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Organic Potting Soil For Houseplants The Works. Why Sterile Potting Soil Is A Really BAD idea!
Apr 27, 2022
Sterile potting soil is never a good idea. This is particularly true is you are using an organic potting soil setup. Organic Potting soil for houseplants need to biologically diverse. The organic potting soil for houseplant needs to have a wide range of microbes that help with nutrient cycling and even pest management. There are a few amendments we can add to soil for indoor plants to help increase the biological activity. This in turn means a wider range of bioavailable nutrients. This Gardening In Canada video looks at how to use humic acid for houseplants. And why humic acid for potting soil helps with biological activity in the soil.
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0:00
Hello plant people how are you guys doing today if you're new around here my name is Ashley and
0:03
I'm a soil scientist on this channel I like to take that science and apply it to all things
0:08
plants and in today's video we're going to be talking about humic acid and specifically how
0:13
to make a better potting soil for our indoor plants and kind of the science behind why I'm
0:20
such a huge advocate of this side of houseplant life but first if you enjoy the science behind
0:27
house plants the potting soil the actual plants themselves then be sure to let me
0:32
know in the comments down below hit that subscribe button give this video a thumbs up and let's just get straight into it but you guys have heard me talk
0:40
about humic acid over and over and over again and the reason why I'm beating this
0:46
to death is because it is I think it's going to be the new thing for both
0:51
gardening and for indoor plants and it's because it works the whatever is going
0:57
on with it, it's definitely working. Now, my first video on this, I got into more so the ethics side
1:04
of humic acid and different ways of which it's derived and how it can become problematic
1:10
And then I also go into how they label it as humic and fluvic acid. But in a lot of cases
1:17
we really don't know what humic or fluvic acid is or how to replicate it. And we think we're
1:23
replicating it, but we're not entirely sure. Nonetheless, the byproduct that we end up with
1:28
that is humic acid is wonderful and it works very, very well. I'm using it currently outdoors and I
1:34
have also been using it inside with my houseplants and I'm noticing pretty stellar results
1:41
So the product I use is K-Tonic. It looks like this. I will leave an affiliate link for this
1:47
product down below now this is ethically sourced uh canadian product also available in the united
1:55
states to purchase and this is what the bottle looks like there's also a bottle that is smaller
1:59
than this a little bit goes a very very long ways and the way that i actually apply this to my soil
2:06
is with a milk jug so i know this sounds weird but i i water all my plants with milk jugs so i fill
2:14
my milk jugs up I let them get to room temperature or warmer I like sun warmed
2:19
water for both my indoor plants and my outdoor plants oddly enough because I do
2:24
find I get better results for my plants in general so warm but like a sun
2:30
warmed water with my dosage of ketonic for this size of the jug and then I
2:35
water every time with my ketonic you cannot over water with ketonic because
2:40
it is not a inorganic compound, meaning it does not have salt in it. However, it is also not a
2:47
fertilizer in and of itself. So you do have to still supplement with fertilizer. Now the beauty
2:54
of a humic acid is that it is kind of like compost on steroids. Therefore, you can use both organic
3:02
or inorganic forms of fertilizer and get very similar results. So the reason why I say that is
3:10
because in the houseplant community, it is not uncommon for us to use things like
3:15
very compost, compost manures within our potting soil. There's nothing wrong with this
3:20
The issue comes when we are so obsessed with sterilizing our soil
3:25
because we want to get rid of things like fungus gnats, mealy bugs, mold
3:31
Some people just do not like mold, root rock, whatever the case is. So we always see on forums, on online discussions
3:38
about how to sterilize our soil either with chemicals, neem oil or in the oven
3:43
And I beg of you, please do not do this. You are actually altering that potting soil medium
3:48
Now, while potting soil is soilless, it actually has an even greater effect when it is cooked or baked
3:55
Meaning, soil, when cooked or baked, because it is inorganic, it really doesn alter its physical or chemical properties that much It just kind of dehydrates it and would dehydrate any microbes big and small harmful or beneficial within the soil profile when we bake
4:16
a potting soil medium which is typically coconut coir peat moss we actually alter the structure
4:23
So I want you to think of it as a hair So our actual head of hair
4:29
We always see the panting Pro V commercials where we see the strand of hair and it's all all the platelets are nicely laid down
4:36
and then it comes along dries out and then it Fluffs up. So what actually happens is the opposite when it comes to potting soil
4:46
When we bake or we sterilize our potting soil our potting soil goes dead flat
4:51
and it makes it really difficult to actually rewet or help water penetrate
4:57
