Base soil

[Carbcon]

You won't go wrong with that mix

Other than adding some oyster shell flour, I use pretty much the same mix. Just without the barley powder & bio-char ...but I will look into adding it from now on.

Cheers for sharing your recipe @itchybro

Agreed, my mix ain't changed much from this.

All about personal preference to a degree after this after you forge your own road.

 

[Beil]

Dig out as big a hole as you can , try get at least 500mm deep , layer the bottom with compost and add good quality soil with no amendments from nursery, 1 ton or a trailer load ,

Do this at the end of summer and add your amendments, by the time your ready to plant your soil should be ready to go

Make you you put in some worm pooh , it usually has thousands of baby worms in it , they will do they job over winter

They will stay there if there's enough food , the clay around your plot will help make this a very nice mix for weed

That's what I did over a period of time. Same in backyard veggie plots

Yeah when we moved in I had 5 fruit trees I'd been growing out in pots for a few years. First this I did was dig a 600mm³ hole, added compost and gypsum. I did just use the existing soil to mix in with it though. Going to mulch with straw or something over this winter, before mulching with 20mm bark... Ran out of money with all the other stuff we had to pay for when we moved so only got a small start on soil amendments. Between those and totally redoing the front yard there was limited funds to go around to do it all 'properly'... But we're here for the long haul so I figured each year can do some improvements.
I want to get a worm farm started so I can grow them out to add to the soil!

 

[Carbcon]

If you build it they will come

 

[Aye Shroomer]

Not sure if you've seen this? He gives a bit of a basic rundown on it. He is selling it though, so may be biased

So after watching, can I assume my raised bed is too acidic atm.

I haven’t put anything in it yet but I did scope some in a pot and potted in a tomato clone that I managed to get roots on. It already had a few flowers and the first fruit has stopped growing and turned black.



Here’s the mother. Got some almost ready to pick.

 

[Sedge]

Might have to do it soon. It looks like he may be shutting up shop . Maybe just online after

View attachment 31404

I saw that last week and was hoping he is only going to relocate ,,although there is no mention of relocation ..

 

[Beil]

So I'm grabbing a shit load of these used Coco peat bags that the local hydro veggie growers are giving away for free.. getting them to use as mulch for the fruit trees and as part of the veggie bed mix..

But is there any reason I can't use these as my Coco/peat part of the grow mix?
I'm planning on mixing up the soil soon to cook until spring, so I figure the roots that are in there will decompose.
The only thing I'm half worried about is plant disease.. but will cooking it, essentially composting it for a few months, kill them if they are there?

This was my first load, there literally pallets so I'm getting heaps of it for my fruit trees roses and future raised veggie patch.
I guess I should be as worried about disease for them aswell. Any thoughts?

 

[junglelover]

Nice score. I think the chances of it passing on disease after composting are pretty small.

 

[Goonie Goat]

Yeah no need to boil it either, it will break down relatively quickly if you mix it in with your compost/soil.

 

[Beil]

So, slowly gathering supplies.
I'm also building a 4x1 raised veggie patch, so most of the stuff I'll be buying will also be going into that aswell.
Made the mistake in the last house of just filling the raised bed with loam, took years of additions to get it anywhere kind of good and it was still kind of crap.
So this time I'm building the medium from scratch, 40/40/20 Coco coir, manure, perlite. Half the manure is going to be blended manure with pine chips you can get from Bunnings (the other half will be 100% manure) to help with aeration there aswell. Then amend it with basically the same stuff that's going into the grow pot.

Picked up some worms today to get the worm farm started (will need to buy casting for this grow as they won't be any when I'm mixing it) and a bottle of humate because it was there and I never see it and have wanted some liquid humate for a while now!

 

[Beil]

Crappy clay soil underneath, dug 600³ holes for the fruit trees and amended them. Will leave this for a year, turn it over and do it again next year.
36 bags of the Coco coir to give a good 70mm layer for the fruit trees.
More than I thought I'd use for it, so gonna have to restock for the rest of the plan.

 

[OZIOZIAUTO]

nice and tidy cobber yea and easy to maintain aye.

I Love your AVATAR , very different

 

[Beil]

nice and tidy cobber yea and easy to maintain aye.

I Love your AVATAR , very different

Yeah, been doing well with weed so far prior to the mulch. Pull some then just glypho when I CBA doing it by hand!
Once the soil is better, plan to grow some random things in between: rhubarb, random country flowers etc


The avatar was my old one from forums back in the day (10+ years), figured I'd just revert back to it, bit of daft lol.

