Recommended Soil for Your Home Tent Garden
Indoor gardening is gradually becoming the new way of doing things, matters gardening, and there is more than one reason that is happening. Using grow tents, grow lights, and other necessary fixtures create an ideal growing environment for your plants, translating to better and higher yields than the typical outdoor gardening. It is efficient and significantly minimizes the cost of plant production. However, the choice of grow medium can be the difference between success and failure even if you purchase a grow tent.
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The Best Soil for your Indoor Garden
Indoor gardening requires a good medium to ensure efficient plant growth without problems. But is the soil you find outside adequate? Unfortunately, the soil from the yard is not sufficient. It is usually heavy and may have weeds and pests, and you wouldn’t want to take these undesirables inside. Ideally, search for the particular mix, specific to the plants you want to grow; they have the characteristics that your plants will love and thrive.
The majority of the organic mixes you find on the market work well. For example, FoxFarm® Ocean Forest Soil is ideal for your struggling seedlings and will ensure they thrive. Well-aerated and lightweight, the fully organic mix is ideal for almost all the plants you want to grow indoors – a truly versatile soil.
An ideal mix for potting includes perlite, vermiculite, and peat moss. These pretty much resist compaction by having a decent absorption level. However, you must provide plants with a decent supply of nutrients, as they do not have their own; they are barren. But there is an advantage to this sterility – they never introduce disease and pest problems.
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Some gardeners add some organic touch into their medium such as compost peat, compost, leaf mold or even rich garden soil. A soilless medium with up to 20% organic matter will not dry out and introduces some essential nutrients, as well as, beneficial microbes.
It is critical to make sure that the soil is adequately light for pore space for water, air, and healthy roots. Outdoor soils benefit from turning by earthworms, and weather for aeration and this is not usually the case for indoor soil. As a result, your indoor mix should contain a significant amount of sharp sand, vermiculite or perlite to improve drainage and ensure the soil has adequate aeration.
Well, indoor plants are not too demanding regarding fertilizers, and it is essential to avoid overdoing it. Always follow instructions to the letter, and only err on the weak side, as opposed to over-application. Water them adequately before applying any fertilizer.
However, it always good practice to supplement inorganic fertilizers with sea emulsion or seaweed or any other organic amendments for purposes of providing any trace nutrients that may be lacking.
Other Options
Instead of a soil mix, you have the option of using hydroponics – growing plants without soil. The primary role of soil is to provide stability and hold the necessary nutrients for plant roots. However, hydroponics readily provides the necessary nutrients, and the plant roots don’t have to look further. That easy access to food and water enhance plant growth, making it 50% faster than plants grown by other means.
Author: D.J. Cartledge
