Potting soil and grow lights

What's everyone like as far as store bought potting soil / dirt for raised beds and the like ? We got like 30 different brands and types here at the store and I'm pretty lost , online reviews ain't helping much at all. Haven been able to make compost either so I need to just buy something for the time being
Also for y'all doing indoor gardening, what y'all like for grow lights ?
Thanks

My wife has the best luck with one called happy frog for all her starts. She has tried others when she could not find happy frog and the results were not as good.

If I had more storage I would buy a pallet for her so she does not run out

I just roam the garden center and find whichever bags are busted open and half price, lol. Honestly I see no difference between the StayGreen brand and the Miracle Grow... actually I prefer the staygreen. But for raised beds I just get whatever bags are marked down.

The local cops see you buying that stuff and they will do a no knock raid on you...

No real difference here either. Just avoid the specialty types like the cactus soil.

As for grow lights I have good luck with a standard flourescent shop light using a warm and cool bulb to try to get full spectrum. If you can find a full spectrum bulb get that. You want it right on top of your starts as bright as possible. But even more important is a small fan blowing on them to toughen them up and move humidity off of the plants.

The store bought brands are full of chemicals. I wont use them. It's not hard to make your own super soil. It might cost a bit more but you can reuse it forever.

Buy a few bags of compost, I used Dr Earth compost( I think). Then a block of coco choir soaked up. Then add a few bags of earth worm castings, a bag of kelp meal, a bag of alph alpha meal. Some rock dust and sand. Some perlite. Then water it in with Epsom salts and Alo water and sit for a month.


They make some nice 1000 watt LED grow lights on Amazon that are priced reasonable now, like $50.That will cover a 4X4 space.

Old castle makes a bunch of different brands. They buy black KS topsoil from construction sites and manure from dairy's thats been composted two years. Mix them together. No chemicals yukonjeff . Stuff is mixed and bagged on the S.E. side of Paola KS. Shipped all over the country . LOTs of different brand names. Look for the name Old Castle.

I do know that MIracle Gro potting mix is the most expensive on the market because of the popular name. I avoid it for sure. I buy what is cheapest.

Usually miracle grow.

On dirt... I have sifted all my own dirt for my combination of raised beds and in-ground beds. Probably overkill but I did it. If you have dirt or rocks-with-dirt like we do in NY, it really works. Let me know if you want to see my sifter and I'll take a picture this weekend. It's a manual sifter but I'm sure you could build something nice especially since I know you weld and made those nice box traps.

I've been "building soil" for years now. I make all my own compost too (in pallets that were only "HT" stamped). I mostly follow MIGardener on youtube. He has changed my life. You're in the south but I'm sure his advice works everywhere.

Also: I remember once calling the MIGardener store in MI and asking the cheapest way to get the dirt for raised beds and they told me. I forgot what it was though. Call them and ask, they have a trick. I think he uses all compost but there is some cheap way. https://migardener.com/pages/contact-us

do you have the low cost bags of composted cow manuer?

for seed starter I mix composted manure bags with peat moss and it works well I use my cement mixer and mix up a bunch and store it in bukets with lids till I need it again.



you can also put wood and stuff in to cut down on the volume you need to fil for a raised bed branches , wood chips , it will all break down eventually


I have used all compost before for a raised bed and stuff grew very well

you may want to try bag gardening if you have to buy your soil

Greencountypete's response made me thing of something:

Do you have a "Cooperative extension" associated with a university? Like in NY we have the "Cornell Cooperative Extension."

If so, call them and ask what farms might have organic cow manure (I know, all manure is technically organic but they'll like this statement).

Then call the farmer and ask if you can get rid of it for him and tell him what you are trying to do of course. I did this. It worked. Try it. Unlimited. And you'll often get it from grass fed cows based on your request.

another video for you

horse farm are good often they just keep piling it up so it gets composted and you can just go pull the weeds off the old side of the pile and start digging and fill your truck

I got trailer loads from a horse farm not far away

now if they will move it with the end loader for you then you really are doing well

Look up hugelkultur, it may help in filling a lot of raised beds.
basically, you put logs, branches, leaves, etc in a pile, or bed then top it with soil, and or compost and plant into that.....would save a lot of soil fill.

