Saw a video with Jim Duffy. He was showed compost in a bucket that he was reusing. Not sure why, but I dump my containers into the garden after one season of use. Have never thought to use it for more than a year. My compost is usually wood, leaves, grass, and some duck poop. I imagine after a season it is low on nutrients, but I spike it with compost tea. So what do you think? Reuse your compost / potting soil or dump it each year?
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container Reusing compost in a container
- Thread starter AJ Drew
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yes i reuse my soil, been doing that for many years. Much cheaper to add nutrients to it then dump it away and buy more soil for my containers.
i re-use and add some fresh potting mix and compost each year to spruce things up.
I re-use my potting mix every year also. I dump all the previous seasons mix out onto a tarp in the yard and try to add 30% to 50% new potting mix and some additional perlite for the new stuff. Then mix it all up and fill my containers again and fertilize once a week or so with liquid ferts, or as needed.
I keep adding more pots every year though so I never quite have enough new mix due to cost. Luckily I'm almost out of room in the garden, so next season I should be able to refresh my mix for about $100 or so I figure. I'll need roughly 30 cubic ft of fresh mix to add to my existing 50 to 75 cubic ft depending on what pots I use next season. I should probably do the math with all my containers and figure it out exactly, but where's the fun in that? :ROFL:
I keep adding more pots every year though so I never quite have enough new mix due to cost. Luckily I'm almost out of room in the garden, so next season I should be able to refresh my mix for about $100 or so I figure. I'll need roughly 30 cubic ft of fresh mix to add to my existing 50 to 75 cubic ft depending on what pots I use next season. I should probably do the math with all my containers and figure it out exactly, but where's the fun in that? :ROFL:
I definitely re-use 90% of it. Don't personally even have the space to dump all that media. If you grind up the plant matter and add that back to compost or put it in the bottom of larger containers, it should be a nearly net-neutral on the nutrients (only losing what is in the pods you take). Just need to supplement with new additives to keep the structure from breaking down too much.
I'm following this thread because I'm going to be struggling with this next season; wanna start my research and strategizing ASAFP....
I'm still a rookie at this, and when it comes to the medium in which I'm growing peppers, I do things that other THP people say never to do.
Maybe in a few years (or less), I'll learn the hard lessons of my wayward soil habits.
Basically, I have one pile of just "dirt", and then several piles of compost in various stages of decomposition.
I'm buying some potting soil every year, but that's basically enough for my seedlings and for a few plants that get some special love.
For my plant out, I'm mostly amending my raised beds with mulch, and containers are mostly getting a "potting soil" made from a combination of mulch with some dirt.
At the end of the year, if the container looks pretty much spent, it goes into the dirt pile. If the container still resembles potting soil, it goes into one of the compost piles.
So far I'm happy with the results. My pepper plants aren't busting out in a fertilized frenzy, but they're healthy. As much rain as I get here, everything would be drowned if I was doing it too far wrong.
Maybe in a few years (or less), I'll learn the hard lessons of my wayward soil habits.
Basically, I have one pile of just "dirt", and then several piles of compost in various stages of decomposition.
I'm buying some potting soil every year, but that's basically enough for my seedlings and for a few plants that get some special love.
For my plant out, I'm mostly amending my raised beds with mulch, and containers are mostly getting a "potting soil" made from a combination of mulch with some dirt.
At the end of the year, if the container looks pretty much spent, it goes into the dirt pile. If the container still resembles potting soil, it goes into one of the compost piles.
So far I'm happy with the results. My pepper plants aren't busting out in a fertilized frenzy, but they're healthy. As much rain as I get here, everything would be drowned if I was doing it too far wrong.
DontPanic said:
What is it that you're calling "dirt" and "soil"? Is it actually dirt and soil, or is it bagged potting mix?
If you're having good results in containers with actual dirt or soil - which can sometimes, unexplainably happen - you are going to "soil" yourself when you see what happens when you build a proper container mix.
Of course, if you just have terminology mixed up, then nevermind.
At the end of the season, I pull whatever plants that I'm not going to over winter out of their containers and put the containers with potting mix still in them, under my lean-to off my garage, they sit in there all winter, which is mid October to end of May for me, so about 7 months or so.Sinn said:
Dirt is the stuff in a pile out behind the fence with weeds growing out of it.solid7 said:
What is it that you're calling "dirt" and "soil"? Is it actually dirt and soil, or is it bagged potting mix?
If you're having good results in containers with actual dirt or soil - which can sometimes, unexplainably happen - you are going to "soil" yourself when you see what happens when you build a proper container mix.
When I do it right, soil is the stuff where my plants are growing.
skullbiker
Extreme Member
I try to get my container stuff remixed and put back into the containers. Then they just sit out in the open over winter. When it gets -20 f or colder, it tends to kill off most all bugs that might have been in the mix.Sinn said:
