 2,550 Posts	Thoughts anyone? __________________ Cultivate a stoic calmness *Fuck the Monkeys* Every Kind of Vice

07-20-2010, 11:47 AM	#5 (permalink)
farmergiles Yahookan Join Date: Sep 2006 Location: Sick of the hatred and the lies Posts: 7,791 Thanks: 2,280 Thanked 3,745 Times in 2,550 Posts	Someday I'd like to set up a top drip coco grow. I had good results with an Atami mix with coco and no perlite/vermiculite. Dried out quite quickly so you had to be on the ball with watering. Coco seems fashionable ATM, maybe with good reason I think. __________________ Cultivate a stoic calmness *Fuck the Monkeys* Every Kind of Vice

08-18-2010, 07:15 PM	#6 (permalink)
Dandaweedman Old School Join Date: May 2004 Location: At the Cabana Posts: 7,407 Thanks: 699 Thanked 760 Times in 613 Posts	Coco is supposed to not need any larger particles to help with oxygenation. You have to buffer coir for 48 hours prior to use, no? Peat moss you can get at any garden centre or lumberyard/borg for that matter. Coir is more of a specialty item, at least around here. I actually have a big pail full that I am using on the plants outside... Yep, I added perlite anyways If you have a plumbing mishap with the hydro it could get interesting fast That's a good couple of posts and should help someone decide which way thier boat floats. __________________ Hanging in the Cabana

09-04-2010, 09:52 AM	#8 (permalink)
Jenna_Grows Old School Join Date: Jan 2006 Posts: 946 Thanks: 311 Thanked 315 Times in 191 Posts	I love watching the results of hydro...man.. i saw some pics yesterday of massive trees..indoors in buckets...30+ oz per.. amazing. It would be fun to try but I wonder if the flavour is there. Tried the coco.. I don't like the feel of it. My preference is definately soil..umm a soiless peat mixture. Nice thread Farmer!

10-07-2010, 07:21 PM	#10 (permalink)
profit restore the republic Join Date: Apr 2005 Posts: 1,255 Thanks: 818 Thanked 357 Times in 237 Posts	What about DWC Yields? Is there an accurate Yield by grow method/ medium chart out there? if not how about a general consensus? thanks! __________________ Cowardice asks the question - is it safe? Expediency asks the question - is it politic? Vanity asks the question - is it popular? But conscience asks the question - is it right? And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular; but one must take it because it is right. - Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. follow https://twitter.com/#!/curtiswm - sub http://www.youtube.com/user/66sicksfishstix

10-07-2010, 08:00 PM	#11 (permalink)
Dandaweedman Old School Join Date: May 2004 Location: At the Cabana Posts: 7,407 Thanks: 699 Thanked 760 Times in 613 Posts	If I ever find the ONE girlie I'll do what Heath Robinson does He has a real interesting system, the fluid flows pretty quickly. __________________ Hanging in the Cabana

10-11-2010, 12:12 PM	#12 (permalink)
vaporedout " U have 2 be some1" Join Date: May 2009 Location: In a Free Nation Posts: 278 Thanks: 56 Thanked 117 Times in 83 Posts	i can always taste soil or hydro through the vap

10-15-2010, 08:22 AM	#14 (permalink)
Dandaweedman Old School Join Date: May 2004 Location: At the Cabana Posts: 7,407 Thanks: 699 Thanked 760 Times in 613 Posts	Combine them for the best of both worlds. Use only perlite __________________ Hanging in the Cabana