I mix my own potting soil, and have for over a decade. It's far superior to the stuff we can buy in the store. I make my own compost, but I can't produce enough for my needs. I bought 22 tons this year so far. At the end of the planting season, often times you can see the Miracle Grow potting mix on a deep discount. I pick them up when they are cheap and they do OK. But I prefer my own mix.

Fox Farm sells a couple different soils that are good, Happy Frog and Ocean Forest (what I use) and for lights I ended up liking Spider Farmer LEDs the best (tried a few different types and brands)

Marty,,,,,, lol

Not around here they won’t. We can grow up to twelve marijuana plants per household for personal use if you live more than 25 miles from a dispensary

I always just use miracle gro for my indoor plants. I’m no expert though, for me not forgetting to water is a bigger deal than what soil to use lol

I buy the broken bags from the local feed store for $1.00 a bag. One time I got 37 broken bags that they had put on 3 pallets. They just let it sit unless somebody asks about it.

Keith

I use promix that I get at walmart. I think it's around 14.00 a bag if I remember right. It comes compressed like peat moss.

It's hard to answer this one as many suppliers are regional. For example Daddy Pete's is a huge supplier of all kinds of dirt/soil. They have one made for raised beds also. With that said, I dunno if you can find that in your area.
Most places have some kind of municipal compost program where the cities and towns pick up all the yard trash and commercially compost it then sell it back fairly cheap, here it's 10-15$ a ton. I prefer this stuff for filling my beds. It's a cheap aggregate, however it's nutritionally void. Beware of that when using pretty much any commercial compost. If you are looking to do starts/soil blocks, I use a mix of Happy Frog (brown bag) with a fine grain propagation mix (which is 99% peat).

Tha ks everyone !!

Don't bet on that. We tried to get some manure from a farmer we were trapping on a few years back. He kind of laughed and said sure, take whatever you want but don't put it on anything you want to grow. Lost, we just looked at him. He explained... "we spray these fields with herbicides and the cows eat the plants. You'd think going through their stomachs it would stop the herbicide but it doesn't. Put this manure on your garden and it will look like you Round Up'd it in a couple days."

So no, not all manure is organic, lol.

Over grazed pasture can be sprayed in the spring to kill weeds but I never heard of it making the manure toxic to gardens. The stuff needs to age a couple years, (compost), before use. Perhaps he didnt bother?

The only active ingredient I’m aware of that will cause that issue is aminopyralid. It’s in a product such as grazon. It doesn’t break down in the animal or through composting. It has to be incorporated into the soil to be broken down by soil microbes. I don’t remember how many days it requires off the top of my head. It can cause crop damage if used before that interval is up.

Any 2,4d product can cause the same issues if the labeled planting interval isn’t followed

Find some one that has a big pile of old broken down manure the stuff that looks like black dirt. I can't keep enough of it around. We experimented with using a post hole auger, drilling about a 3 foot hole and filling them with manure. we had exceptional results, But obviously you are gardening in doors if you are using a light. Give the manure a shot I bet you will be shocked.

I sent in for a timer for my grow lights. It came with a sticker that said "legalize tomatoes"

My garden has excessive amounts of P&K I think because of adding composted horse manure. the neighbor just bought the house and was cleaning out the barn.
Sorry I said OK.
just

Wow that's interesting. I did not know that. Makes sense.

Better get it composted otherwise it will be full of weed seeds and you will have regrets.

I have definitely heard of compost that doesn't grow plants due to herbicide contamination. It happened to a compost place local to me.

Horse manure is the worst one for being contaminated with herbicides. The reason is that most people feed their horses high quality hay. High quality means almost zero weeds, which means they spray it more often with herbicides. Some ingredients in some herbicides are not compostable, it’ll make your garden a wasteland for years. I wouldn’t risk it, unless I knew where the hay came from and what they put on it with 100% certainty. There are better soil amendments anyways.

1.) That's why I said to ask for organic farmer and moreover ask for grass-fed only farmer (that's what I did). I know now (from this process) more than one.

2.) I only noted the "All is organic technically" not as advice to pursue, but as a passing comment I don't even agree with; I noted this because I was told by a Penn State agriculture graduate and farmer that very statement and thought to note before someone refuted the other statement. But yes, if it's not grass-fed poop (as a laymen here which I am definitely, I know nothing about this so I error on the side of caution), I'm not using it.