Whoa I haven’t had gnats in leca before, but my plants have bare roots so that makes sense. I was thinking about starting my lettuce seedlings in coco coir then transfer to leca 🤔
I’m currently starting plants in coco coir + vermiculite with the intention of transferring to LECA. I plan on washing everything off the roots before transferring
Generally no because I'd be going through so much product so I try to only use it when I identify a gnat issue. There are situations where I do use it with every watering for certain plants but that's only during the warmer months when I'm at higher risk for gnats. During the summer/spring I sometimes water the few plants I have in soil with a BTI solution as a preventative, but I also keep a layer of aquarium gravel on the surface of the soil to help keep gnats out. If I use a hydroponic system during the warmer months, I add liquid BTI to the water tank as a preventative because those are almost guaranteed to get fungus gnats (in my experience)
Liquid BTI solutions can be added to the water with other products. I almost always use mine with fertilizer/plant food in the water as well since I do a lot of hydroponic growing
If I'm rinsing brand new LECA fresh out of the bag I don't let the water go down the drain since there's a lot of residue. All the LECA I use now has been ran under water countless times so there's not much residue shedding off of it
