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The Difference Between Organic and Synthetic Gardening

As long as the tools for growing indoors have been available, the advantages of growing organically, or supplementing your garden with synthetic nutrients, have remained a hotly debated topic. While the practices of growing with either organic or synthetic supplements are theoretically different, the ultimate goal, in this case, the goal of producing a clean and heavy harvest, is identical. Whatever your preferences in the garden, the choice between growing with organics or synthetics typically causes growers to commit to a specific medium, one which complements the inert, or mineral-based style of fertilizer. Whether you’re growing organically in soil, or synthetically in peat, coco or rockwool, chances are, GreenPlanet Nutrients has the perfect feeding solution for your garden. 

So What’s the Difference?

The main difference between an organic and synthetic garden lies in the way that essential elements are introduced and broken down in the root-zone. In an organic garden, inert elements such as worm casting, oyster shell flour, kelp meal, and other raw materials are pre-amended into a soil or soilless mix and left to “cook-off” and break down into elements which can be readily absorbed by plants. In a synthetically fed garden, plants are placed into a porous medium like peat, coco, or rockwool, and then irrigated with water and chemical plant food. Unlike a traditional organic garden, a synthetic garden can be fed with measured inputs exactly to the gardener’s specifications. This does not mean, however, that feeding synthetically has a specific advantage over an organic garden, as natural ingredients, which contain wellsprings of microbes and living beneficial bacteria and fungi, arguably affect the inputs in positive ways we can’t yet understand.

  • Soil or Soilless.
  • Inert elements are pre- amended into the mix.
  • Allowed to “cook-off” into absorbable elements.
  • Porous Medium.
  • Irrigated with water and chemical plant food.
  • Fed with measured inputs exactly to specifications.

Choosing Your Medium 

One aspect of the garden that growing with either organic or mineral-based compounds will affect, is the medium in which your plants will grow. Most purely organic fertilizers, in short, will not be compatible with certain styles of growing. For example, GreenPlanet Nutrients Medi One is an extremely viscous and concentrated fertilizer, formulated with thick inert ingredients including fish hydrolysate, sea kelp, and specially sourced potassium sulphate; unfortunately, because of the viscosity of this nutrient system, it is not recommended to use Medi One in a hydroponic or water-based garden. So, keep in mind that the medium you’re working with will need to be able to support the living qualities of the organic fertilizer in your feeding arsenal. To find out which media will work best for your synthetic or organic garden, consult the passages below. 

Take a look at the back of a GreenPlanet Nutrients Product or click on the product page to ensure you can grow in your medium of choice.

Mediums Suitable for an Organic Garden:

Soil

The term “soil” is a broad term used to describe a mixture of organic compounds including earth, “top-soil”, and forest fines (a logging industry term for bark and the organics that fall off of logs during the sorting process). While most soils in the industry are amended with organic ingredients, like fish waste, this medium is a perfect candidate for the introduction of other liquid or powered organic nutrients.

Peat Moss

Peat moss is arguably the favourite choice of indoor and outdoor growers in the industry. Being that sphagnum peat moss has an extremely porous nature, meaning that it can absorb and expel water at an amazing rate, peat gardens are in some ways the most reliable for drain to waste systems. Peat moss naturally has a very acidic pH; so, once this medium has been buffer, or limed with pH adjusting compounds, it is a perfectly acceptable medium for an organic garden.

Coco Coir

Made from the discarded husks of the coconut fruit, coco is the halfway point between gardening in a “soil/soilless” medium, and a hydroponic system. Although coco occupies a somewhat contentious grey area on the spectrum of gardening methods, if fed properly, coco mediums will perform with excellent success in an organic garden. 

Mediums Suitable for a Synthetic Garden:

Rockwool  

Rockwool is a completely sterile medium made from the action of heating and spinning rock materials like slag or ceramic. Unlike peat moss, rockwool is naturally alkaline, and prior to transplanting into a rockwool medium, gardeners must buffer the pH of this medium to ensure the root-zone remains in an adequate range of acidity. Because of the propensity of rockwool to develop algae growth on the ridges of media which are exposed to light, organic fertilizers, which contain vibrant sources of bacteria, are not recommended for use. 

