@Bobbydigital A single bale of straw has a greater surface area to volume ratio and is able to vent heat hundreds of times more efficient than large stacks. But there is still some heat generated from the inside of the bale as the nutrients and nature start digesting the inside of the bale.
I plan on using a meat thermometer to monitor the inside temps of the bale, starting in seven days. In about two weeks the internal temps should drop and level out to around 75-80 F. That’s when I’ll transplant to the bale.
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i think it may work but drainage will be super fast! Might be better chopped up fine?
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Use hay wire, the stuff you tie rebar with. Take one end of the wire and feed it through the bale wrap it around while the bale is still intact. Do it a few times. Then cut the twine.
The positive thing about this idea is that one of the most famous gardeners in history Ruth Stout has been using hay to grow food with minimal effort for years. Particularly potatoes! There are numerous videos on the subject. Hay mounds are a super easy way to break new ground without tilling or stripping the topsoil off. No weeding required! Simply bust open a bale where you want to prepare ground for a garden and throw some seed potatoes on the ground, bury them in 6 inches of hay and as they grow hill the hay higher! Its that easy.
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One thing is for sure, the roots are gonna get allot of oxygen which is great!
My worry is that your gonna spend a ton in nutrients because the medium doesn’t “retain” water and nutrients like it should, in fact, I could see you watering like 5 times a day lol… but I set it to watching cuz I wanna know myself lol
This makes a little more sense to me.
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Who knows, bale it tightly enough and maybe it will retain more than what im thinking.
Definitely has to be a tight bale
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Well the other thing one might do is have a small pump and do a circulation thing? Some kind of continuous drain to reservoir back to plant thing? More or less treat the bale like a liquid hydro show? Now that would be cooler that ice! Like a hay growdan cube!
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Hey neighbor. I’m kind of grasping the concept of the continuous pump… but I’ve never seen one set up the way you’re describing. Do you have a link to where I could see one? And a list of materials I’d have to buy/make/find in my garage?
Watering four or five times a day is quite a commitment I wasn’t prepared for (get ready to hear that a LOT). Lol.
Would I be able to feed nutes through the reservoir and pump?
Ok. That’s my worry now too. I don’t know much about nutes and ppms and runoff and stuff. The number of threads of people explaining their nutrient regimen is intimidating. To me, it’s like reading a book with characters with really foreign/alien names. At some point early on, the name (or word) just becomes a blank space in the line of words I’m reading. I am fully aware of the micro and macro nutes and what they are supposed to do and how they interact with each other. It’s the application, the measuring of EC and all that stuff that makes my brain eyes close.
I don’t even own a ph meter or the other kind of meter that people talk about. @Zee It looks like I’m going to get that ph meter sooner than I thought.
Can you recommend a nutrient line that would (1) work with a straw and compost medium and (2) be easy enough for me to learn by taking baby steps.
@SweetsOnDeck Here’s my latest project that I jumped in to without studying first. I built a trolley today for a bale of straw to grow plants in.
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Yeah, its the same set up as a hydro grow. Reservoir with a pump in it that you dial in the amount of pumpage. I would consider sone poly tubing and some dripline in a circle around the plant. Set the bale and container above the Reservoir so it gravity drains and does a continuous circuit. I dont think you would need much flow rate, youd have to tinker with that because it isnt typical.
I cant see nute useage as being a whole lot different than hydro.
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Could you recommend someone’s thread with a hydro grow that I could read about and study their setup? Which brand or model of pump that would suffice what I might need?
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hmm? Let me check.
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Round bales? Hollow out the center of a bale of hay preferably last year‘s hey. Add soil mixture into the center of the Haybale transplant your seeding inside and watch it grow. Of course that’s just one way. However if you’re going to grow more than one at a time multiple plants or even better, clones can be grown from a single bale square or round bales. Use some imagination and you can make it happen
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just go to the hydro section and scan through the different grows. They are all pretty much the same. A pump, a reservoir, some lines and either emitters or just a bucket system. In your case it would be like a drain to waste, except you dont waste you recirculate. The nute levels and ph would need careful monitoring as the plant uses the nutrient and drinks water, but it should be very similar to a hydro grow.
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i think his plan is to not use soil? I could be wrong so I wont speak on his behalf.
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Understand. Hay should be good quality also a mixture of straw can help root stability. Basically when growing in this medium you have to treat it as a soil less hydro situation which includes close attention to nutrient retention pH levels etc.
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@Happy I was under the impression that when I add the fertilizer to the straw for the first two weeks, the decomposition of the straw (along with the soil that I add during transplant) would be the growing medium. The composting straw actually becoming the “soil” mix, but looser than soil.
I am now beginning to understand that I’m not going to have the soil composition inside of the bale that I initially thought I’d have. Unless I add more soil to the inside of the bale, which will be easier to do once the bale starts to digest its own insides.
I was imagining this project being a “water and feed it one time real good every day because it’s straw not dirt”, and I’ll add the soil to the bale if that’s what helps make it work. I do figure I’ll need to figure out the nutes to use since it’s a totally foreign kind of grow for me. Any advice there would be appreciated.
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I would recommend some soil when you first transplant it doesn’t have to be much. Also if your hay gets compacted it can mold very quickly. Good air circulation helps keep this from becoming much of a problem
Let me know how it goes. I’ve never grown in hay inside. It used to be trick on the farm to keep your outside plants hidden. There’s many different going surfaces on a square bale of hay. How do you light
Many hay barns have and do burn down because the hay is to wet or green when bailed. When this type of compacted plant material begins to break down it create tremendous heat which in turn creates combustion therefore well you know the rest
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@OlyBoy98503 ah yes reminds me of the moment I researched coco coir after blindly buying it 
i decided to mix with soil just because it helps balance pH and should have some nutes in it already (which seems to be working okay) so if you have no idea what you’re gonna do for nute feeding and pH balancing, you might wish to incorporate some soil as well. Granted I’ve heard that can make matters even more confusing as some nute regimens are specifically for hydroponics and others are specifically for soil. This would be an inbetween medium like mine, so if you go this route I would think that more soil than hay would make matters simpler… just my thoughts!
I’m gonna tag along and watch this grow. Definitely think it could be quite successful & I’m sure there’s much to be learned here. Good luck!
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