soil Recycling Soil

[outlaw]

I'm sure this has been discussed somewhere, but I couldn't find anything on it, so forgive me if I am being repetitive. I was just wondering what is the best/preferred method for saving and storing container soil? I have A LOT of soil and I feel like most of it can be re-used.
 
Pile it all up next to the compost bins? Put it in a bunch of 5 gallon buckets? Any advice/input is greatly appreciated!
 
 

 

[Hybrid Mode 01]

     I just toss mine in the compost bin. 

 

[someguy]

Some of it I toss in the compost pile and some of the other I use to top off some of the raised beds.

 

[outlaw]

     I just toss mine in the compost bin. 

 

Some of it I toss in the compost pile and some of the other I use to top off some of the raised beds.

 
I was thinking about tossing some in the compost bin and incorporating some into the in-ground soil prep for next year, but I guess I was wondering mostly about re-using the same soil in containers next year. If I toss it in the compost, I feel like I will be diluting the soil consistency.
 
Dash - do you fill your containers from the compost bin? Is it better to just toss it in the compost bin and buy new soil for my containers next year?

 

[John1234]

What type of soil? Most organic mixes are good for 2-4 runs, and peat 'n perlite/coir can be flushed out (salts) and reused, though it will inevitably compact. You could always start mini-acreage farms and throw something in for cover crop

 

[Husker21]

Sad... these topics make you realize the end is near...  Gonna pull all of my tomato plants today.  Pitching all of the soil into my compost pile.  Peppers are gonna stay in their pots until we get a frost.

 

[someguy]

 

 
If I toss it in the compost, I feel like I will be diluting the soil consistency.
 

 
When I fill up my pots or seedling start mix it comes from the compost pile. I have always had great results doing it this way.

 

[AaronTT]

What ever new soil i am enriching, I add old soil. Doing that does several things. Besides recycling, it can add some nutrients that were not fully used, and provide material that can be used to enlarge the total amount of soil being amended. It won't dilute, because you take that into account when your adding the ingredients used for enriching. The older material can also help to add airation to the mix, and a home for beneficial bacteria and fungus to harbor. Now some material if used before is best taken out such as large chunks of wood, as they drain nitrogen and other nutrients for its continual long term breakdown. Large woody hard pieces can take years to break down into a soil like consistency, and thus they don't add a whole lot into mixes. Shredded wood though if composted correctly can be good.
 
Some other stuff as well is not worth recycling such as used sandy type material that is completely devoid of any nutrients. Better to not add that type of junk as it will dilute the other and probably not worth it. So probably depends on what your considering on recycling...

 

[juanitos]

as miguel said they are good for more than one season usually so you may not have to do anything...
 
You can dump it all out into a big pile on a tarp somewhere if you want, and mix some more compost or whatever in for next year and cover it up so it "cooks". You want it to cook to kill off any pests in the soil(a major problem of recycling).

 

[queequeg152]

What type of soil? Most organic mixes are good for 2-4 runs, and peat 'n perlite/coir can be flushed out (salts) and reused, though it will inevitably compact. You could always start mini-acreage farms and throw something in for cover crop

regarding peat lite and soilless mixes....

you can use peat lite two times in my experiance. peat decomposes fairly quickly compared to coco.

after two runs, you can cut the peat lite with 50% by volume fresh new peat lite, and still get close to the original bulk density.

coco lite, it like 3 years ive heard, tho ive only switched to coco, so i cannot say from first hand experience whether or not its accurate.

you can measure the bulk density when ever you have this question... just heat it at like 250 degrees for a few hours to drive out moisture.

 

[outlaw]

ALL good info, exactly the type of ideas/first hand experience I was looking for. Thanks a bunch! 

 

[Proud Marine Dad]

If its organic soil it can be used over and over again.

 

[Dave2000]

You can just leave the soil where it is, there is no need to do anything with it.  I've used the same soil for several years, maybe even a decade or more in some of my pots  In spring a few weeks before transplanting sprouts that were started indoors, I mix in some aged compost and non-aged peat moss, coffee grounds, egg shells, etc.  The former came from a compost pile of stuff I build up over the year between the start of last season and the current one.  The main thing is that what you add has enough fluffy fibrous material so the soil has good aeration and drainage.
 
