Sweetsue's First Grow - Stealthy Trio of Autos Under CFLs

Sad to say I'm going to be busy for a few days with medical challenges. They've told us we can continue treating his busted heart with meds until the inevitable heart attack or stroke or organ failure kills him or risk open heart surgery and the cascading complications that could occur from dialysis and diabetes. This will take a few days to sort out.

I am still proceeding with this grow. If I'm going to lose his companionship sooner than we expected I'm going to do my best to see to it that he has some damn good homegrown to make those last days, months, years easier to deal with. Within the week I'll be mixing soil. Count on it. I'll keep him alive at least long enough for the first harvest and hopefully for many more after that. I can be quite a force of nature. He has a steam engine to finish building.

Hang in there guys. We'll get this going soon enough.
 
Open heart surgery it is, possibly as soon as next Tuesday. Whew! I'm in awe of the talented team who have no hesitation in taking on his many challenges and their confidence that they can add quality years to his life.
 
It's definitely open heart surgery, scheduled for Tuesday afternoon. It will mean up to two weeks of additional hospitalization. I do my best to make the staff feel like family, so that's not as bad as it sounds (once we get past the pain part), but he's bored out of his mind! They let him come home for the weekend and we're sitting here in the living room while he plays with redesigning the grow space to include his carnivorous pitcher plants or possibly orchids. :laughtwo: He's such a fan of the exotic and unusual. I'm just interested in getting it up and running. I don't want to take him out today after 10 days in the hospital, so I may take this opportunity to walk to Lowe's and get that sphagnum. The corner of our living room is still piled with soil components waiting to be transformed into living organic soil.

We passed the time in hospital discussing designs for a stealth box that would double for display spaces and/or work surfaces for his model train interests. Something that was about chest height with storage slots for small bottles on the front, about 4'x3', vented right out the edge of the window it would extend a bit in front of. The trick is getting time and money for follow through, but you must admit it's an interesting idea. Some of our best furniture we built ourselves over the years. We had a workshop then. Not having one forces us to think outside the box.

I need to create space in the storage area for the soil to cook. It's too cold outside now to let it sit on the balcony, which was my original plan. The nutrient kit has the overwhelming perfume of organic fertilizers, mostly of the crustacean variety I'm assuming. It's been stored on the balcony and I'm wondering how I'll deal with the odor when I bring it indoors.

Oh wait, that's why you have a carbon scrubber! Duh! On the 3rd I will get my butt in gear and make that happen. In the meantime - just because I'm the curious type- does anyone know an organic trick for tempering the odor, or will this not be a concern in the end? My instinct is that I'm going to enjoy the smell of healthy soil.

CO, if you stop by, I love the tiny sprouts of that forest floor mulch you're developing. It looks beautiful. I see a reflection of my desire to try to mimic natural environments for the living things I bring into our home.

Gotta run. My husband has to have his beard shaved for the surgery. He's only shaved once in our 33 years together and that was the only time in 40 years total. He wants to have a barber do the initial job. This is going to be so weird.
 
sue,
the cooking soil shouldn't stink. (I think that's what you were referring to) but, mint family plants are great living potpourri as you can imagine. They also have some nice pest deterrent functions.
 
Thanks CO. That's what I suspected.

Mint! Of course! I'll keep that in mind. I can see the possibility of expanding to the balcony next year to grow planters of herbs that will be useful in the cultivation of cannabis. I had moderate luck out there with planters in half-assed soil until my husband's health hiccuped and I neglected the garden. I'm older and wiser now, and LOS geared to the plants would make all the difference. I actually have a double balcony to play with. Our daughter has the adjoining apartment that shares the balcony, which means I get to use it all. LOL! Such a control freak.
 
Walked the mile to Lowe's enjoying every moment of this brisk morning in one of America's most beautiful river valleys, strapped this to the portable dolly and pulled it home. It was a wonderful walk and we now can proceed with building living soil for these seeds. Life is sweet.

image15177.jpg


I feel a bit like a mad scientist. :laughtwo:
 
One of the challenges was getting the ratios right. I knew I had 3 gallons of Worm Power and 3 gallons of pumice. I dumped them into the tote so they were leveled out on the bottom laid out half and half. Then I measured the depth, which came to 5 inches. That meant I needed 2.5 inches of sphagnum to bring the level up to 7.5 inches in basic soil mix.

image15178.jpg


My intention at this point was to only mix up enough for two 5 gallon Geo Pots.
 
On top of this I dumped the mineral part of my CC nutrient mix. This is where I almost made a fatal mistake. Instead of ordering a small batch for a mere cubic foot of soil, I had decided on the larger bag. This bag had 41 cups, and I was only going to use about 6 cups, but, distracted by concern for my husband, I dumped in all 41 cups. Just as I began mixing it I realized my mistake, and carefully took out what I figured was the overfill. Whew! I realized that more of the basic soil was called for to compensate for any mistake in judging how much mineral mix had been left in, so I added more sphagnum mixed with perlite we had left from pitcher plants we no longer raise, and immediately placed an order for more Worm Power. When it gets here this week I'll add more in until I feel it has the right balance. I was going to order it next week anyway, but I need them yesterday.

I also added some zeolite, some Japanese river sands, some orchid mix, about 2.5-3 cups of Yum Yum mix and just over 2 cups of the fertilizer part of the nutrient mix. Everything is beautifully mixed and I've been carefully adding rainwater as the day goes on. It's just about at the proper moisture level now. I'll be mixing it every day or so, adding more vermicompost when it arrives.

