Do you use rice hulls as an amendment?

[AriesAmbition420]

I have been reading online articles for quite a while through binoculars and thought I'd jump into the light with this simple question. When growing in soil do you add rice halls as an amendment. Rice halls break down releasing silica filling your trichomes' even more. Contrary of what big name growers or others online tell you 5 to 10% is all you really need of this low cost aggregate and it breaks down within weeks, not years. The pictures I attached are Northern Dawn and Dr Grinspoon(just for fun) I am growing these now. Photo, Sativa, 60 to 75 inches tall, flower week 5 of 8, pictures will show the rest.

 

[AriesAmbition420]

I forgot to say the soil arraignment I am testing is the soil Bruce Bugaby, a professor of agriculture from Utah University has outlined on his Youtube channel,

. Just add 5 to 10% Rice halls and feeding with the new Jacks 321nutrition schedule with Monopotassium Phosphate 0-52-34 during flower. One of the easiest and cheapest (there are many I know of) grows you will ever do. This recipe used for NASA will compete with any Humboldt or other chemical additive used today, for pennies in comparison.

 

[StoneOtter]

Hi AriesAmbition! Welcome! Thanks for bringing this up, I haven't yet. Nice garden you have!

 

[Phytoplankton]

To my knowledge the silica doesn’t do anything for trichs, but it does strengthen the cell walls of the stems.

Edit: I found a couple articles saying silica increases trichs, however, there’s no studies or references cited, and the claims are being made by companies trying to sell silica additives. I think additional silica may be useful, but whether it justifies the cost, I don’t know. I throw a cup or so of diatomaceous earth in every 5 gallons of soil, it’s a very slow release.

 

[AriesAmbition420]

Oh ok. Apparently works on keeping pests away too. My first grow with zero pests.

 

[SmokingWings]

When growing in soil do you add rice halls as an amendment. Rice halls break down releasing silica filling your trichomes' even more.

I have come across articles mentioning the use of rice hulls as an organic or plant based material that can be used for soil aeration. Some soil growers do not like Perlite so they use the rice hulls since it is scrap left over from prepping the rice for market.

... it breaks down within weeks, not years.

If the hulls break down that fast in soil then it would seem to defeat the purpose for those who are using it for aeration.

Contrary of what big name growers or others online tell you 5 to 10% is all you really need of this low cost aggregate ...

I did some research and read up on the silica in rice hulls. Interesting reading. The hulls do contain large amounts of that mineral. I get the feeling that if a grower wants to use them for their silica then the most efficient way is to burn the hulls.

However the articles quickly became involved with the commercial use of the silica. Once the hulls have been burned the ash is now pretty close to 95% silica. The silica is then great as a way to increase how well other materials will increase lubrication in industry.

Going to have to look up more on this as time permits.

This topic now reminds me of the products in gardening stores that are bags of Palm bunch ash which is a high percentage organic source of Potassium often running 0-0-20 and as high as 0-0-30. Palm bunch is the fruit or seed cluster of the Palm tree.

 

[013]

Yes, I use rice hulls as an amendment and as a mulch layer. Plus I grow in swicks and rice hulls make up part of my 40% extra aeration along with pumice.

Disagree on the part about breaking down in a few weeks. I’m sure they biodegrade and beak down to some extent but the process is slow and I can definitely see rice hulls in my recycled 2nd & 3rd run soil.

Rice hulls are pretty cheap when purchased in bulk, think I paid about $45 for a 50 pound bale. 50 pounds of rice hulls goes a long way so it’s no biggie to add more but generally speaking you want to rinse them, mix with soil and let the soil cook for 30 days

Interesting side note but in my experience they come built in with soil mites, don’t think soil mites are intentionally added but more like a byproduct of having tons of tiny bits of organic matter being processed, bagged & stored. Previously had a few battles with soil mites, they kicked my butt and won. Turns out soil mites don’t attack the plant but they love to line dance around perimeter of containers. Now I’ve adaopted live and let live policy on soil mites…just ignore them and ignorance is bliss

Supposedly rice hulls can be used as soilless media as well, just mix your nutes and fertigate same as you would coco coir.

Thanks for that hookup SmokingWings, gonna make some rice hull ash and biochar…

 

[AriesAmbition420]

The rice halls I buy seems to be steril of avarything even dust. My canni photo 20 week grow so far the rice hauls are almost half degraded. I will text with pics again later today with info where I buy it when I get home from holiday.
50 lbs of rice halls is alot...lol could fill a room with that...lol. You must have a massive grow. Between rice halls and vermiculite I would say there is a 20% return on my dry weight past five 9 plant grows.
Them mites are just creepy I agree no harm to plants. If they get populated I buy ladybugs off of Amazon. You can get 100 for $3. I leave the package the come in my grow room with a small piece of wet bread half in and out of package. They can last weeks and will decimate mites.

 

[SmokingWings]

Thanks for that hookup SmokingWings, gonna make some rice hull ash and biochar…

I started off with searches about "decomposing rice hulls" and then went wandering into "amounts of silica in rice hulls". That is when rice hull ash started to come up.

You might want to do the same sort of google search to see if there is anything special that has to be done to turn the hulls into ash.

 

[SmokingWings]

My canni photo 20 week grow so far the rice hauls are almost half degraded.

Ah, now I understand what you were talking about. A 20 week grow which is almost 5 months is a lot longer than breaking down within weeks. Usually when we say within weeks we are thinking of 2, 3 to maybe 4 weeks.

I had thought about using the rice husks or hulls as an aeration amendment but stuck with using Perlite.

50 lbs of rice halls is alot...lol could fill a room with that...lol. You must have a massive grow.

Ya, that caught my attention, too. We gotta keep in mind that when @013 mentioned that he was buying the hulls in 50 pound bales he is going with a combined aeration of up to 40% of his growing medium. And his growing methods are not as simple as the basic soil grows that many of us are used to and require more complex soil mixes.

 

[013]

Nope not a massive grow at all but I’ve got 3 of the 30 gallon plastic garbage cans of soil cooking. When doing the hulls as mulch layer they can turn hydrophobic fast such that when you water them they float around. So I add the rice hulls as mulch layer, chunk in some mosquito bits and sprinkle light layer of sand on top… then before flipping I might add more worm castings as top dress and then build another layer of rice hulls on top then add more mosquito bits and sand.

Typically I pre-cook small batches of rice hulls using big tote tub with a lid. Pour a few gallons of hulls in, add a 5 to 2 ratio of humic acid to kelp, bokashi bran, down to earth 5-4-2, great white and few handfuls of used soil, spray water it down, close the lid and let her sweat for 30 days in the attic.

A bale is about 2 foot square by 5 foot long and they are compressed so tight in the bag that they won’t pour out, you have to dig a few handfuls out at a time but I love using them.

I’m excited to try the rice hull ash….