You don't need to rinse anything out of soil if the plants previously in it were healthy (ignoring end of season cold weather effects).  If there was an excessive salt buildup or way off pH level, etc. then it would have killed or at least noticeably stunted the plants previously in that soil.

If its organic soil it can be used over and over again.

 
What soil isn't organic?  I mean if I dig a hole in my neighbor's yard that's organic soil...  everything is organic soil... even soil that has non-organic things added, will have those things break down and become organic soil.  Some day, I too will become organic soil. 

 

[Proud Marine Dad]

I meant not full of salts like soil is that has been fertilized with non-organic things Dave.
Yes it will eventually become better but I wouldn't want to plant in that soil personally.

 

[Dave2000]

^  That's a personal choice you are entitled to make but has no bearing on the fitness of soil for reuse.   To some extent it's sort of the opposite that an all organic soil may have nitrogen depletion by the 2nd year unless you essentially add so much compost to it that you're really only half reusing the soil and half replacing it.  There's nothing wrong with doing that either and it can make a lot of sense for people who wish to expand their # of plants or move to larger containers.

 

[queequeg152]

its very important to recognize that soil, like all things obey the laws of the universe...

ignore water.
any plant grown in soil, will remove matter of some kind. both from the air, and from the soil itself. its literally impossible to grow plants, then remove them, and continue to use a unit of soil indefinatly without replacing matter withdrawn from the soil.

im NOT claiming pmd said this, but i get a tingling notion that's the direction this discussion is going.... that organic methods are somehow disconnected from the need to replace minerals via healthy soil ecology or w.e.

no amount of organic farming circumvents the need to replace nutrients removed from the soil. in one way or another, organic farming methods require inorganic means, tho indirectly, to replace nutrients much the same way conventional farming methods do. organic potash is mined.
even organic sources of nitrogen directly rely on synthetic sources of nitrogen.

without synthetic nitrogen, it would be impossible to produce the amount of feed that cattle consume to produce beef and organic nitrogen aka "manure" etc.

nitrogen is extracted from the air however, and arguably can be a closed cycle, through simply trading energy.
phosphate etc however is a mined mineral with a finite open cycle.

phosphate reserves are arguably the lowest of any of the mined minerals required for fertilizers, metals, sulfate, etc, have either large reserves, or alternate means of production, or are required in such small amounts, that their future is not in question.
and cannot be produced synthetically.
it will be interesting, 100's of years or so from now, to see what they will come up with when phosphate gets stupid expensive.
metallic robot centipede phosphate miners, crawling about the center of the earth... comes to mind for what ever reason.

 

[Proud Marine Dad]

no amount of organic farming circumvents the need to replace nutrients removed from the soil.

No argument here my friend. Even the organic soils we all recommend on the cannabis forums are subject to additions to the soil after a season or two of growing.

To some extent it's sort of the opposite that an all organic soil may have nitrogen depletion by the 2nd year unless you essentially add so much compost to it that you're really only half reusing the soil and half replacing it.  There's nothing wrong with doing that either and it can make a lot of sense for people who wish to expand their # of plants or move to larger containers.

Really? Tell me how the organic growers on the Cannabis forum can often grow two seasons in a row with no addition to the soil mixture?
Since you don't know the ingredients in the soil we use how can you make such a claim?

 

[Dave2000]

^  So they got a whole 2nd year, but based on your soil recommendations in the past it seems to cost an extreme amount of money to do it.   Knowing the ingredients in your soil does not change the fact that it would grow better with synthetic fertilizer added after the first season, and even better after the second season, and so on.  The question is not whether soil can be used forever but rather what is the practical limit and how to easily reach it without wasting money.
 
I've never claimed there was no benefit to enriching the soil with organic matter, but there is also benefit in enriching it with synthetic fertilizer, and a practical limit on the cost to benefit ratio particularly when there's tons of organic material all around us instead of having to buy it ground up and bagged. 
 
The length of time soil can be used also has a lot to do with the quantity per plant size and water conservation.   You can go several years with minimal to no soil amendments that add nutrients besides NPK if you start with rich soil and your water has minerals in it... so you really can't ignore the water.  My tap water adds minerals and my rain water lowers pH to help accelerate mineral salt formation.  As far as putting back what's in the soil, there's an easy and free way to do that.  Compost your uncooked kitchen scraps.  Fruits, vegetables, and the remains of last year's pepper crop leaves, stems, roots.  I even compost the seeds from peppers.
 
