I live in North Florida and I have the option to grow outdoors or indoors. We have a lot of mold here so I am thinking of making a small 1-2 plant indoor setup to start. I have nothing yet. I ordered the seeds, zkilltez, and while I am waiting for them to come I want to learn everything I can before I even attempt to germinate them. What is the best soil to put the seedlings in after they have germinated?
Happy frog would be my go to
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Would that be the only soil I need or would I eventually need to add other soils like perlite,vermiculite etc? I am so confused. I just want to grow a plant the easiest way possible. It seems so complicated though.
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Yes happy frog by itself is fine.
Some add extra perlite to help drainage, but its not completely necessary.
No matter what, you will need to feed the plant at some point.
There are supersoils that will grow a plant all the way to harvest with only water. But they are spendy unless you mix it all yourself. Defeats the purpose of what you seem to want.
So get some happy frog soil, a bag of perlite and pick a line of plant food you can feed with.
Btw, perlite is just a lightweight addition to help drainage. Its not really soil per se.
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You can make your own, or use any local blend, 30% perlite or vermiculite is recommended to avoid compaction.
Coco is a better choice, you mix coco with perlite or vermiculite and then add nutrients from day one.
Even if you grow in soil you will need to add nutrients, so starting from day one will be a better move. You will also yeild almost double the amount if not more.
But if you really want to stick with soil it’s just important you avoid bagged soil thst reads something like “feeds for 6 months!” ad this means there is nitrogen pellets in the soil which causes issues with controlling feeding.
Rather then peat I like coco as it’s more environmentally friendly but you can use peat as well
Fox farm soils are a common choice, and good stuff but there is lots of stuff out there that’s great.
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One idea is to use A Pot for Pot kit that is advertised on ILGM. I’m nearing the end of my second grow with them and have been very happy, and it’s made my first grows so much simpler. They have great customer/product support, too, and will answer your questions during the whole grow. If/when you want to try DIY soil, etc. setups, doing at least one grow in A Pot for Pot will buy you time while you do more research.
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This is also a great suggestion if you have any doubts.
You will eventually need nutrients, iglm also sells nutrients but I am not familiar with them. The support team will be though and we do have a mod who has used this system before.
Any nutrients will really work, they all come with feed charts.
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Coco is only a better choice if you’re down with the measuring and monitoring that it needs to be cared for properly. It’s not the simplest way.
I disagree that yields will necessarily be higher in coco than with soil. Vegetative growth will definitely be faster though.
Organic bagged soil like FF or Coast of Maine can be dumped as is right out of the bag into a pot and you can grow buds without doing much more than supplementing with some earthworm castings and bat guano during flower. All you need to add is good clean water.
There’s a wealth of information out there to get you to grow the best buds possible. It’s easy to forget that you can still grow damn fine weed without all the pro tools and tricks.
Seed. Soil. Water. It’s that easy. You can make it more complicated and get a better product or higher yields but you can also K.I.S.S and still have some fine weed at the end of the day. It can be rocket science if you want but it doesn’t have to be.
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+1 for Happy Frog. I recommend Jacks Nutrients for nutrients but so many options out there. Kacks is pretty cost effective from what I have seen.
There are many methods to soil grows and coco grows.
Coco via autopots is the least amount of work and labour, running a nutrient like Jack’s you can fill a reservoir and ph it once every week or two, sit down and mix a large batch once ever week or two depending on variables.
Even with soil grows you need to add nutrients so you kgiht as well learn how to understand nutrient levels from day one then when your 1/3 done your grow.
You may disagree that soil has lower yeilds but the overwhelming proof is there, the science is there as well. A plant works hard to absorb nutrients from soil then from a hydro /soil less system.
If ones going to grow full organic no till that is totally possible but the process has its own complications and risks like pests.
Your also going to want bigger pots to provide a larger reservoir of nutrients for a soil grow.
I will leave it to the OP to choose their method.
I have had many new members grow in soil and eventually try coco, when they do they wish they went to coco sooner.
Are two doing well with their recent switches.
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Removed. It’s not worth it.
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Forget it it’s not worth it
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Not worth arguing.
After listening to @Nicky Im an avid believer that coco is better. @Hellraiser is a grow god, he knows everything. He even stated that coco is better and he will not be going back to soil. To each their own though. I for one will be using coco instead of fox farms soil or any soil for that matter.For me the proof is in the pudding and the pudding with coco looks way better.
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My advice is to take it slow. You seem willing to put in the time to learn and to actually do the work when it comes to it. This forum is a wonderful place full of information. But it is ultimately up to you to decide which direction to go. I am still new myself, only one successful grow, one seedling I killed, and one super healthy plant that ended up being a male…
That being said, there has been some good guys here using coco that switched from soil. I was / still am thinking about doing the same thing myself, but I just don’t know if I am willing to do everything that growing in coco requires. Like @Breezy said,
@Hellraiser is the guy that I learned the most from, and I trust his judgement whole heartedly.
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Im reading that the coco is naturally antifungal which interests me because I live in North Florida and fungus is nuts here on everything. The humidity is high and there are a lot of bugs also. If I grow indoors I probably still have to watch for fungus and other things. I am not opposed to doing it the difficult way, I just dont want to make mistakes.
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I may be wrong but if you grow indoors you shouldn’t have a fungus issue I don’t think??? I haven’t really ever heard of this. I have only really heard of making sure your RH isn’t too high to cause bud rot. I am in a place very similar to where you are and I have no issues and neither does my friend.
I think I was thinking of mold.
Yeah you’re good if you do it indoors and keep RH stable with airflow. I wouldn’t worry about this. White powdery mold is what you would be most likely to get if your RH is too high, especially with low / no airflow.
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This was incorrect, he actually had gotten bud rot because his RH kept spiking through the day I think. @MaD-VapoR correct?
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