BUILDING A NO-TILL, RECYCLABLE LIVING SOIL: 15 GALLON FABRIC CONTAINER

November 8, 2016 5:48 pm Published by Leave your thoughts

Building and maintaining a recyclable, organic living soil is the way mother nature intended to grow plants.  Taking the science out of gardening we put nature back in charge.  With this unique knowledge base there is no more need for purchasing bagged soils, liquid fertilizers and the like.  Our mission is to create a biologically dynamic microscopic herd of bacteria, fungus, small soil-based creatures and beneficial insects that benefit the plant and your garden as a whole.  This is why we call is a ‘living soil’.

The soil is ‘recycled’ after a few cycles of plant growing (when growing in containers indoors) or at signs of plants showing deficiency.  This soil can be reused through small amounts of organic soil amendments being re-introduced to the recycled soil.  This soil can be used for years and years through this simple re-amending.

How to Build a 15 Gallon Fabric Pot of Recyclable, Living Soil

  1. Purchase a 15 gallon SmartPot or fabric equivalent container.
  2. Add an aeration layer at the bottom of the fabric pot, about 2” deep.
  3. Add equal parts aeration (pumice, rice hulls, lava rock or grow stone), compost (humus/forest compost, earth worm castings), and a soil base (Sphagnum peat moss or Coco coir)
  4. Add 8-10 cups of minerals, to include: 1x Bentonite Powder, 1x Oyster Shell Powder, 4x Glacial Rock Dust).
  5. Add organic soil amendments, to include: 1 Cup Neem Seed Meal, 1 Cup Crab Meal, 1 Cup Kelp Meal.
  6. Mix thoroughly, do not disturb the bottom aeration layer.
  7. Water with a Botanical Tea of Kelp and Alfalfa meal.
    Botanical Tea:  5 Gallons Water, 1.5 cups Alfalfa, ½ Cup Kelp, ½ Cup Molasses
  8. Let sit for 4 weeks.
  9. Plant freshly rooted clones in this mix and water in accordingly.

To Recycle:

  1. After each cycle cut the plant, leave the stump and dig a little hole next to the stump. Apply a handful of homemade EWC and plant the freshly rooted clone into this hole.  Cover with mulch of wood chips.  Water accordingly.
  2. Every new cycle: Apply 2-3 cups of Kelp meal, 1 Cup Crab Meal via top dress for every new planting.  Apply homemade EWC to 2” for the top layer (on top of the kelp & crab meal) . Do this for 4-5 cycles or until you see signs of a deficiency.  Mulch the first inch with woodchips.
  3. At signs of a deficiency or after 4-5 cycles, dump out the container on a tarp and amend with: 4-6 Cups of Crab Meal, 2-4 cups Kelp Meal, 1-2 Cup Neem Seed Meal, 4 Cups of Mineral Mix. Water with botanical tea.  Let sit for 4 weeks.  Start no-till again.

No-Till Batch Rates

We have had a great response from our 15 gallon post, so we decided to answer your questions here in an informative post regarding building a living soil for bigger batches in containers or outdoors!

Generally speaking, you want to apply amendments at a rate of 1/2 cup per 1 cf of dry soil mix.  You dry soil mix should be:

Equal parts aeration (pumice, lava rock, perlite, growstone), homemade compost (preferably homemade EWC) and sphagnum peat moss.

1 cubic foot = approximately 6.5 gallons of dry soil

For Containers:

5 gallon container:  1/3 cup amendment of each
7 gallon container:  1/2 cup amendment of each
15 gallon container:  1 cup amendment of each

Amendments

Fish  Meal 9-4-0
Nitrogen, phosphorous, amino acids, hormones, etc.

Crab Shell Meal 4-3-0
Nitrogen, Phosphorous, Calcium, Magnesium, pH buffer, chitin, etc.

Oyster Shell Flour
Calcium, pH buffer

Kelp Meal 0-0-1 or 1-0-2
Potassium, abundant trace minerals, etc.

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This post was written by sperling

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