Water-Based Gardens 

There are countless ways to garden completely in water. Among the most popular in the industry are aeroponic gardens, ebb and flow systems, drip irrigation and deep water culture (DWC). Being that these systems use air and water to churn and circulate water throughout the reservoir, an organic supplement would likely become a mess of bubbling organisms and proteins within a few days, if not a few hours. To ensure your reservoir is sterile and free of any unwanted contaminants, a concentrated and highly soluble liquid nutrient, like GreenPlanet Nutrients Dual Fuel, would be a reliable choice of fertilizer in a water-based garden.

Choosing Your Fertilizer

Now that you know the difference between growing with organic and mineral-based compounds, and that this choice will influence the system in which your plants will grow, choosing a clean and well-rounded nutrient system is sure to be less of a debate, and more of a concise choice. Whether your garden is organic, synthetic, soil-based or hydroponic, GreenPlanet Nutrients has a variety of nutrient systems available to suit your needs. For a detailed list of nutrient programs currently offered by GreenPlanet Nutrients, see blow below. 

Want to learn more about Medi One? Read our blog titled Medi One: Now Officially OMRI Listed. For all other questions, contact a member of the GreenPlanet sales team, or your local garden supply store for product information and purchasing inquiries. 

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Understanding the Feed Program: Medi One

Dedicating your garden to a complete and well-rounded feeding program is a great way to ensure that your harvest is a cut above the rest. Not only do feeding programs contain the essentials for plant health and nutrition, but they also include supplements that can elevate your product to levels of unforgettable quality. Whether you’re new to gardening or have been growing for decades, experts would agree that committing to a program that promises to produce a heavy, quality-driven harvest, is a good place to start. In hopes of guiding gardeners to possibly the most quality-focused feeding program on the market, the following passages will dive deeper into the organic feeding program of Medi One. 

What is a Feed Program?

A feed program is a schedule of plant nutrition that can be mapped in terms of fertilizer dose, ratio, supplementation and use overtime. Usually containing several bottles, a complete feeding program should contain supplements including a base nutrient fertilizer, a vitamin supplement, a bloom booster, a source of carbohydrates and a trichome enhancer. By combining the inputs in a feeding program, prompted with other factors that produce a confident yield, growers can expect their garden to produce the most quality driven harvest possible. To browse a complete list of feed programs available at GreenPlanet Nutrients, click here. 

The 1 Part Medi One Feed Program

Medi One is perhaps the easiest to use organic base nutrient on the market. Accompanied with a cornucopia of supplements like Ocean Magic, Vitathrive, Massive and Rezin, the 1 Part Medi One Feed Program is sure to impress. Perfect for indoor or outdoor soil/soilless gardens, Medi One is the choice pick for growers who want to produce a clean harvest, free of any harsh or insoluble chemicals. Before committing your garden to the Medi One Feed Program, consult a description of each supplement included in the schedule below. 

Medi One: Base Nutrient

Medi One is an OMRI-listed, one-part, organic base nutrient. Composed from multiple organic sources, including hydrolyzed, slow-steamed fish ingredients and naturally sourced potassium sulphate, Medi One boasts an impressive yet balanced N-P-K ratio of 4-3-3; and, because of the slow steaming of inert ingredients during the manufacturing process, Medi One is an overflowing reservoir of essential micronutrients like copper, boron, manganese and zinc. Additionally, unlike other organic fertilizers, which are usually manufactured and sold in powdered or soluble form, Medi One’s liquid form offers plants instant nutrient availability. 

Ocean Magic: Additive Nutrient

Ocean Magic is a vegetative and flowering additive derived from cold-pressed sea kelp that benefits your plants. The wealth of ingredients found in Ocean Magic supports several functional properties, such as rooting and reducing environmental and plant stress. Used as either a root-soak or foliar spray, Ocean Magic contains special plant hormones, including auxins, cytokinins and gibberellins, which have been linked to promoting vigorous growth, branching, and increased resistance to stress in plants (Stirk & Staden, 2014, p. 127). 

