VARIGATED Mimosa Cake Auto | Living Soil

poloq_mauriceloetel At the beginning, the focus was exclusively on providing a mild but humid environment so that the seedlings could establish themselves. See how there are random little plants coming up, as well as mycelium, moss, et cetera? The system already starts to stabilize and creates a breeding ground for all sorts of organisms that - in the end - will benefit the symbiosis and longevity of said system. _____________________________________________________ Introduction I took a lot of precautions because my last run got eaten by slugs (probably because of the top dressing (leaves) you can see in the very 1st image). Besides that, I just focused on a stable and humid environment for the 1st Week. A very exciting aspect is that I noticed a variegation on the Mimosa Cake Auto right from the start! Setup This is a low-noise, low-budget grow (331 € acquisitional cost (including fails and abundance of substrate for the next runs), 17 € for electricity per month, max. 28 dB). I don't use an air filter and try to minimize every use of electricity (the system can't draw more than 110 W). Living Soil The goal is to learn how living soil (and nature really) works - healthy plants are just a side effect. To this end, I am intensively engaged with the biological functioning of plants (which is also an important part of my profession as a product designer focused on biomimicry). Germination Mimosa Cake had water contact on 01.12.25, Gorilla Z on 04.12.25. Mimosa Cake broke through the soil on 04.12.25, Gorilla Z on 07.12.25. The documentation starts at 04.12.25 (so you have to add about 3 days to the Mimosa Cake to get the real age including the germination). 'Optimal' values (I try to reach) Soil temp.: 24 °C Air temp. : 26 °C RH veg.: 95 - 65 % (lowering while time goes on) RH flower: 50 - 60 % Temp. Gerneal min. 16 - 18 °C, max. 28 - 30 °C Soil: 20 - 80% saturated Exhaust air: ~ 1 tent volume per minute Circulating air: as low and 'chaotic' as possible Philosophy I take what I learned, compare it with knowledge from a wide range of disciplines, and try to develop a system that is as durable and as efficient as possible. I also wanted said system to be as modular and simplistic as possible to actually learn and feel what every components does - not just have a controller that I don't understand and can't manipulated to the point I'd like. So the leeway I have with these components can be used to influence other values. In the end: Yes, I could use higher PPFD + increase the substrate temperature to 26°C, but that would be inefficient (in my setup) because none of the values are in a critical range right now and stay like that naturally because of the ambient environment (just so that you understand my reasoning for this experiment). Further Info I used the nutrients tab to show the light intensity (ml/l) (I will rarely fertilize because of the living soil). I will try to add an Info tab as soon as I've figured out how. 😅

poloq_mauriceloetel With the seedlings stabilizing, I slowly and gradually lowered the humidity to about 75% RH by removing the cling film. Because I started to see Sciridae, I also focused on a reduction of the moisture content within the first few centimeters of the substrate. This - in combination with more sticky fly traps - should disable the sciridae's ability to lay eggs. Removing the foil while increasing the PPFD also decreased the temperature by about 1K, which will be compensated for with an increase of light intensity over the upcoming weeks.

poloq_mauriceloetel This week especially, the pests got out of control. I noticed that the amount of scridae stayed the same, while being accompanied by exactly 1 premature spider mite. This was a signal to me that my environment - at this point - was not in an equilibrium and needed to change. So I decided to: Order fine quartz sand (0.1 - 0.4 mm), which I will use as a top dressing (2 - 3 cm) so that the adult scridaes can't lay eggs and their larvae can't hatch, as well as nematodes that will actively hunt for the larvae, + new fly traps. Another aspect showing me that I needed to change something was that the variegated plant got cellular damage... most likely because my temp. and RH varied too much (VPD and temp. spikes were too extreme and rapid [Variegated plants in general are less resilient and need a more stable environment]). Until now, I didn't use the exhaust fan so that I could keep the moisture and temperature up, but from now on, I will start to activate the fan at 0.5 - 1 air exchanges per minute. This should homogenize, but also decrease the temp by 1 - 2 K, with the RH staying the same (I'll get back to giving water to the substrate in around week 4 because the sand should do what I tried to achieve with decreasing the substrate's moisture content). In general, from now on, I will yet again focus on the 'right' environment rather than battling the pests. With this approach, I can keep the moisture content in the tent the way I want to without worrying about anything else - the nematodes actually appreciate a well-balanced climate that is also optimal for the plants themselves.

poloq_mauriceloetel Neither the sand nor the nematodes have arrived by now. But because I am still trying to dry out the sciridae, the RH dropped to 55%. This is lower than I'd like it to be at this point but should be acceptable for a few days. This is also supported by me starting to use a circulating fan. It's just strong enough to get the air inside the tent moving but is not adding too much stress to the plants (it's giving them more resilience, though, and makes it harder for the sciaridae to lay eggs). The increase of light intensity yet again raised the temperature by 1 K - although I chose to not increase it by only 60 PPFD yet again, but by about 160. This is due to the observation that the plants are a little bit behind, and I still have around 250 PPFD (at 30 cm distance) left as 'room for improvement' (especially for the flower). At this point, I might actually not use the (nematodes and) sand. The drying process seems to work (a lot more adult sciridae can bee seen (larvae hatching but no new way of placing new eggs)) and within the next few days the population should collapse. If that happens, I will then use the nematodes just to make sure every last bit of sciridae is gone. The sand on the other hand can be stored and used next time or for other projects.