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favorite What's Your Favorite Indoor Potting Mix?

Hey all,
 
    In my quest to find the "perfect" indoor potting mix for me to use while indoors until pot out in late May/early June. I have researched many different mixes and still not quite sure what to try with my next batch of plants I'm potting up to #1 pots this weekend. (I have read the soil sticky also) I am currently using Pro-Mix Ultimate Organic with 30% Perlite added (the mix I linked must be the replacement or renamed version, my bags have blue accents vs red and are not on their site anymore). I am not set on using organic, It's just the bag that looked like a good choice last season and I had some left over so I am using that up this season. 
 
The problem I have with my current mixture is it holds water for way to long. You can see this in my Glog if you are interested and or not following it currently. Even with a fan on them for 17 hours per day, the #1 pots hold just 2oz of water for 10 days before my plants start to wilt. The edema was caused by me watering them a bit too much at pot up, roughly 8oz or 9oz each and they didn't have the root structure in place to use all that water so that was my fault. Now my biggest plants are only about 50 days old at this point, so they dont need much water, but I dont like how the peat based mix like I am using now shrinks so much when it dries. I'd prefer something that doesn't hold water so long. Thinking of going to something with more Coco instead of peat, I know Coco wont shrink like that, but it can hold even more water than peat. Also, as much as most people dis-like MG mixs, I used them years ago and never had any edema issues, what are the real issues or reasons for disliking MG mixs?
 
All that being said, what is your favorite mix, store bought or homemade?   
 
(available locally I have the usual stuff from big box stores, plus a local hydro store with Fox Farms, Pro-Mix and a few others)
 
Has anyone tried Pro-Mix HP? Still has a lot of Peat, but supposed to be great for indoor growing and drainage.
 
Thank you all in advance for your input. 
 
~Troy
 
U)<now said:
Hey all,
 
    In my quest to find the "perfect" indoor potting mix for me to use while indoors until pot out in late May/early June. I have researched many different mixes and still not quite sure what to try with my next batch of plants I'm potting up to #1 pots this weekend. (I have read the soil sticky also) I am currently using Pro-Mix Ultimate Organic with 30% Perlite added (the mix I linked must be the replacement or renamed version, my bags have blue accents vs red and are not on their site anymore). I am not set on using organic, It's just the bag that looked like a good choice last season and I had some left over so I am using that up this season. 
 
The problem I have with my current mixture is it holds water for way to long. You can see this in my Glog if you are interested and or not following it currently. Even with a fan on them for 17 hours per day, the #1 pots hold just 2oz of water for 10 days before my plants start to wilt. The edema was caused by me watering them a bit too much at pot up, roughly 8oz or 9oz each and they didn't have the root structure in place to use all that water so that was my fault. Now my biggest plants are only about 50 days old at this point, so they dont need much water, but I dont like how the peat based mix like I am using now shrinks so much when it dries. I'd prefer something that doesn't hold water so long. Thinking of going to something with more Coco instead of peat, I know Coco wont shrink like that, but it can hold even more water than peat. Also, as much as most people dis-like MG mixs, I used them years ago and never had any edema issues, what are the real issues or reasons for disliking MG mixs?
 
All that being said, what is your favorite mix, store bought or homemade?   
 
(available locally I have the usual stuff from big box stores, plus a local hydro store with Fox Farms, Pro-Mix and a few others)
 
Has anyone tried Pro-Mix HP? Still has a lot of Peat, but supposed to be great for indoor growing and drainage.
 
Thank you all in advance for your input. 
 
~Troy
I'm definitely watching this thread as I'm pondering the same thing again after using FFOF 50/50 with promix bx as they didn't have HP but I have used it before (not on peppers but similar requirement plants) and it's nice and drains real good especially when you add more perlite and throw in some goodies like bone meal, earthworm castings, epsom salt, and blood meal (optional) .. Like 1 part perlite to 3 or 4 parts soil (eyeballed it). Also, if you're using what ya got you can probably do well cutting it with coir as you were thinking and throw in some more perlite for good measure.. It's difficult indoors in the sense that you don't have the radical heat, air movement, and uv protection against fungus and disease like the sun can provide, just means we have to alter our attack! I'm dealing with the same water retention issue as we speak and kicking myself for not just ordering the HP online instead of settling on the bx because that's all this store had (until I found out about the BIG garden store HERE-DOH!

I also just created a thread with my dilemmas about soil and fungus too, you should check it out :) But I'll be interested to hear what others have to say.. Here's my thread if you're interested
http://thehotpepper.com/index.php?/topic/67720-Issues-on-first-grow-of-peppers-input-appreciated!

I'm also gonna start a GLOG as well here since I've never went as far as GLOGGING before on other forums and also to see how this new light works out :)
Regards,
-Tristan
 
Dinsdale said:
Biobizz Light-Mix.
I've used it for years for various plants other than peppers. It's always worked pretty well and it seems to work for peppers too.
I saw someone last season using that and they had awesome looking plants. I'll look into it again.
 
Sleepy lemur said:
For indoor mix, I know many use fox farm ocean forest with good results.
Maybe some can, ive done it before in a mix in a totally different state (IL) during the winter and used it as a blend amendment but if you have airflow problems or humidity like we do here in TN where I live now you will be fighting the fungus amongus like me at the moment :( unless I'm doing something wrong perhaps but I believe there's so much organic nutrition in there that fungus thrives because there is so much to eat!

