Love it!
The age old debate!
My room and I will be available in early July for me to give this my full attention. Between now and then I already have a crop going and there will be June vacation travels so when I get back then I can dive in. I may even run a little hydro myself along side soil just for shits and giggles.
There's a que of strains lined up for my next 4 grows and the July grow will be one or a combination of... Oreoz S1 (Cookies N Cream x Secret Weapon)...Critterz (Zkittlez x Animal Cookies) and Frozen Custard (Wedding Pie x Animal Cookies) all by Greenpoint.
I'm fairly certain these will be hybrids or indica leaners but yeah for the most part I'll be baking cookies.
I see a lot of soil growers who's game is on point so doubt I can be any kind of guru for many of Y'all. However, if you're looking for speed, I know exactly where to find it. And if you wanna see if your soil grow can be as speedy and fruitful as any kind of hydro grow, I can help with that.
My background over the years has gone from being an outdoor grower to hydro indoors to soil indoors and out, to just soil indoors.
When I did hydro, I ran just about every type of system other than aero unless you count aerocloning which I still do when I need clones.
IMO there's no better way to clone than with aeroponics but that's another debate. I like to think my hydro experience has played a huge roll in how I run my soil grows and how today I don't really see one having a huge advantage over the other and really just comes down to preference.
Ok so there's two sides to soil growing and one side isn't really soil growing at all. What we're really doing more often than not is soilless hydroponics.
True soil growing IMO is growing plants in the Earth, outside. You may dig a hole and fill it with enriched goodies but your plant is in the Earth and the earthen soil and whatever is in it will play a role in the grow.
Indoors with a potting mix is far closer to hydroponics using a medium like coco than growing in the Earth. The mixes out today, custom or bagged, are rich in nutrients, light, and fast draining. By using ingredients like perlite we can ensure they're also loaded with oxygen. And that fast draining oxygenated soil is where the lines between hydro and soil become blurred.
When we ask what's faster or better, hydro or soil, depends on what answer we want.
Faster? I doubt any hydro grower will ever tell you that just because they grow in hydro they can take an 8 week strain and have it ready in 6 or 7 weeks.
So then how or why can it be faster?
The answer is in the start and in veg. Hydroponics starts fast because of abundant amounts of oxygen to the roots.
If you want to be fast in soil, it doesn't start in peat pods, rapid rooters, or solo cups. It starts with a vertical bare root germination and an aerating container like an airpot. And a little mycorrhizae doesn't hurt either.
When we stick a popped seed in something like a solo cup, that move alone adds a week or longer to the grow. We'll find the speed and on the other side, if a hydro grower fumbles with pH or nutes, be prepared to see your soil grow go faster than hydro
So for anybody wanting to join Team Dirty Fingers, rather than have matching jerseys and uniforms, we'll be in matching airpots. I have plenty to share or BYO but if you're looking for hydro speed in soil, an airpot is like a 4bbl carb for your soil.
Combined with vertical germination (which I can show how to do with a DVD case or 3D printed kit), good soil, good clean water, we should be able to start a seed and be flipping it to flower at around 20-25 days. A clone, 10 days max veg time after rooting and planting. If working with an 8 week cut, we can go from dry seed to harvest in as little as 90 days and no more than 110. Clones will go much faster at around 70-75 days from root to harvest.
To answer the question of which is better is where everything else comes into play to decide. Lights, environment, nutrients, water, soil quality and so on plays just as much factor in that decision as any. It's well beyond just the medium to decide that.
But if it's all dialed in and you have the speed to go along with it, it makes the decision of which is better all the more difficult to make.
We also have to define "better". Is it yield or potency? Or is it other factors like cost of operation or easiest to set up, maintain, and ease of post grow clean up? Probably a gumbo of all of the above and that's what we'll try to figure out and have some fun doing it!
.my grows half the time go over the 110 day cut off.but not by much..5 week veg 11 week 
.I’m between 40-50 days from putting my nxt batch in so I don’t think I’ll b able to play 
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we have used those fish for bait