This is a creative experience. I feel like I'm painting the soil. Does that sound too weird?

I'm working on instinct here. I've never attempted anything like this before in my 60 years. It smells fabulous. Tomorrow I'll begin working out what special additives like fertilizer tea, possibly some comfrey tea, it might benefit from. I won't have time to do that until after the surgery, but I still need that vermicompost. I need to order worms. Seriously. I probably need them before the scrubber.

We have soil, or a close approximation of such. I won't start countdown until I've added everything, but at least it's started. I was beginning to think it wasn't going to happen.

Has anyone tried corn stalks and leaves in the mix, or as a mulch? A neighbor plants a stand on the corner of this urban wonderland every spring and the stalks are enticing. He plants sunflowers too. It's really cool to see them growing so unexpectedly in the city, along a busy main avenue.

Question; when does one add the mycorrhizal fungi to the soil? I'll be planting the seeds right into the pots they will live their entire lives in. This suggests that I add the inoculant somewhere near the end of the cook, but I'm still a bit confused as to exactly when.

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I love the smell.
 
nice!
you aren't messing around.
I add myco stuffs at transplant, in the bottom of the hole. I guess autos are best not ever transplanted (from some reading, not personal experience). in your situation then maybe dust a small bit into the soil a couple inches below the where you plant the seed. Some say watering it in is a waste of time, not sure where I read that, but, you could do that as well, it certainly wont hurt anything. I mixed the great white with water and watered it in for 2 years of TLO growing.

thanks for journaling your grow, this is gonna be a fun one to watch.
 
:laughtwo: That's exactly what I did CO! I realized when it came in that I hadn't ordered enough and then I needed to expand the mix to accommodate the over dump of mineral mix. In the end it's turning out to be a good thing, since I will end up with enough soil to plant 7 gallon pots. They will just fit into the space front to back. Bigger is definitely better when you want no-till.
 
Open heart double bypass for my man tomorrow. I'm at a stand still for a day or two until he's not critical any longer. Then I can focus on pulling the space together while the soil cooks.

I hate sleeping alone. They warned us it could be two weeks in the hospital. It's so hard to live without him under foot.
 
Sweetsue said:
Open heart double bypass for my man tomorrow. I'm at a stand still for a day or two until he's not critical any longer. Then I can focus on pulling the space together while the soil cooks.

I hate sleeping alone. They warned us it could be two weeks in the hospital. It's so hard to live without him under foot.
Click to expand...

Hang in there.
 
Surgery was a screaming success. We dodged that bullet. I swear, this man lives a blessed life. God, I'm so I relieved.
 
:blushsmile:
Antics said:
That's awesome news! I'm happy for both of you! :circle-of-love:

And I'll keep following quietly here, you seem to know what you're doing so I'll just learn from you :thumb:
Click to expand...

I'm touched Antics. I'm brand new to this process, although I will admit to being a quick study, so we'll be learning together. COorganics has been an invaluable mentor so far. :green_heart:

A quick update on life: Dale is healing quickly and they're talking about letting him come home tomorrow or Monday at the latest. We're ready to get back to some semblance of normal.

In the meantime, soil building continues. I got my order of 3 gallons of high quality vermicompost yesterday and decided I needed to find a larger container to mix and cook the soil in. Fortunately I have one that Dale was using to store speciality styrofoam for his train layouts, which I can empty out this evening. It will be almost twice as long as the 14 gal. Roughneck one I'm now using, so it will be easier to stir. I hadn't taken into consideration how challenging it would be to get to the bottom with a trough.

Now that I'm going to be using a larger container, why not make more soil? See how that works? :laughtwo: Since I was ordering the geo pots today I added in 4 gallons of rice hulls. I'm planning on setting it up as no-till so I went for 7 gallon pots for the Buddha and Bomb THC. I decided on the rice hulls because it's highly recommended to go half and half with hulls and pumice for a no-till, and looking at the shape of the hulls and considering the nutritional benefits for the micro beasties I can understand why. This means the soil timeline will be bumped back another week, but Dale and I would rather have primo soil than a rush to plant. We're thinking long term here. Later this week I'll figure out how to balance the other additives. I'll probably use all the vermicompost I just got again and need to order more the first of December. This Worm Power is so beautiful I have no problem with that.

My little starter community of worms is expanding nicely. I checked this morning to find the food was all consumed and there were busy worms all through the mix. It's crazy how excited you can get over something like that. :blushsmile:

Still working mostly on instinct here.

I'm planting all three autos as originally planned. I've decided to grow the White Widow in a plastic 3 gallon to compare the difference with the fabric pots. I'll try to resist the urge to treat it differently than the others in the interest of science.

Can't wait to get back home again and get started with painting and organizing the grow space. Somewhere along the way I will do a cost breakdown. This has already cost more than I planned, but this initial investment means it should pay off big time at harvest.
 
Im pumped for you guys. Im also curious as to initial investment to get properly set up as you are. the nice thing is you wont find a better way of growing in a year and have to learn that, and reinvest in that. That doesn't happen. ;)
 
Thanks CO.
I suspect the total startup cost isn't going to be too bad, especially since maintenance from this point on should be negligible. I remind us that it's long-term planning and that I already grew the best cannabis we've had in 33 years with half-assed soil and no fertilizers. I keep telling Dale "this should be the last thing I buy" and then I change my mind. LOL! That's OK. I haven't taken any money for my interests in a long time, and this benefits him most.
 

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