#container soil

[balkanradfem]

Prepairing the soil for the indoor seedlings!

Yesterday, I put many seeds to germinate in a wet paper towel, and I've already used up all of the soil I had stored for spring plants, so, I had to go to the forest on a nice sunny day, and dig out some soil from under a dead stump. I only take soil from already dead and rotting trees, and only take a little, because that soil is now made out of tree-decomposing matter, which is very fertile, rich in nutrients, and basically compost quality. It's also very light and airy and that makes it possible to use in containers, all soil that is used in containers needs to be very light so that the baby plants can stretch their roots thru it.

Other than the forest, I'd been able to find such soil in the areas where the river has flooded and dumped massive amounts of tree leaves, which then decomposed for months, and again, have created compost.

I've planted my seedlings directly into the forest soil before, and they were growing just fine, then for a while I was mixing new forest soil, with already-used-up forest soil, and that was fine too! I also ran some experiments mixing soil with fine sand, and planting half of my seedling in soil+sand mixture, and half in only-soil, and they've both grown equally well, no difference was noticed.

This time, I'm going to mix my forest soil with already-used soil, which I have on my balcony, and I have a bag of fine sand from the riverbank. I'm making this mix because it will increase the amount of soil I can use, since I have a neck injury, it's complicated for me to bring home large amounts of soil home, and re-using soil is effective and easy, and perfectly fine if you add fertilized and nutritious soil in it.

You don't need to go thru this entire process just to grow plants, you can use store-bought soil, or try any kind of soil you have around until something works, I'm doing this just to increase the amount of soil I have and make sure it's easy to grow in!

So I have forest soil, already-used soil, sand, and a bucket to put it all in. Before it gets in the bucket, I want to be meticulous and clean it, because even the already-used soil will have some hard clumps or pieces of bark or something, that might bother the tiny seedlings when they grow. I want to make it the most airy and productive soil ever. This is how the already-used soil looks after it's been clean.

And once it's nice and clean I dump it into the bucket! Now it's time to clean the equal amount of the forest soil, and this one is way more messy. There are leaves, roots, pieces of bark, rocks, seeds, sometimes there's even tiny little bugs I accidentally woke from hibernation, but they are fine and good for the soil, and they generally just keep living in the soil and don't go running around the apartment, so I don't mind them at all.

This is how it looks before and after I cleaned it, I was just brushing my hands thru and taking out anything that felt clumpy and odd. If you had a big sieve you could do this within seconds, but I like having my hands in the soil, so I was having a good time spending 10 minutes picking stuff out.

Now, both of the soils are added into the bucket, and I'm also adding sand in. Sand isn't going to add any nutrition to it, but it is very airy, very light, and very easy for little plants to push seeds thru. It will make the soil lighter, and increase drainage, means the water will run down more easily and the soil will not keep water inside. I've tried to make it about 20% sand.

And I'm loving the result after mixing! The soil is a tad more grey in color, but extremely light and airy, I think the plants are going to love it. It's a bit less filled with nutrients than the pure compost would be, but I will add nutrition when the plants become big enough to require it (when they have more than 1 set of true leaves).

All of the clumps, leaves, pieces of bark and clusters of roots I took out, can be composted, but, I'm going to actually use them for filling the big pots on my balcony. I usually add all of the clumpy soil at the bottom, because it adds more drainage at the bottom, and by the time the plants grow their roots all the way down, they won't be bothered by the clumps, it's only the most fragile tiny roots of baby seeds that are sensitive and need airy and non-clumpy soil.

Since my experiment with mixing went so well, I repeated the process and added once more, a container of used soil, container of forest soil, and a bit of sand, to make a full bucket of soil. Now I have plenty of soil to work with! I'm going to keep this bucket inside of my room, because those baby seeds are used to warm temperatures, and will want to be planted in warm soil. I'm also closing the lid, so the soil remains damp and full of life.

If your soil dries out, then the bacteria and diversity inside of it starts dying off, and it can even become hydrophobic! In case it does get so dry it starts rejecting water, it can still be rehabilitated, by adding more organic soil in it and mixing it all together. I've also seen gardeners add soapy water, because bubbly water has less surface tension and is more easily absorbed by the dry soil. For this purpose, they'd add a few drops of dish detergent in the water.

Here's my bucket of soil! This can fill many containers and cups, and when I run out, I have enough ingredients to make more. In a few weeks, I'll probably have to go to the forest to get some more, but I'll be all set until then.

