Do nutrients get "left behind" if I harvest too soon after a feed?

[GrandmaGanja]

I found myself in a bit of a pickle. My plant is about a week away from harvest, so last Friday I gave her Kool Bloom. Unfortunately, over the weekend some spider mites decided to move in. A small infestation, and I'd take the plant right away, but Kool Bloom says I should wait 5 days after stopping to harvest to get rid of any stray nutes left in the plant.

Do nutes get left behind like this? Is there any actual science that says nutes need some time to get through and out of the plant? It makes intuitive sense that it would need time, but the science has often proved me wrong.

 

[Zill]

Gramps,

No biggie. At this stage of the plants life cycle it’s probably not doing much that requires added fertilizer. Slow senescence.

Harvest and be happy.

Zill.

 

[GrandmaGanja]

Gramps,

No biggie. At this stage of the plants life cycle it’s probably not doing much that requires added fertilizer. Slow senescence.

Harvest and be happy.

Zill.

It was Kool Bloom, some ultra-high PK nute for the end of the plant life to fatten them buds. I'm not so much worried about the plant not benefitting from the nutes as I am ingesting said nutes when I enjoy my plant.

 

[Zill]

Either way you are consuming what you feed to plant. Nutrients don’t stay as nutrients as the plant incorporates the salts into molecules it needs.

If there is excess salts in the it will be in the roots. Salts taken up are pretty quickly modified and utilized by the plant. Don’t worry. Enjoy.

 

[GrandmaGanja]

Either way you are consuming what you feed to plant. Nutrients don’t stay as nutrients as the plant incorporates the salts into molecules it needs.

If there is excess salts in the it will be in the roots. Salts taken up are pretty quickly modified and utilized by the plant. Don’t worry. Enjoy.

Thank you!!

 

[Zill]

Gramps,

That kool bloom fertilizer is expensive! I use alfalfa leaves that are ground into a powder. It’s 5.5/0.5/2.5, N/P/K. At 3 feet tall I switched over to super phosphate. Cheap. Throughout the growing period I also supplement with Epsom salts and iron sulphate. Sometimes I’ll spray the plant leaves with the iron and Epsom salts. A very dilute solution.

I grow outdoors. Is your plant indoors?

Zill.

 

[GrandmaGanja]

Yeah I grow outdoors. I had two indoors this season that I was very excited about and they fell to spider mites. I tried to fight it for 2 months before I gave up and just put them outside and neglected them. Now the spider mites are dead and they are super healthy and blooming, but with tiny little buds. And at this point in the game... Such wasted potential.

The dry kool bloom is pretty cheap and goes very far. Apparently it is less extreme than the liquid, I got it because it was so hot this year my buds have been rather undeveloped. I love alfalfa meal, and went ham on making a alfalfa meal and molasses tea and fed it to the girls extensively this whole season. I guess I got a little too excited and it was too much nitrogen, they grew extremely tall but their yields are not as bountiful as you'd think theyd be. Lesson learned, ease up on the alfalfa next season.

It sounds like you're using raw nutrients rather than a mix from a company? If that makes sense. I've only been using stuff from Down to Earth, guano and blood meal and bio-thrive. A few months before planting (once the ground thawed) I dug a 3'x3' trench and loaded it with a few bags of Michigan MAde Mix (the white bag of biosolids. Black gold!) and a few bags of happy frog potting soil, a few pounds of guano and blood meal and azomite and alfalfa meal and buried it all. Then I've been using Neptunes Harvest fish and kelp every few weeks, used some fish Sh!t a couple of times, pleanty of alfalfa meal, and once flowering started I hit them every few week with Mikrobes and started on GEneral Organics Biothrive Bloom. I did much better with nutes this year but really need to get on a better schedule for next year.

I salted my plants a few years ago because I burned the hell out of them with Fox Farm liquid nutes and got yelled at so much for it that I've been very scared of using any other types of salts since. I think it helped a little, the burn lessened up. I got some real bro-science going on, I'd do well to dial it in a little better.

 

[Blastfact]

The only nutrient I've ever seen that will truly ruin weed is Calmag. Some people use it like crazy and it will completely foul a plant to the point of no return.

 

[BehindEnemyLines]

Worth the 5 min watch if you're interested in a scientific answer.

Skip to 41:25 on YT or -30:00 for media player: Flushing before harvest

 

[beluga]

Worth the 5 min watch if you're interested in a scientific answer.

Skip to 41:25 on YT or -30:00 for media player: Flushing before harvest

Appreciate that.
A couple years back, I dove into what actual documented experimentation I could find of the effect of flushing and typically found the same answer.
The consensus seems to agree that for healthy plants it's just a waste of water

 

[Zill]

Thanks BeL,

Not too scientific. But guy seems to know his stuff. I’ve never understood this notion of flushing before harvest. It makes absolutely no sense. How can I apply molten hydrogen oxide to a plant and expect a flow of free ions back out of root system that is somehow being stored in the plant. These are not halophytes, they don’t accumulate free salts. That’s not true however for the roots. Between the periderm and epidermis is a free space where ions can collect waiting to be transported. If you take a well fertilized plant, rinse the roots then stick the roots in only water you can measure ions leaching back out of the root for a short period. That’s the limit to any flushing. If the leaves are displaying chlorosis around the margins, guess what you’ve over fertilized. As the water moved up the plant to the leaves then transpiration removes water causing an increase in the [salt] and you see marginal leaf chlorosis. No flushing will ever reverse this. It might help the pant recover overall but will not correct damage.

Organic or inorganic fertilizer - Simply depends on which deity you speak with.

 

[Zill]

Beluga rocks! Gramps, See what you started

 

[Moshmen]

Gramps,

That kool bloom fertilizer is expensive! I use alfalfa leaves that are ground into a powder. It’s 5.5/0.5/2.5, N/P/K. At 3 feet tall I switched over to super phosphate. Cheap. Throughout the growing period I also supplement with Epsom salts and iron sulphate. Sometimes I’ll spray the plant leaves with the iron and Epsom salts. A very dilute solution.

I grow outdoors. Is your plant indoors?

Zill.

Kool bloom marketing to uninformed growers there are much cheaper options , just depends on your growing style - a 3 part salt based fert will do the same as you change ratios

 

[Zill]

Moshman knows. You can buy just about anything, and I really hate it when products are oversold. OMG. Look at the car detailing industry. I'll bet I could buy a special expensive wax from Chemical Guys that is specifically made for a cars right front fender.

 

[Aqua Man]

Worth the 5 min watch if you're interested in a scientific answer.

Skip to 41:25 on YT or -30:00 for media player: Flushing before harvest

worth watching the whole thing… great video

 

[BehindEnemyLines]

worth watching the whole thing… great video

Absolutely, lots of great info in there.

I love the quick-fire questions and answers. Able to cover a lot of topics in a reasonable amount of time.

You know how hard it is to get a stoner to watch a 40 minute video (myself included )

 

[GrandmaGanja]

Kool bloom marketing to uninformed growers there are much cheaper options , just depends on your growing style - a 3 part salt based fert will do the same as you change ratios

Unfortunately I already have it, so I'll use it up. What are the cheaper options that are just as good? I'm starting to get the feeling that of all the expensive ferts I am buying, there are cheaper ways to create the same thing.