back into that system because we actually need those nooks and cramies
5:02
that are developed through hydration so we actually need a plumping effect on
5:06
our soilless medium so that is why we don't want to sterilize it because it
5:11
actually makes it kind of hydrophobic and I'm sure you've seen this before you've had a severely dried out bag of potting soil compost manure vera compost
5:19
whatever the case is you notice that it's hydrophobic and the hydrophobicity of this is
5:24
due to the actual laying down of the fibers of the organic fibers not allowing the water to
5:32
penetrate so if you want to google what that concept is or if you want a video on that concept
5:37
then let me know in the comments down below but essentially it is called water repellency or soil
5:44
repellency there's multiple different names of it many different studies done on the concept because of how difficult it actually is to re-wet soil that has
5:53
come into that level of dehydration the other issue with the sterilization is
5:58
that yes we're getting rid of those harmful microbes that we do not want
6:03
because they cause root rot or they cause fungus on the top of the soil
6:07
which looks ugly however we are also getting rid of all the beneficial
6:11
microbes meaning the microbes such as nematodes that will eat mealy bug eggs
6:17
thrip egg fungus gnat eggs watch my me my nematode video if you want more on
6:23
that and then we also will end up getting rid of our nature frying
6:28
denitrifying bacteria phosphate solubilizing bacteria you name it it is all gone meaning if we are using an inorganic form of fertilizer in our
6:38
soil it is just amplified and it gets that much worse because we don't have
6:42
the microbes to actually follow through on our nutrient cycles to make that
6:46
nutrient into a bioavailable form so when we notice on organic packages we
6:51
right away can see that the values of NPK are much much lower than that of an
6:56
inorganic substitute the reason for this is because the inorganic substitute is
7:01
immediately bioavailable meaning the moment it hits the soil and water is
7:06
applied it can be brought up into the plant because it is already in a usable
7:10
form we don't need the microbes present in many cases in order to alter that
7:17
format or make it into a format that is uptaken by the plant however in an
7:23
organic soil we do need those components present and in a potting soil system or
7:30
an indoor plant system a closed system this is even more important because we
7:36
actually want a very biodiverse soil profile because it's going to help us enormously fight
7:42
off things like root rot which is actually caused by an anaerobic bacteria it's going to help with
7:48
full mungus and full mold that is harmful and then also help with controlling of pests that
7:55
can be damaging to the upper foliage of the plant so we want biodiversity to the max so the next
8:01
question is how do we get biodiversity in a closed system such as a container
8:06
which is what we have in a lot of cases with our potting soil or with our house plants the answer to this is we need to add carbon and we need to add organic amendments in a diverse range and that
8:17
is where something like the humic acid would come into play so the humic acid is going to add the
8:24
carbon contents it's also going to add a diverse array of amino acids carbohydrates proteins you
8:31
name it it's in there and this isn't feeding the plant so much as it's feeding the actual soil
8:37
itself and not so much the inorganic compounds of the soil but the living things within the soil
8:45
that are going to eventually help you fight off things like root rot or harmful mold and fungus
8:51
and feed you know things that eat your mealy bugs that sort of thing so that is where a humic acid
8:58
would come in and this is why you would apply it you know every time you water
9:03
that brings me into the second way that we keep the biological profile up in our
9:09
potting soil for our house plants and that is through moisture now you do not
9:14
want anaerobic soil you want moist soil there is a huge difference here anaerobic
9:21
means that oxygen is absent if you are running into a situation where you water
9:26
on a regular basis and you end up with anaerobic soil your soil is much too
9:31
heavy and you don't have enough airspace in it this is why you would add in
9:36
things like pumice perlite volcanic rock orchid bark that sort of thing to add
9:41
in enough air the key here is that we don't want so much airiness in the
9:47
system that we are losing microbial activity due to lack of moisture because
9:53
are not able to get into water nearly enough so find your comfort zone a lot of people are
9:59
promoting an aeroid mix which is pumice charcoal it's almost basically like the old-school orchid
10:06
mixes that is okay so long as we're able to keep up with the watering system also keep in mind
10:14
because you are so top-heavy on actual wood and tree fiber it's not uncommon for you to end up
10:21
with more fruiting bodies or fungal bodies within the profile if you are adding in things like humic
10:27
acid and keeping the moisture nice and high this is okay this is normal it's a normal process and
10:33
the breakdown or the degradation of that potting soil medium so watch my mold video so you can get
10:39
a better understanding of how this is beneficial to the actual potting soil itself it means your
