A Deep Dive Into Substrates | Soil Mix for Indoor Plants

I've been wanting to make a longer deep drive video into the most common components of soil mixes for ages! I go through everything from what you should look for in a soil mix, what everything does, a deep dive into each component and what they provide / where they originate from and notes on their sustainability. So I hope this will give you a good background on which to base your own personal soil mix on 💫
#soilmix #houseplants #substrates
Timestamps 🌻
00:00-02:22 Intro
02:23 What do our plants need?
03:19 What do you need to consider?
04:40 Substrate components
05:31 My Style of Plant Care
06:27 Perlite
09:29 Vermiculite
11:55 Bark
15:18 Coconut Coir
19:26 Worm Castings
23:20 LECA
27:06 Charcoal
30:42 My Mix
32:15 Round up & thoughts
35:31 Outro
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[@sherrykumar2883]

Great video Amy, I appreciate you breaking it down substrate by substrate and their purpose.

[@renatecormick7399]

Thank you Amy for providing the information in this video as well as doing all the research, then breaking it down to an understandable format. I’m definitely with you in not throwing away soil from my plants. Ii reuse where I can and if t’s too old for the potted plants it goes onto our very small garden beds where hopefully the worms will do their things and replenish it.

[@mick.atnite]

Thank you for making this video! It was very helpful as a new indoor plant parent :)

[@dragonfly1102]

What I always wondered is what influence each of these substrates has on pH. Are perlite, leca and vermiculate completely chemically inert? Are they dissolving over time if your water is acidic? Are the minerals they release not absorbed or adsorbed at all? The bark and coco coir should technically decompose over time right? So how can it be not bioavailable? Again, would that influence pH at all - at first or as they're decomposing?
Charcoal will bind and over time release both toxins and nutrients like nitrogen. It also lowers acidity.

[@eddy6959]

The pH is obviously affected by different substrates but in a soil mix I think the effects are rather neglectable since it will take quite a very long time. In a semi hydro environment the effects are more obvious since the substrate is in constant contact to water. As for decomposing you have to take in consideration that you do need some organism (bugs, worms, bacteria, fungi) that will do the work and decompose dead organic material into nutrients. So the substrate needs to be bioactive be bioavailable which in a houseplant environment is usually not the case.

[@dragonfly1102]

@@eddy6959 Interesting! Thanks for responding.

[@rodrigoramirezf3767]

great to know ur take on how environmentaly friendly can this hobby turn into 🫶🏼🪴

[@gloriabond4529]

Very informative Amy,really look forward to your videos,
Could you tell me if it’s ok to mix Lecca in with your substrate as I tried the pon,but not struck on it for my bigger plants.
Kind regards
Gloria London.🌿🌾🍃💚

[@schilling3003]

Bark provides essentially no nutrients to plants in a container. When composted it will break down in to bioavailable nutrients, but that takes a very long time in a container.
Also, vermiculite comes in all different sizes, you just got tiny ones. I believe the larger ones might be better at retaining moisture, but I'm not sure. My concern with vermiculite is that I find it breaks down very quickly into a nasty sludge that has the opposite effect of aerating the mix.

[@schilling3003]

Your description of coconut coir made no sense. First you say it is hydrophobic when dry and will repel water. Obviously that is not the case, it is hydrophilic, which you then describe when say it will absorb water from roots when it's dry. You also explain how it comes in bricks and easily expands with water. That would not be the case if it were hydrophilic and repelled water. I think you are mixing up facts between coconut coir and sphagnum moss.
That being said, I really enjoyed your video and look forward to watching more.