grow beds full of roots

Wickham

Please don't tell me to search. I know all about the search button, but just like "google" you have 1000's of sites, (and I need help now.)

Made a mistake over the Pilbara winter and overplanted my grow beds. I am constantly unblocking the drain holes etc because of roots. What is easiest way to clean the grow beds. 1 000 000 earthworms couldn't eat through the monster I have created. I am literally pulling out soccer size balls of weeds mixed with GB rocks and rinsing them in buckets.

Please Help
Thanks

faye

Can you share a picture with us Wickham? I have never had a root problem, they break down and worms help. Is it causing a problem?

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RupertofOZ

Wickham... the first thing I do.. is when removing any plants with large root balls...

Is shake the majority of the media off over the grow beds... then leave the root balls to dry out for a few days... and the worms to leave the root ball....

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After a few days... you can then just break the root balls apart... and salvage the majority, or all... of the media....

Then I fill my beds.... take the bell off the siphon, or turn the standpipe so that the drainholes are blocked off....

And divert the bottom drain... so that it doesn't allow water back to the sump/fish tank...

Then it's just a matter of starting at one end... and lifting and sieving the clay... by hand or sieve... to extract the majority of the roots.... the worms will get the rest....

Drain the grow bed... then refill.. and drain again... to get rid of the majority of the dirty water....

Then just reconnect every thing... and set the system back to normal.....

If I've got multiple beds... or can spare a bed... I'll actually leave the cleaned bed fallow for a week... then replant.... but I've also replanted immdeiately...

If you've got a spare tank... or large container.... you can always take all the media out of the bed... wash, sieve and clean the media... then repalce it...

I posted some pics and things in one of my threads somewhere.... showing both methods...

TCLynx

certain types of plants can be far more aggressive about filling a bed with roots than others.

With most plants I've never gone to the lengths that Rupert describes with sifting or re-washing the media. However, a plant like mint or banana or lufa can clog a bed. With the lufa I just cut off the vine and left the roots to decompose in the bed for a month. The mint and banana are perennial so if you want to rescue the bed from them you have to remove roots.

Most other annuals I never put that much effort into clearing roots. If the bed is clogged up, remove some plants to provide more space for the others.

Question, how deep are the beds? And what size is the media? How much grow bed do you have relative to your fish tank? Too shallow of grow beds can lead to far more root clogging. Too small of media can lead to premature clogging. Not enough grow beds overall can lead to clogging issues.

RupertofOZ

Indeed TCL... most plants aren't a problem...

Large root mass plants can be... and long term, or heavily cropped plants like tomatos can be...

Wickham

Thanks for the responses eveyone,
the problem definately stems from over cropping tomatoes. Haven't had much success with AP up here, finally after 3 years I managed to get it right. But made the mistake of throwing a handful of seeds into the GBs, oops, they were all tomatoe plants, and for the first time ever they all grew and grew and grew.

Grow beds are same size as yours TCLynx, really do need to follow RupertofOZ procedure, the GBs are a mess.

Thanks

mantis

Pulled out a sage plant the other day and it is another bed clogger with a huge root ball. No wonder the other herbs in the bed were struggling

jessy

I use a a huge screw driver and swirl and stab the clay. The roots collect onto the long end of the driver, and the clay rolls off, or get flicked out, and I am covered in muck :mrgreen:

. Works for me and it is a cumbersome job .

TCLynx

Yea, sometimes it really does pay to thin the plants out after they get going to avoid the solid plant mass that won't even let you close enough to the grow bed to sift things.

we just finished moving the beds from the 300 gallon system that had the massive lufa in it last summer. All seems fine, I just left those beds minimally planted for a few months after we cut the lufa plant off. (I don't think we even pulled the root ball out, just cut off the stem just above the gravel and when it rotted a bit we pulled the stump out. There would have been no way to actually lift out the whole root ball since it had taken over the entire bed and lifting/shaking would have meant lifting/shaking the whole 100 gallons of gravel, which weighs almost a ton.) Anyway, no issues in those beds, the gravel seemed much like the other beds 8 months later, no stinky mass of rotting roots or clogged media.

With tomatoes I tend to do like Rupert says, where I lift the root ball out and shake it a bit then leave it on top of the gravel to let the worms escape and the roots to dry out enough to shake the rest of the gravel off. I don't go sifting the hole bed or anything though.

mantis

This thread spured me on to do a job I have been meaning to do for months. The ibc bed I put on the fish pond had filled with muck from the pond that had never had a pump in it before. The pond is a lot cleaner now and I put the pump up on a couple of bricks so it pumps clean water. Redirected the out let to the lawn and pulled the herbs out. Gave the media and good stirring with the spade while hosing the muck off. Then topped the bed with a bag of canna clay.
Hoping the herbs and worms will be happier in a more oxydenated bed

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