I do make one concession when I buy a bale of peat moss every 2 to 3 years, because it's a good amendment for the high clay soil around here, totally about texture not nutrients.

 

[Proud Marine Dad]

^  So they got a whole 2nd year, but based on your soil recommendations in the past it seems to cost an extreme amount of money to do it.   Knowing the ingredients in your soil does not change the fact that it would grow better with synthetic fertilizer added after the first season.
 
I've never claimed there was no benefit to enriching the soil with organic matter, but there is also benefit in enriching it with synthetic fertilizer, and a practical limit on the cost to benefit ratio particularly when there's tons of organic material all around us instead of having to buy it ground up and bagged. 
 
The length of time soil can be used also has a lot to do with the quantity per plant size and water conservation.   You can go several years with minimal to no soil amendments that add nutrients besides NPK if you start with rich soil and your water has minerals in it... so you really can't ignore the water.  My tap water adds minerals and my rain water lowers pH to help accelerate mineral salt formation.  As far as putting back what's in the soil, there's an easy and free way to do that.  Compost your uncooked kitchen scraps.  Fruits, vegetables, and the remains of last year's pepper crop leaves, stems, roots.  I even compost the seeds from peppers.
 
I do make one concession when I buy a bale of peat moss every 2 to 3 years, because it's a good amendment for the high clay soil around here, totally about texture not nutrients.

Why would I want synthetic crap in my soil? You really don't know much about the soil food web and organic growing in practice so good luck with whatever crap you put into your soil.
It is obvious we have a totally different idea on how best to amend the soil and I guarantee you would be far better off doing it the organic way.
I will continue to use organic kelp meal, neem cake from India and other great amendments like alfalfa meal and most importantly quality EWC made from good sources not pathetic table scraps.

 

[Dave2000]

Why would I want synthetic crap in my soil? You really don't know much about the soil food web and organic growing in practice so good luck with whatever crap you put into your soil.
I will continue to use organic kelp meal, neem cake from India and other great amendments like alfalfa meal and most importantly quality EWC made from good sources not pathetic table scraps.

 
1)  It's not crap.  That's an opinon you are entitled to but has no factual basis.  Quite the opposite, the highest yielding plants have the same soil nutrients to draw from PLUS the extra nutrients from the synthetic fertilizer.  Chemically, your organics have to change into the equivalent of synthetic fertilizer anyway.
 
2)  Synthetic fertilizer comes from nature.   It is then refined to be exactly what plants need the most of.  Do you ride a horse around because it's too convenient to ride in a car made to be exactly what we need for transportation?  Does your car burn refined fuel or does it have a wood furnace?
 
3)  Apparently I know quite a lot about food web and organic growing if I can reuse my own soil and not have to keep spending an arm and a leg for someone else to do it for me.  Having products shipped across the world to grow plants is a ludicrous concept to me and that includes growing cannabis. 
 
4)  There's nothing pathetic about kitchen scraps.  Think about what you are suggesting.  If the food is good enough for YOU to eat, suddenly it isn't good enough to use to grow plants that produce food you eat?  I think you are growing too much cannabis.     Putting fruits and vegetables back into the soil is almost exactly what you were taking out of the soil when you grow peppers and later compost the stems and leaves, NOT the exotic stuff you are adding instead.
 
5)  I would concede the benefits of extreme expense soil in one situation, an apartment or condo dweller with severely limited space.  Otherwise, it's a lot more effective to just put more plants in the ground.   Take a look at the following picture.  This plant has no special soil whatsoever and is only 5 months old.  It literally cost me 15, "maybe" 25 cents max. and if I wanted more of them I have many thousands of seeds.  There was a bush growing there for over 15 years so it's not remotely fresh soil.  What did I spend the 25 cents on?  A few gallons of water and a handful of synthetic fertilizer.  Total time invested was about 5 minutes including transplanting it.
 
Ideas about soil don't pan out if you spend a lot more time and money without reaping any benefit.  You too could simply grow more plants and completely skip the exotic soil mix.  Less time and money for higher yield isn't crap at all, it's awesome.