#soil health #free soil for planting inside #soil mix #soil nutrition #compost #planting mix #diy inside soil #container soil #gardening #growing seedlings #growing transplants

[starblaster]

(since no one is reading my tags or other reblogs): this post has an addition. the addition is specifically about co-mingle recycling in most usamerican cities. always check your local guidelines for recycling. the point of this post was not to tell you what you can or can’t recycle, anyway. the point was that a lot of recycling gets thrown out because it’s fucking contaminated. if you can’t clean your recyclables to keep them from contaminating a whole bin, just put it in the trash. you don’t need to feel guilty about it... that's it. that's why i wrote the post.

#this is not a character judgement against him btw i'm just surprised #working at a landfill and recycling plant no matter how short a time will seriously turn you into the kind of person #who un-contaminates recycling bins #i'm in there digging plastic straws and bags and food-soiled containers out of the recycling #because otherwise the entire bin will be trashed

[queer-ecopunk]

Epic news gamers

We've had a bunch of plant pots next to the building since I moved in. I had assumed they belonged to my upstairs neighbor, but I finally asked her about them and she says they were abandoned by a previous tenant. I can do whatever I want with them! This effectively doubles my available container space, so I might plant more 😏😏

#i dont know anything about the soil in the pots but that will be my next hurdle #gardening #container gardening #mine #ecopunk #solarpunk #plants

[invoke-parlay]

Although it seems early, it’s almost time to start prepping for the garden if you’re growing from seed!! These grow bags are much cheaper than buckets or pots, and if like me the only option you have is container gardening, I recommend these grow bags.

Happy gardening!!

#gardening #garden #it’s almost time #grow bags #vegetables #container gardening #useful gardening #gardening tips #beginner gardening #garden hacks #simple garden #compost #happy soil #happy plants

[rjalker]

if you ever see someone throwing away dead potted plants you better take those. reuse those pots. reuse that soil. There's no such thing as "dead" soil. IDK what they were growing in them. Take that soil and reuse it. Mix it with other potting soil, add some cheap granular fertilizer, add some kitchen scraps. do not fucking throw away potting soil!!!!!

your parents buy those hanging baskets from the hardware stores that always die at the end of a year? Reuse those containers! Just break off the stems of the dead plant, stir around the dirt with a shovel, and you're good! There's literally nothing wrong with that potting soil!!

#gardening #Rjalker trains its gardening skill #we only buy new potting soil when we're already using the rest #which we literally never throw away #it gets mixed together and dumped into a big bin whenever whatever we had in that container dies #and reused.

[puppygirltitties]

Please do not fuck the clay rich soil of the riverbed

damn i was really gonna do it but now that i've received this ask i'm definitely not going to do that!!!!

#walks in the general direction of the riverbed containing clay rich soil*

[bunnyb34r]

Theres the teeny tiniest lemon starting to grow on my lemon tree 🥺 idk if itll make it to maturity and if it does how big itll be but I'm like crying at how fucking small it is

#its like maybe the size of a quarter at most but its so little 😭😭😭😭😭 #marquilla #i had to cover the container with a trash bag to keep the rain out of it bc it flooded the other day so now the base is covered and it's #like a little greenhouse but only over the soil and roots sgdggdgd anyway im hoping that works bc i dont hace enough dry soil to keep #replanting it every time it rains

[confinesofmy]

one of the traps that was closed on my venus flytrap when i bought it is reopening 🙌 and it has THREE tendrils growing out of the center now instead of the two that it had before! i think i'm actually going to keep it alive and happy somehow

#if it really thrives i might wait until it pups to put some in the bog #i really like the idea of setting it loose but without soil testing for all i know it'll be dead within weeks :'( #yes it's a bog and yes it has poor soil quality but idk what kind of 'poor soil quality' it actually is #maybe i can just keep the thing alive and happy in a container.. i wasn't expecting that to be the case #adam yaps

[balkanradfem]

I am ridiculously happy about these; I've been saving this one big laundry detergent bottle for years, and I was planning to cut it up and put a hot pepper plant in it, but, I had 2 hot pepper seedlings. Then I randomly found another, similar detergent bottle abandoned outside! I cut them up to make them into planters, and, it's not very visible on the picture, but I grabbed colored pencils and drew on them for decoration. You might be able to see little hot peppers drawn on the right one! The left one has a meadow with grass and flowers. They're more visible in reality and they both look so cute. Not to mention the plants look happy and eager to grow, I had just transplanted them and they had no visible stress on them. Looking forward to little baby peppers!

#hot pepper plants #seedlings #container plants #diy containers #reusing detergent bottles #i think it was the fabric softener to be exact #i stopped using it a while ago #soil is from the forest #it's all free plant growing #seeds were taken out from a random hot pepper

[alegocarmadein]

BUGS DOIN' BUGGY THINGS BELOW:

I cleaned out the substrate in my isopod terrarium because there was a soil mite & slug problem & the substrate was due for a change anyway.