Sent from my XT1565 using Tapatalk
 
Dinsdale said:
Biobizz Light-Mix.
I've used it for years for various plants other than peppers. It's always worked pretty well and it seems to work for peppers too.
I've worked for a guy that used that for clones and seedlings and it was excellent for that then when they were established and transplanted into "roots organic supersoil" I believe it was called and the plants definitely peaked out their genetics for sure! Light mix seemed like more expensive promix hp but with either you would be ahead of the curve :)
 
promix hp is what you want. holds less water and dries quicker.
it's been used by lots of peeps on gardenweb/houzz/thp

My local nursery has a fast draining custom berger mix that i love.
If you have a local nursery you can ask who their supplier is and they can order you whatever. Every major supplier will have a fast draining mix.

MG is frowned upon for its inconsistent quality and their new line holds even more water for longer (moisture control). Generally any normal bag soil/soilmix that is not marked fast draining is bad.
 
juanitos said:
promix hp is what you want. holds less water and dries quicker.
it's been used by lots of peeps on gardenweb/houzz/thp

My local nursery has a fast draining custom berger mix that i love.
If you have a local nursery you can ask who their supplier is and they can order you whatever. Every major supplier will have a fast draining mix.

MG is frowned upon for its inconsistent quality and their new line holds even more water for longer (moisture control). Generally any normal bag soil/soilmix that is not marked fast draining is bad.
Thanks Juanito. Should I use the Pro-Mix HP straight out of the bale as it comes, or do you recommend adding anything to it?
 
juanitos said:
promix hp is what you want. holds less water and dries quicker.
it's been used by lots of peeps on gardenweb/houzz/thp

My local nursery has a fast draining custom berger mix that i love.
If you have a local nursery you can ask who their supplier is and they can order you whatever. Every major supplier will have a fast draining mix.

MG is frowned upon for its inconsistent quality and their new line holds even more water for longer (moisture control). Generally any normal bag soil/soilmix that is not marked fast draining is bad.
 

that the BM7 or another I need to try?
 
I've used FFOF with 30% chunky perlite.
water seems to run through it, but I haven't measured how much or how long it holds.
certainly gets me from feb/march to late may. after the plants are a little bigger in the solo cups i'll fertigate weakly with  foliagepro
 
juanitos said:
if you are using nute water then don't need to add anything.
Ok yeah, I currently water with CNS17 Grow at 10ml/gallon every watering.

I'll pick up a bale of Pro-Mix HP today.
 
U)<now said:
Ok yeah, I currently water with CNS17 Grow at 10ml/gallon every watering.

I'll pick up a bale of Pro-Mix HP today.
 

that looks good. I use the CNS bloom. Pretty nice and isn't expensive. Prolly try the 3-1-2 as soon as I run out of the other.
 
juanitos said:
they actually customized the recipe. idk exactly what https://www.berger.ca/en/product/bm-custom-blend/
 
 
if you are using nute water then don't need to add anything.
When you mentioned that name "berger" it reminded me of something I saw at the local garden center (more like a mall complex for everything grow) but it said berger BM custom blend and I just called there to ask about it and she said they have bm6 and bm1 and that they use the 6 in their 3 greenhouses they use to grow and sell all their plants, flowers, veggies etc. Said the bm6 was 80-90% sphagnum peat and 10% perlite and the bm1 has ~75%+-,and vermiculite, perlite.

So I wonder if that bm6 is the high porosity mix-if so I wonder if I should pick one up to use to blend out my raised beds or container gardens, might be a good base to add amendments to, they have fancy fox farms soil conditioner too that might blend well? I have 2 cuFt of Ocena forest too I could blend in it. $26.50/3.8cuFt. I have this retentive promix bx I bought when I started this yr, because they didn't have hp, and I'm stuck with a 3.8 and barely used any maybe I can take it back!

Regards,
-Tristan
 
YAMracer754 said:
When you mentioned that name "berger" it reminded me of something I saw at the local garden center (more like a mall complex for everything grow) but it said berger BM custom blend and I just called there to ask about it and she said they have bm6 and bm1 and that they use the 6 in their 3 greenhouses they use to grow and sell all their plants, flowers, veggies etc. Said the bm6 was 80-90% sphagnum peat and 10% perlite and the bm1 has ~75%+-,and vermiculite, perlite.

So I wonder if that bm6 is the high porosity mix-if so I wonder if I should pick one up to use to blend out my raised beds or container gardens, might be a good base to add amendments to, they have fancy fox farms soil conditioner too that might blend well? I have 2 cuFt of Ocena forest too I could blend in it. $26.50/3.8cuFt. I have this retentive promix bx I bought when I started this yr, because they didn't have hp, and I'm stuck with a 3.8 and barely used any maybe I can take it back!

Regards,
-Tristan
 
:high: think the BM6 is for weed :high:
https://www.berger.ca/en/culture/cannabis/
 
probably killler stuff

 
 
Peat moss/ pearlite. You need to add a lot of pearlite .

Don't add vermiculite. ( vermiculite is to retain water)

Peat moss keeps wet for very long but when you add enough pearlite you can dial it in to your needs to not be wet for too long

You don't want any organic mix as it contains possible disease and it brings insects into the house.

Coco coir contains salt,you need to buy a buffered coco coir and even then it needs a lot of nutrients to give it a kick,coco coir is a great product but i would not recommend it if your not going to feed it proper nutrients often. It's great to use in a garden but you need to rinse it if you buy the bricks,i still love coco coir but i now use peat moss as i struggled too much with coco coir.

Best mix is a peat moss and pearlite for me.

Edit: added to the post.
 
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