Pre Soaking PrimeAgra

[Ross]

Got it!

[Becca]

Well I tried to follow the directions off of Ray's website for soaking my PrimeAgra, although the second batch soaked for about 24 hours and not just overnight. I did not read to let it dry out before using it to pot the plants. How long does it take to dry out? I live in a pretty dry area so alot of the PrimeAgra on the top layer already looks dried out to me even with water in the resivor. I thought I would be able to see more of the wicking action through the plastic container but I don't see much. I have read both good and bad on s/h and I recently acquired some plants from someone who uses the s/h method and the plants where just beautiful and healthy! I am sure it works better for some then others depending on the growing conditions. I mainly wanted to switch so that I had more of a sure way of knowing "when" to water. I think I am more apt to rot roots off in bark or Aussie then I will be in PrimeAgra since it will be able to see when the water resivor is nearing empty. The amount of times I have to water isn't really an issue , just knowing when the medium is dry enough with bark and Aussie is the big issue for me. Thank you for everyone's input!

[Grandma M]

Susanne: When you wet it before using again, after it has been in KLN and dried, do you lose some of the strength of the KLN?

I guess we each have our own system which works for us. This is what I do, right or wrong. I have been doing this for about two years and it has worked well for me.

When I repot, I always use clean P/A which I have stored in a container in my garage.

After I'm finished repotting, I take the used material, rinse it, then I boil it for about an hour, sometime longer if I forget to set my timer, with a bit of Physan 20, to make sure I have killed any thing that may be hiding in the old stuff. I dry it completly, put it into a plastic container to be ready to reuse anytime I want to repot again. I always soak the P/A again in KLN for 24 hours before I repot with it.

I hope the boiling has been successful in killing anything unsafe. Maybe I am overdoing it with the boiling process, but I don't want to risk having something remain in the saved P/A.

[cb977]

I don't re-soak it when I'm going to be using it. Most of the time, it gets used pretty quickly

[Ray]

Rebecca,

All LECA products will dry pretty rapidly. The fact that the top surface of the pot appears dry indicates that in your growing conditions, the RH is low enough that the evaporation is happening faster than the wicking action can replenish the moisture at the top.

Under even drier conditions, that "wet/dry" line will move farther down in the pot, and under more humid conditions, may disappear altogether, with the medium be wet clear to the top. It's nothing to be concerned about, as the medium will still contain more moisture than it appears, and the plants will eventually put their roots all the way down into the reservoir anyway.

[Grandma M]

Susanne

Am I reading this correctly?

When you re-use it, after it is dry and stored, do you not rewet the medium, or do you plant into dry medium? I re-wet mine but that means when I see a need to re-pot just one plant I can't do it until it has soaked again. Your method sounds simple and quicker than the way I have been doing it.

[Ray]

I actually missed that in the earlier post.

Soaking fresh LECA media - no matter what brand you have - removes dust and helps extract residues that may be present from the manufacturing process (that's the source of the buildup Ross was referring to).

Soaking it again with a rooting hormone allows them to get into the medium so they can be available to the plants once used.

Allowing the medium to dry before use will result in the decomposition of those fragile organic compounds. They are not like the minerals in fertilizer that can re-ionize once back in solution to become useful. They "break" irreparably.

I won't say it's essential, but in my opinion, it's always a good idea to pot up plants in presoaked medium, no matter what that medium is.

[Plantcrazed101]

How long do you rinse the LECA for? Do you just do a quick splash for a couple seconds and then soak, or do you need to rinse it for a few minutes or more?

[Ray]

I prefer to rinse to remove dust, then soak.

[Plantcrazed101]

I see. This is my first time working with Semi-Hydro, and despite listening to your webinar about three times now, I still had to stop several times and check again that I was doing it right! lol

I read that the hole on the side is supposed to be about an inch from the bottom...now what if you are growing a tiny orchid and only need a 3 ounce solo cup? Still an inch?...or less?

I also rinsed the LECA 3 times, soaked it overnight, rinsed it again, and the water still had a slight shade of of the red clay color...hope that's okay! :/

I didn't use the CAL MAG...I've already blown my orchid budget (not just on LECA though lol) but I did use epsom salts since they were handy.