These are some of the ones I managed to get out of the soil, there was easily another one or two hundred babies that I could not be assed to pick out of the soil individually.

Not pictured, but when I dumped out the soil in my backyard (everything in my terrarium is from my backyard, nothing exotic because I'm boring & cheap) there was like...three centipedes AND A FUCKING NIGHTCRAWLER? Just....chillin there? I must have put in a chunk of soil that had a baby nightcrawler in it, but it was a FRIGHT it was like six inches long and a thick worm too!

#tw bugs #bugs doin buggy things #note this container isnt the actual terrarium obviously this was my intermediary container in between my old terrarium and it when it was #cleaned out and gussied up #i thinkkkk im going to buy some springtails for it to help ward against soil mites #MAN FUCK SOIL MITES. #as i was grabbing pieces of wood and shit theyd climb up my arm and it was the WORST OF FEELINGS #and theres soooo many #and they're soooo tiny

[pinkadillydoo]

mmm.. seriously considering switching my plants from soil to pumice

#vriska got fungus gnats and this is like the second girlie to do so #i put her back in water for now and she perked up right away #princess philomena and george clooney don't seem to have gotten any despite them being literally next to each other #and im guessing that's due to my homemade soil mix being VERY draining and only containing a teeny tiny bit of soil #sigh... i shoulda known... ive never been much of a dirt gal

[neotrances]

bfs making a bug habitat :0

#we’re watching a big documentary and he started tinkering with moss and soil in one of his containers #might go look for beetles

[whxrecxre]

ill never understand why my apt seems to get DIRTIER while im cleaning im pulling dust out of corners i didnt know existed

#knocked a container of dry ass potting soil off my plant table #literal dirt everywhere over there #also lots of hands and knees scrubbing that i just might not do today

[jedi-bird]

Did I buy this cauliflower because of its name? Yes. Yes I did. But also, I love cauliflower and I'm going to try having a mini vegetable garden again this year, so why not have some fun with it.

#adventures in gardening #even my plants are nerdy #i also bought a raspberry that supposedly can grow in a container without needing a trellis #just need to get a big pot and some potting soil for it tomorrow

[ghostlycollectorchaos]

Before class a friend opened a bowl of fresh grapes and another peeled a tangerine and we shared grapes and citrus berries between us and I thought this is what life should be like. I love all of you. I love all of you and want us to eat well

#poem #daily poem #its just #human nature #fresh fruits #and the love of every bite #i been thinking about the love of the ordinary thigs lately #the way the cup holds the tea #the way the soil firms the feet #the way the window contains the sunlight

[confinesofmy]

me and my cousin i'm barely on speaking terms with (but in a relatively casual way) repotted her deceased grandmother's pothos today. this was our first time actually properly repotting it bc last summer it was in such a fragile state and we were so scared to hurt it that we just lifted it out of its pot and placed it in a bigger one but this go round we basically dismantled it entirely. we got eight discrete plants and placed it into four different pots!! in nine months it went from the edge of death to that many plants and like ninety leaves altogether. so if you're bad with plants but still wanna fool with them, i guess you should get a pothos.

#neither of us are corny enough to say it or interested in tearjerker moments but i think we both felt the presence of her grandmother HEAVY #this was the only potted plant of hers still living since she died back in 16 & it was. god. it was no longer variegated from lack of light #it actually had more leaves than i remembered. it had like 20. but for every leaf there were 4 places there should've been and wasn't. #water that touched the soil came back yellow which i've never researched to see what the cause is #but i associate it with like. bogs. and stagnation #like if it was still in that dark corner of my other cousin's living room it fr might be dead now #but in nine months thanks to my other cousin asking for help and thanks to us repotting it and taking our turns with it #it has more than quadrupled in size and is variegated af #i don't know what we'll do in like six months when it wants to do it again... #i'm keeping mine somewhat contained tbh i don't even like pothos i just love it bc it's a piece of my aunt #and it is like objectively so fucking sweet that we've rehabbed it like that #adam yaps #like two weeks ago i asked my other cousin if she'd want a pot of it when we repotted and she once again emphasised #that she didn't want it or any cuttings off it leaving the family or being handed out willy nilly #and i once again tried to explain that it's a pothos. it wants to be split up and thrown all over. #that's a pothos' favourite thing #plus her mom probably gave an ungodly amount of people cuttings off it like come on now #but anyway maybe she'll understand now when she sees and fully comprehends that in 9mos we turned half a plant into 4 #at this rate we'll either be giving bits away or throwing bits away. those are the options we will eventually face. #because you can't just repot infinitely. eventually your whole house will be one massive pothos in a hundred pots.