reusing coco

[oldjarhead100]

what do others who reuse coco do before reusing it , I flush mine with water and flora clean then with just water, someone said they use calmag and water before reusing coco ,I just read the thread on reusing soil so I thought I would ask the same question about coco

[DoctorJohnson]

Good question. I threw mine away last time because it was full of roots (a good thing!) and had had fungus gnats that I got under control with neem oil spray, but I'm not sure it was completely clean. (It was an outside grow, and Mother Nature came calling. Aphids too.) But coco is awfully expensive (especially considering that it's just agricultural waste!), so this time I'm going to reuse.

I think the single most important thing would be to make sure the coco is pest-free. In commercial greenhouses they steam their soil to sterilize it. I would think if you just gave the coco a good rinse to get rid of any excess fertilizer salt, verifying that by checking the runoff for both pH and PPMs, and then poured boiling water on it and let that soak till it cooled to try to kill bugs/eggs, that should do the job?

[oldjarhead100]

thanks Doc I'm surprised at the response to this question I thought it would be a lively conversation lol

[CaptainShamrock]

I’d like to know about this as well. I’ve heard some people say never, and some people say they add some enzymes to take care of dead root matter in order to reuse. I’m with you Jarhead, I’d figure more people would chime in

[Californiakid]

OJH...I started a grow with coco. But family stuff got in the way, too much time involved. But I intended to reuse it. I have some stuff called Enzymes Komplete. It breaks down remaining roots and washes out build up. Is also has a strong mint component which you know I like mint to keep bugs away.
After that I would soak with ph'd water and calmag.

[Californiakid]

Coco doesn't contain any nutrients whatsoever. So there isn't anything to become depleted.

[oldjarhead100]

how much calmag? do you soak it with

[Californiakid]

oldjarhead100 when new I used 2tsp/gal.
I figured that I would do the same to reuse. But I transplanted into soil and didn't reuse any yet. To me it seemed like cheap insurance.

[Insight]

After my first coco grow...I dumped all 3, 5 gallon smart pots coco in to a large container. I cleaned out the old roots, stirred it up. I then filled up the 3, 5 gallon smart pots and had to add some more coco and perlite to fill all 3 pots again.

The second grow went well, no problems.

I'm on my third grow and I did NOT reuse the coco/perlite again....all new....I'll probably do the same for next grow...clean this grows coco up and reuse one more time.

[DoctorJohnson]

thanks Doc I'm surprised at the response to this question I thought it would be a lively conversation lol

One old jarhead to another. Semper fi, bro.

As for adding enzymes, that sounds cool and scientific but unnecessary to me. What's the harm of some dried out old root fibers in the midst of all the coconut fibers? So it seems to me anyway. If you give it a good rinse so there's no salt buildup, there aren't any cooties, and it looks like it's holding up well (which I expect it would--it's probably mostly just cellulose or something like that), I would expect that you could use it indefinitely. Just another .02...

[D.A.A.S.69]

Hey OJH, yeah, you can reuse coco, its lots more versatile than soil.

[Doubledealing72]

Hey ojh, I haven't personally reused mine, and I have heard both sides of the story online.

Some people say their grows get better after each use because the coco is already "charged." Others disagree, saying their 2nd grow did not go nearly as well.

I think it's very possible that the ones that didn't go well probably skipped a step somewhere (didn't get all the roots out, didn't run some sort of cleaning enzyme through) and that's probably why it didn't go well.

Since it's an inert medium you should be able to flush everything out and start over from square one. I may try it with mine this time!

[Mr.furley]

Hey OJH.
I let my pots dry out for a week then pop it out the pots to a large Rubbermaid, knock the main root ball till it's cleaned out. I sift through and pull out all the roots I can, mixing multiple pots together as I clean them out I usually mix a little new coco and perlite in, stirring it all together multiple times.
I can store it in the tub at that point and will start repotting for new plants from there.
I know it's suggested to flush but my thought is that, did the last thing I do to it was flush? If it's a transplant the root ball is suspended in the previous pots coco so by the time its roots are growing in the new/old I've already and ph'ed water, newts and calmag to it.
I've reused coco 3 times as of now, hope this helps.
Mr.furley

[St.buds]

I flush the coco at harvest time for 2 weeks useing flora clean then after harvest I remove as many roots as possible mix all together then I ph to 6 and add half strength cal mag and add germinated seeds to the coco restart cycle

[St.buds]

I add some new coco here and there but not alot

[oldjarhead100]

I have always reused my coco, sometimes I remember to flush it out some times I dont ,must of forgot this grow the girls are crawling along very slowly ,I'm going to do a flush with them as soon as I can, just haven't had time .

Part of the reason for this post was to find out what others do to there coco and I'm real interested about the calmag ,how much do you use

For the sake of argument if we flush before we harvest shouldn't this flush for the next grow as well, Thats what I believe but this grow is proving a challenge and I think its the medium thats the problem, so now I will flush before every grow

[Mr.furley]

OJH, I flush with Ph'ed calmag water when my cocos is new, otherwise I don't do not much on the reuse.

[oldjarhead100]

it was a ph problem as I was flushing (look in new grow room) I remembered that I had six plants that were in bloom then due to a timer problem went back into veg so I tossed them in the hash pile but did not flush the coco

[GreenDragonRon]

I've reused for a couple grows, only thing I notice is that it doesn't quite drain as well. It might be because I don't get all the roots out or the coco could be breaking down a bit.