Organic soil pH - questions

hippylee · 07-02-2009, 03:02 AM

I\'m having a rough time with my plants these past few weeks after switching to organic growing (indoor with soil). I mixed up my soil from one of the recipes posted in the organic growing guide sticky a few weeks in advance but it went mouldy (I had added bone meal and that\'s what appeared to be mouldy). I transplanted my vegging plants a few days before switching to flower, into a mixture of organic potting soil, worm castings, mushroom compost, peat moss, perlite/vermiculite, and dolomite lime, with some added high phosphorous bat guano, a bit of blood meal, and some various other enrichments (kelp meal, alphalpha meal, etc). I obviously over-did it somewhere along the line...!

I`ve posted the details of the problems I encountered elsewhere - fungus gnats, organic N overdose (I was using fish emulsion as pH down... since I only needed a small amount, about a tsp per gallon, I figured it would be fine), and pH problem (Organic nitrogen (guano tea) overdose?!? Pics. Suggestions anyone?!). The pH problem is the reason I am posting here - hoping the organic experts can help.

I always adjust the pH of any water/nutrient solution I give my plants to the 6.5 range before watering/feeding. So I was shocked when I tested the run-off water today and found it was in the 4.0 range! I immediately repotted all my plants, got rid of as much of the original organic soil mix as I could, and replaced it with ProMix, throwing in some extra dolomite for good measure. I flushed them several times each with high pH water (8.5) and could still not get the pH higher than 5.0

I obviously did something very wrong, but I\'m not sure what -- why would the pH of my organic soil mix be so low? I know peat moss is acidic but my mix was less than 20% peat moss and had added dolomite to guard against the acidity -- in hind-sight, obviously not enough! If I want to use organic soil mixes again, how can I avoid this problem in the future?

Finally, any thoughts as to why the pH of the run-off water is still so low when I`m flushing with high pH (8.5) water (I upped the pH with Wilson\'s transplanting solution and baking soda) -- the plants are in ProMix now with only about 10% of the original acidic organic soil mix left in the roots.

I really want to grow organically, but I`m having a lot of problems! I`d be grateful for any suggestions (or just a pep talk, lol!).

Thanks!

-Lee