Massive Bloom Formulation: Additive Nutrient

Massive Bloom Formulation is our premier flowering additive formulated with all of the necessary macro and microelements to increase flower size. It also provides several additional beneficial properties, such as L-amino acids and a source of carbohydrates. Massive is the perfect blooming supplement to pair with Medi One’s living, organic qualities. 

Rezin: Additive Nutrient

Rezin is our flowering additive formulated to enhance the natural processes within flowering plants that produce flavour and aroma. With no PPM, Rezin can be used with any base nutrient program until harvest to produce large, sugar-coated flowers. Now known for enhancing the “entourage effect” (Russo, 2019, para. 17), Rezin is one proprietary supplement that is a must-have for any quality-driven garden. 

Entourage Effect: The theory that the synergistic effect of THC, flavonoids, cannabinoids and terpenes all contribute to the overall “experience” of cannabis consumption. 

Liquid Weight: Additive Nutrient

Liquid Weight is a supplement blend of simple carbohydrates that support beneficial microbial life in the root zone. This leads to an increase in the absorption of essential nutrients that help develop impressive aromatic flowers and fruits. Plants spend a fantastic amount of energy-releasing sugars like cellulose into the root zone; so, by supplementing your plant’s expenditures with additional carbs, you can be sure the beneficial microbes in your soil will be plentifully fed, which in turn will support the cultivation and growth of your living medium.  Want to know more about carbohydrate supplements? Read our blog: The Power of Carbohydrates in the Garden.

Using the Feed Program

Like a recipe, the Medi One Feed Program delivers the best results when the formula is followed. As explained above, a feeding program is a schedule of plant nutrition that can be mapped in terms of fertilizer dosage, ratio, supplementation and use over time. Throughout the weeks of vegetative and flowering growth, the Medi One Feed Program will guide the grower through different stages of a plant’s life and offer general feeding ratios, doses and helpful supplementation tips over time. All the measurements of plant food on our feeding programs are described in millilitres of fertilizers per litre of water.

Features and Considerations

At a glance, you’ll notice a few distinguishing features about the Medi One Feeding Program: first, only certain products and supplements are recommended for use in specific stages of plant growth. For example, the feed chart is split into two stages: vegetative and flowering growth. In these different stages, only certain supplements are recommended for use; for instance, you’ll notice that products that increase flower size, like Massive Bloom Formulation, are only introduced in the second week of flower, once plants have established pistils and bud sites. 

Our feed charts are split into two stages: vegetative and flowering.

Another aspect of the feeding chart to examine is the rise and gradual plateau of the recommended Parts Per Million (PPM) of your nutrient solution. PPM is a unit of measurement which describes the concentration of a solution. In this case, since we are examining fertilizer, PPM can be seen as a measurement that determines the strength and concentration of dissolved elements within a nutrient solution. While following the Medi One Feed Program, you’ll notice that the PPM of your nutrient solution will gradually increase as you move into the flowering stage, finally plateauing in weeks 2 – 6, followed by a gradual decrease in strength as you move towards the final weeks of the flushing period. These general measurements are based on the assumption that as time progresses, your plants will become larger and will, therefore, be able to digest a more concentrated nutrient solution.

As plants go from the vegetative stage to the flowering stage of growth, their nutrient requirements increase.

There’s no better time than now to start your garden off right with the help of the Medi One nutrient schedule. Want to learn more about Medi One? Read our previous blog: Medi One’s Role in an Organic Garden. For all other inquiries, contact a member of the GreenPlanet sales team or your local garden supply store for product information and purchasing inquiries. 

Works Cited:

  • Russo, E. (2019). The case for the entourage effect and conventional breeding of clinical cannabis: No “strain,” no gain. Frontiers in Plant Science. Retrieved, December 10th, 2020 from US National Library of Medicine.
  • Stirk, W. A., & Van Staden, J. (2014). Chapter five – Plant growth regulators in seaweeds: Occurrence, regulation and functions. Advances in Botanical Research, 125–159. Retrieved, December 10th, 2020 from ScienceDirect. 

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