Looking for a clarification to this old thread that keeps giving:) ... [ @tapla needing advice on possibly slightly changing up Gritty mix after lugging all of my succulent pots plus my 3 FLF trees in and out of my Houston home over the last 3 mo (in when temp dropped into 50' and then back out 2 days later when we are back @70-90 deg winter days cycles ). It's been worth the hassle for sure since I'm almost one year into my mission to quickly grow these Home Depot one pot/ two tree FLF" bushes" into beautiful indoor 7-9 ft trees so letting them thrive acclimated to hours of afternoon direct sun outside since purchase. I repoted one bush into two trees last May/ June into true Gritty and I need to repot my last "bush" this May into two separate pots to move to Gritty and curious on what your thoughts are on adding a fraction of perlite to the original Gritty mix to take away some weight in the size pot I want to use (roughly 14"x12") would you think that is "okay" / and if so what breakdown of fractions do you recommend? And if not okay, maybe verse me in your knowledge and thoughts why as I've been blindly experimenting with perlite my succulent propagating.... I've been having trouble getting some species of succulents to root in Gritty mix / esp difficulty getting propagated leaves to grow roots on GM as well as they do in soil( I usually spray well prop.succulent leaves with spray bottle every 2-4 days so Gritty issue for this purpose likely due to me not spraying/ watering daily and surface too dry for the callused ends. I get terrific roots but occasional leaf rot propagating on soil So I've been experimenting w mixing perlite with cactus soil and a small fraction of Gritty mix ( random I know - just literally grab a handful of each ) and so far it seems to be working well so this is what got me curious on the repot of the FLF. I'm sure it helps to note that I do not desire to need to water anything daily since I'm out of town on weekends often but do like being able to check in w plants and water weekly to biweekly. The FLF's I have in Gritty do well outside ( high humidity) with only weekly, thorough, watering. Maybe it's our constant 70-90% Houston humidity ( plus plants stay semi sheltered under covered patio) but I only find my Gritty gets dry to touch one to two inches down by day 2-3 in the hot summer months/ otherwise it's Usually still slightly damp under the surface 2 days later even though water in pot drains quickly in large quantities within seconds of me watering. Hope that all helps you offer me more of your expertise!

An update on General Pumice Products: I ordered 15 lbs of 3/16 pumice from them and received it yesterday- well within the promised timeframe. It was completely dry, so I sifted some to get a feel for it. There was dust, but less than I expected, and I didn't even bother sifting for fines- there was no need. I elected to rinse some to get a feel for overall weight. A very small fraction floated, which is perfect for my needs. The color is a light grey, a few pieces are a bit brownish- much less jarring than perlite to be sure. The photos from below were taken after I poured the pumice into a orange bucket- the substrate doesn't have the strong reddish tinge outside that influence. The packaging was a very sturdy plastic bag inside a large flat-rate box. I didn't weigh the package, but it was completely packed and the volume was what I was expecting. It looked as though the post office was less than gentle with the shipping, but there were no holes visible in the plastic bag or dust seepage from the package. So- I've got some elephant bush cuttings that I'm going to pot in a mix of DE and pumice- I've not used pumice before, so I thought I'd try it out with something I've had a lot of experience with. Overall- even if pumice is not something I'll use in the future, I'm happy with General Pumice Products.

One thing you all need to learn is that humic substances have the most amount of misinformation spread about them in the agricultural industry and even more in the hydroponic industry. To answer a couple of questions. 95% of fulvic products, usually potassium fulvate are not what you think they are. Anyone who talks about a super concentrate is a salesman. Pure fulvic will read ppm the only thing that won't is pure water. Humic acid and fulvic acid are the two main organic acids extracted from humic substances. Humin is another but is of no use in hydroponics as it is completely insoluble. When people talk about solubility of humic and fulvic this is not actually correct. they form what are called colloidal suspensions. Commercially they are extracted from brown coal also called low grade coal or lignite, preferably from a brown coal called leonardite which is more soluble because it is more oxidised and the average oxygen and functional group content is higher. They are also extracted from peat, leonardite is high in humic and low in fulvic generally and peat in comparison has a higher fulvic content and lower humic content. I won't go into the details of extraction and isolation but basically potassium hydroxide is used to get the soluble humic substances into solution and then the humic acid is precipitated to separate it from the soluble fulvic. An array of different additives are used to increase the effiancy of extraction and are usually dependant on the source material of the humic matter. I have worked on humic substances for 15 years consulting all over the world inc. Europe, Russia and China. If you want to make your own home made fulvic the easiest way is to buy some peat, and add about 1.5 litres of vinegar to 500g of peat. Mix well and leave for a couple of days or more. Strain out the peat and your done. If you have a highly decomposed compost this will work as well especially if you have added microbes to your compost.

Grate it on a kitchen grater or with a rasp?