Help there's hella wood in my soil!

The sugarbear

Active Member
I am sugarbear and I need help. I posted a thread In the newbie section if u wanna know my background more I'm just gonna get right to the point. I'm doing a personal outdoor medical grow this year and I'm tryna do mostly organic I'm using: organic humic acid, organic liquid kelp,organic lime , great white roots, chelated liquid iron, organic fish emulsion, Epsom salts, molasses , urea (I make it myself ;)), hydrogen peroxide, and alfalfa meal and worm castings for top dressing. I use all these things sparingly to avoid burning a problem I had last year with all my gsc's (even tho I managed to get em to turn out pretty bomb). Now my soil from last year was a combo of ffof and roots 707 but this year I'm using 20 gal storage bins instead of smart pots (they dried out too fast) so I needed more soil but I didn't wanna buy ffof at $20 a bag I would need quite a few I compact my soil pretty good and would've been expensive so I went to a landscaping company and got 100 gallons of simple potting soil looked safe pretty dark mostly peat I'm assuming some perlite not much but my soil from last years had too much imo so I mixed them seems like the perfect amount of perlite. My problem is that the cheap soil I got is full of wood shavings , bark and twigs. I had no idea the problems this could cause and I planted 4 reserva privada kosher kush clones from dark heart nursery and 1 mystery plant from seed in the bins with this soil mix and some charcoal and dry banana peels. They looked good for the last 2 weeks but now one of them looks like it has a significant phosphorous deficiency (which I've never had problems with before) and I fear the others will follow suit. Planning on giving it some aerated Jamaican guano soup/tea in the morning and I gave em all a tbsp as too dressing today. My question is am I going to be able to grow these plants in this soil full of wood or did I really screw up that bad? I'd appreciate any input on this .thanks ,the sugarbear
 

MeJuana

Well-Known Member
Bark and twigs are fine as long as it composted for awhile otherwise it might screw with pH. You would assume a landscaping company would have allowed that soil to cook but if you are concerned you can call them and ask. I am in Northern California also and my tap water which is normally 7.3 pH is at 7.9 pH right now. Are you using tap water with a high alkalinity? Even with organic growing if your water is very far outside of pH range you should set it within range but with organic growing you shouldn't use chemicals like Phosphoric Acid you should use organic solutions such as Citric Acid, or Google for your approach.

Looking forward to your photos so I can see this Phosphorus deficiency
 

MeJuana

Well-Known Member
No we don't use Hydrogen Peroxide on our organic soil but sometimes it is used s a foliar spray.
 

The sugarbear

Active Member
image.jpeg image.jpeg image.jpeg image.jpeg This is the plant in question after doing some research looks like a phos deficiency to me. I use tap water that I evaporate for 24 hours to try to get rid of some chlorine and the ph is between 7 and 8 so I use humic acid in my teas which seems to keep my soil ph between 6 and 6.5 has been that way the whole time no fluctuations. Good to know bout the hydro peroxide I just figured it was over oxygenated water essentially but I can see how it might be bad for micro life. Ill post pics of the other plants for comparison
 

The sugarbear

Active Member
image.jpeg image.jpeg image.jpeg image.jpeg image.jpeg Other three clones and mystery plant from seed one of them has crinkly weird leaves at the bottom but I actually got it like that .in 2 weeks they are about twice the original size but just now starting to show some deficiencies .just found out about the wood thing recently trying to figure out what was goin on wondering if this means I need to feed heavy? And just an update that leaf that is dark and curling upward on the problem clone is now droopy crunchy and dead the leaf above it in the pics is now curling into itself from the sides brown on the tips but still green very different from that other leaf. Starting to think I really fucked up bad with this wood soil bullshit. Any input or advice on ways to counteract the nutrient lockout effects would be much appreciated. Thanks , the sugarbear
 

The sugarbear

Active Member
It has been over 90 degrees farenheit here and I put them outside 2 weeks ago during a heat wave where it got hotter but until this week I've been keeping them in the shade for half the day to acclimate them. Is it possibly too much sun or heat stress?
 

The sugarbear

Active Member
Gee thanks for that but I don't think I can dig it out because my wood has penetrated the soil too deeply ;). But seriously the wood is pretty much all the way thru the soil and the plants are in it so no way I can sift through all of it. I dug into it a few inches and noticed most of the bigger wood pieces have kind of floated to the top with the perlite. Also it's possible some of the wood was composted I got it from a giant moist pile that's been there for years but the top stuff was all dry. Any advice as far as the possible phosphorous deficincy?
 

Bubblin

Well-Known Member
Really guys... Dick in a wheel barrel best advice I'm gonna get here?
If there's a lot of it then @whitebb2727 already gave you an answer, hardware screen + Sift.

Tbh though, that super soil might be a little too super or undercooked. imo if they're all having issues transplant them. The list of what's in that soil makes me want to not say anything other than transplant them lol.

fwiw.
It's much easier to feed via liquid compost / a shit soup than it is to make a good super soil. Super soil takes time and needs to cook ect.
Normally we just make a good loose soil base without all the added slow releasing nutes, then feed with a liquefied compost mix as needed.

Just feed some cows, pigs, chickens a bit of ex-lax, toss the results of the power poop party into water filled 50 gallon drums, partially cover them and sun cook emm while stirring it now and then.

Or look into something like Dr Earth liquid fert. ;)
It's a lot easier to fix issues that aren't a permanent fixture in the soil.
 

The sugarbear

Active Member
I don't think I can sift through the soil the plants have taken root in it. Other than the one with the fucked up leaves they all seem to be doing pretty good starting to think there are some differences in ph further down in the soil that shocked the plant once it got there so I'm gonna stop feeding for a bit until my ph is consistent through out the pots. Can't really transplant either that would involve more soil and even larger containers which I don't have room or money for. And all the stuff wasn't mixed in to the soil just a list of all the nutes I use for teas.
 

The sugarbear

Active Member
I've been watering them pretty heavy since it's getting hot here in Cali I'm afraid flushing would cause them to get over watered. I'm actually skipping watering today to see what happens the pots have been really heavy/ soaked so I figured it's possible I've been giving them too much water
 

Bubblin

Well-Known Member
Prolly a good idea to skip the watering, they really need wet/dry cycles.
Soggy is bad over extended periods of time ;) It can cause root rot or mold issues and attract bugs ect.

Often in soil I let them just start to wilt just a little, take note of the amount of time it took for the wilting, then water a bit sooner next time.
Usually I water till there's a good amount of run off too, making sure all the soil is moist / no dry pockets.

GL
 
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