 

[Beil]

I had a thought, maybe redundant, good or just indifferent.
I have an aquarium and every now and then the filter sponge needs a good squeezing to get rid of build up of gunk, this has a shit tonne of nitrifying bacteria in it.
I know Aquaponics utilise fish water to feed the roots, mainly to utilise the nitrate in the water I believe (the roots would also be covered in the same bacteria as in the filter), so I figured there wouldn't be any harm (atleast) in using this water when moistening the media to cook. Basically bump up the bacterial count?

Good idea? Pointless? Or probably won't make a difference as any bacteria in the mix will just multiply anyways?

 

[itchybro]

imo , basically shouldn't be any harm , not sure you'll get the benefit you think you might though
but shouldn't cause you any negative effects , just don't over do the water & end up with anaerobic soil , use the old squeeze test
grab a handful of soil & squeeze it in your hand , if you get any more than a couple of drops coming out while you squeeze , you've probably over done the amount of water you added
i would tend to be more interested in using a wetting agent / food source like aloe vera , the same applies = don't over do it

 

[Beil]

imo , basically shouldn't be any harm , not sure you'll get the benefit you think you might though
but shouldn't cause you any negative effects , just don't over do the water & end up with anaerobic soil , use the old squeeze test
grab a handful of soil & squeeze it in your hand , if you get any more than a couple of drops coming out while you squeeze , you've probably over done the amount of water you added
i would tend to be more interested in using a wetting agent / food source like aloe vera , the same applies = don't over do it

Yeah, if it's it's going to cook for a while then any bacteria will multiply amyways, so verdict, redundant? . Might as well just use gogo juice as atleast that has fungi in the mix aswell!

 

[Beil]

Question... I was sorting out behind the shed, cutting down grape vines and moving piles of grass clippings and noticed the grass clippings has mycelium growing... Is there any point in throwing some of this local fungi in the mix to cook? Or is it not the type of fungi/mycorrhiza we're looking for here?
The soil under Neath the 30 year old vine was gorgeous, dark, humus rich... Is it Mick or Diesel who uses some garden soil in their mix? Probably the best soil in the garden if I were to use some?

 

[Beil]

If it seems like I'm just posting any random though that comes into my mind, it kind of is, one of my ways (have a thought, ask it/look into it) ... One day I'll settle in on researchgate.com and get into the technical studies with this stuff like with my brewing

 

[OZIOZIAUTO]

If it seems like I'm just posting any random though that comes into my mind, it kind of is, one of my ways (have a thought, ask it/look into it) ... One day I'll settle in on researchgate.com and get into the technical studies with this stuff like with my brewing

Know the feeling , some like some dont

 

[VinDeezle]

i swear by a good yard soil when I can't get a mix to activate well. Sometimes the peat moss/coco mixes wont cook until I add a few good shovels of yard soil (especially if the mix has a lot of raw amendments and dry peat/coco as the dry state isnt the best for microbial activity). I also like the added bonus of hypoaspis which take care of gnats and other pests in the medium. If you are using a base that has been kept moist and relatively active it's probably not needed.

I always notice a fresh mix will start to heat up, sweat more and gather far more colonies once I add some yard soil. The soil I use has noticeable white mould/fungus as well as its been loaded with clippings and humus for 15 or so years. The haze I'm running at the moment is in yard soil/peat moss/compost with perlite, gypsum and palagonite and its going pretty well.

When I say "Yard soil" I'm not talking about rocky, clay fill most places have, more well-developed natural soil with a good base of natural composting. If I dug a hole in an average lawn, it would just be sand, rocks and building rubble lol.

 

[Beil]

i swear by yard soil when I can't get a mix to activate well. Sometimes the peat moss/coco mixes wont cook until I add a few good shovels of yard soil (especially if the mix has a lot of raw amendments and dry peat/coco as the dry state isnt the best for microbial activity). I also like the added bonus of hypoaspis which take care of gnats and other pests in the medium. If you are using a base that has been kept moist and relatively active it's probably not needed.

I always notice a fresh mix will start to heat up, sweat more and gather far more colonies once I add some yard soil. The soil I use has noticeable white mould/fungus as well as its been loaded with clippings and humus for 15 or so years. The haze I'm running at the moment is in yard soil/peat moss/compost with perlite, gypsum and palagonite and its going pretty well.

So that mix is pretty much most of what I'll be going with, plus a few other amendments. I reckon I'll throw a bit in, can't hurt really.
Does that mean you don't add extra mycorrhiza when planting/transfering?
So I don't need to search, can you throw me a photo of your current grow with that medium to give this thread some canna porn?