10:44
potting soil is alive and that means you're actually doing a good job and you're not doing bad job so keep that in mind now if you're on the other side of the spectrum
10:53
where you have very very high peat and you're adding things like ketonic and
10:58
humic acid and moisture and it goes anaerobic this is going to do nothing
11:05
for you because the beneficial microbes that actually fight off root rot don't
11:11
survive in anaerobic environments meaning you need to add in what you need
11:15
to add in in order to counteract that appropriately appropriately now that
11:20
maybe things like pumice bark orchid bark whatever the case is have a whole
11:25
DIY potty soil recipe over on the website that you can actually check out
11:29
and it literally goes through every type of plant and your watering style
11:34
whether or not has lighting your potting style because the potting actual pot
11:39
itself it's a part of the medium trust me it's very very thorough third thing
11:43
you want to do besides the humic acid and the moisture is a limit the exposure
11:48
of the pot to high heat whether this be in the form of Sun or ambient heat so
11:54
the actual heat inside of a closed system can kill off our microbes that are
12:00
typically used to living and surviving in an environment that is in the ground
12:04
and is not exposed to high heat makes sense pretty basic stuff now in an
12:09
indoor scenario it very unlikely that we going to run into this however in an outdoor scenario it can happen keep in mind in an indoor setting when we have high heats applied to our actual pot that would take place probably more
12:23
so inside of something such as a grow tent so if you are a grow 10 person or
12:28
you have a rehab tent then make sure your actual soil itself is not getting
12:33
too warm last way to actually increase the microbial activity and therefore the
12:38
nutrient cycling and the ability to fight off disease and I mean the list
12:42
goes on and on is to actually mulch the top of this soil now this one is going
12:49
to be for the experts not so much the beginner and or plant people because we
12:56
are drastically reducing our rates of evapotranspiration in a system that has
13:02
a mulch on top it's really going to alter our watering habits and how we go
13:07
about watering in and of itself this may not be for everybody especially if you're
13:11
in an environment that has a very high ambient moisture this simply just will
13:16
not work however if you are in a dry climate with very low rates of
13:21
evapotranspiration or with or with very high rates of evapotranspiration then you may benefit from using a mulch on top so this would be more applicable to
13:32
people in the southern states people growing under actual grow lamps people
13:36
growing in terracotta pots or growing inside of undersized pots and this mulch can come in the
13:44
form of actual rocks physical wood chips grass cuttings straw you name it and this is simply
13:53
going to help keep the moisture higher within the soil system a bonus tip that may not be for
14:00
everybody is actually putting your roots or your planted pots into a clear pot now it's really
14:08
difficult to find clear pots that are going to fit into beautiful cover pots i understand that
14:14
but if you can get your hands on it please do orchid companies or orchid pots typically are
14:20
the best way to get these and not only is it going to give you a visual look at the roots itself it's
14:26
actually going to allow for sun penetration into that soil system so if
14:31
you guys did not know the microbes in the soil both outdoors in the natural
14:36
environment and indoors inside of containers only exist in the portion of
14:41
the soil that is exposed to light so a lot of microbes still need sunlight to
14:47
some degree and therefore the active section of the actual soil system is
14:53
within that first you know foot to two feet of actual soil matter so if you
15:00
have a clear pot inside of a cover pot you're obviously going to end up with
15:04
more sun exposure especially if that cover pot is oversized compared to the
15:09
nursery pot it's in and you will begin to see things such as algae formation on
15:15
these sides of the container and this again is a very good thing a sign of a
15:19
healthy soil is a soil that has upwards of five percent algae the higher the
15:24
better it actually increases oxygen and heration to the soil system which is
15:29
going to then reduce the level of root rot and anaerobic disease that you can
15:36
actually end up with in your plants so that's just another fun fact that is
15:40
actually something that I personally use as a way to detect root rot very early
15:45
on is with the clear pot system and then I also end up with the LJ and better
15:49
microbial activity and therefore better transfer of nutrients especially in an inner and an organic indoor system and yeah I'm just I'm all about doing
16:00
organic and or because they do find it really does keep the pest down and it's
16:06
just much easier to manage so that is just my personal opinion in that sense I
16:12
I hope you guys enjoyed this video. If you did, be sure to give it a thumbs up. Hit that subscribe button and let me know in the comments down below if you learned something
16:19
new and what that new thing was. I will talk to you guys next time
16:22
Bye
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