10-25-2010, 01:05 PM	#15 (permalink)
Galt Si fecisti nega! Join Date: Jul 2010 Location: In the Great State of Denial Posts: 565 Blog Entries: 2 Thanks: 304 Thanked 316 Times in 208 Posts	Old school geezin' Soil guys...do you sterilize your medium before use? I used to grow thousands of seedlings indoors for transplanting outdoors and used a soil block maker. The soil blocks were a mix of compost, sphagnum moss and topsoil. Large batches would be sterilized using clear poly over black pond liners for a couple of weeks and small batches were super heated in a microwave. Don't know if this created a technically "sterile" medium but for large scale seedling propagation it was cheap and I never had any problems with surviving weed seeds or soil born pathogens. Seedling trays were standard nursery trays on heat mats under floro's. Each tray had a piece of synthetic (usually poly) cloth laid across the entire bottom of the tray and up and over the one outer-most edge. From there the fabric was draped down the side of the tray into a slot cut in a piece of 1 1/2" PVC pipe, (ran it through a table saw). The PVC was hung with straps across the front of each run of shelves and capped on each end. Fittings and valves were installed to allow the pipes to be flushed and filled every other day and algae was never a problem. Watering was from the bottom up through the cloth wicking moisture out of the PVC trough and the soil blocks were spaced to allow air flow between them. Eventually learned that we had to stack the blocks to keep the seedlings from rooting into the wicking material on the tray bottom. Didn't have any high tech nutes back then (Dark Ages before cell phones and P.C.s) so we stuck with fish emulsion, liquid seaweed (some sort of kelp extract) and another liquid starter that was called Roots. Hardened off just like regular veggie plants in sunken cold frames and then moved to permanent beds. Worked well for the times (mongrel seed) until somebody decided that they liked our plants better than we did. Also used to use beneficial nematodes from the local land grant university. They were watered in and the two types lived at different levels in the soil eating any bad juju that might try to set up house in our beds (where most pest insects begin their life cycle). The same stuff is probably for sale somewhere today but back then we used to get it for free from the ag grad students. __________________ "I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use." - Galileo Galilei (1564-1642) _________________ "Nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity." - Martin Luther King Jr. (1929-1968)

10-25-2010, 01:29 PM	#16 (permalink)
farmergiles Yahookan Join Date: Sep 2006 Location: Sick of the hatred and the lies Posts: 7,791 Thanks: 2,280 Thanked 3,745 Times in 2,550 Posts	I had problems once from using a soil mix containing unsterilised compost- I introduced a plague of fungus gnats to an indoor grow. Introducing unsterilised soil ingredients from outdoors to indoors could cause infestation as the conditions indoors are radically different. For instance those carefully controlled heat and humidity levels some of us spend so much time, effort and money perfecting will be pretty rare in nature and ideal for certain critters. __________________ Cultivate a stoic calmness *Fuck the Monkeys* Every Kind of Vice

10-25-2010, 05:34 PM	#17 (permalink)
Dandaweedman Old School Join Date: May 2004 Location: At the Cabana Posts: 7,407 Thanks: 699 Thanked 760 Times in 613 Posts	That's exactly why we use peat Damn bugs can get bad enough without doing on purpose kinda. I know enough that if you are going to sterilise soil, don't do it in the house. It can get stinky __________________ Hanging in the Cabana

10-25-2010, 05:59 PM	#19 (permalink)
TomaToe Farmer Fightin dem pills Join Date: May 2006 Location: In moving space Posts: 278 Thanks: 54 Thanked 132 Times in 88 Posts	Mmmm I personally prefer soil all the way, it serves as a great buffer hasn't failed me yet. May try some hydroponics in the future but right now soil is quite good for my needs. __________________ Let’s get down to brass tacks. How much for the ape? – Raoul Duke bongsmilie

10-26-2010, 06:13 AM	#20 (permalink)
Galt Si fecisti nega! Join Date: Jul 2010 Location: In the Great State of Denial Posts: 565 Blog Entries: 2 Thanks: 304 Thanked 316 Times in 208 Posts	The gnat/fly problems can also be helped by using sticky traps. Greenhouse suppliers sell a goo that you can paint on plastic strips and just stick in the soil or on a wall. I seem to recall that yellow was a recommended color for the sticks. Kind of a DIY fly paper...only a shitload stickier. Works great on the bugs, just don't let it touch your plants. Had a friend that used an old microwave out of doors to re-generate used carbon from his water filtration system. Now that was funky. As cheap as carbon is it seemed counterproductive (using all of that juice to salvage some burnt coconut husks) but that's just how he rolls. I haven't searched yet but there might also be a beneficial insect predator available to control the gnat/fly problems. How about lady bugs loose in the grow room? Just a thought. __________________ "I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use." - Galileo Galilei (1564-1642) _________________ "Nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity." - Martin Luther King Jr. (1929-1968)

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