First grow, Autoflowers, and the Mediterranean winter...

[Smoking Gun]

So the brand is called Sterling Cocopeat. Made in India, it was one of those get what I can situations out here. I will raise temps, should I switch the. larger led panel back on. ?

Ok, I do not know that brand, and since it was a 'get what you can' situation you probably should have washed it thoroughly before use. By washing I do not mean re-hydrating but actually running a large volume of water through it after it is hydrated to remove excess salt.

Yes I would do a foliar spray at this point, but use half of what the bottle recommends.

If the second panel will raise the temps then turn it on but move it further from the plant tops. You could also replace one of your CFL bulbs with a standard incandescent and that will increase the heat and still provide light.

 

[fatconeskills]

Ok, I do not know that brand, and since it was a 'get what you can' situation you probably should have washed it thoroughly before use. By washing I do not mean re-hydrating but actually running a large volume of water through it after it is hydrated to remove excess salt.

Yes I would do a foliar spray at this point, but use half of what the bottle recommends.

If the second panel will raise the temps then turn it on but move it further from the plant tops. You could also replace one of your CFL bulbs with a standard incandescent and that will increase the heat and still provide light.

just gave them a foiler spritz at 6.1 with calmat at half strength as you stated. Ive stabilized the temperature. The newer growth looks healthy, they are recovering, and the symptoms haven't been expressed further. thank you for your knowledge !

 

[fatconeskills]

Keep thinking about this comment, lol, funniest shit I seen on this forum hahahaa

it was the first thing I could think of when I saw the new nodes popping out ! My wife was not as amused as the both of us, " I can't believe you post shit like that you weirdo".

 

[Smoking Gun]

just gave them a foiler spritz at 6.1 with calmat at half strength as you stated. Ive stabilized the temperature. The newer growth looks healthy, they are recovering, and the symptoms haven't been expressed further. thank you for your knowledge !

You don't need to worry about pH so much when using Advanced Nutrients, they have buffers right in the bottles so even if the pH looks too high or too low it will still find a proper point for the plant to utilize all nutrients. The foliar spray should help, but keep your eye on the new growth from here.

 

[fatconeskills]

Day 30 of the struggle, I have officially become a lifetime member of the struggle bus. Honestly I feel like snowwhite with my 5 dwarfs, they're not too happy with me. As I'm still figuring out how to water correctly, I have been letting my pots get bone dry, usually takes up to 5 days, and my waterings are minimal, 250-400 ml per plant. Feeds are still being mixed in 1 liter batches. I think the next watering will be just water cal mag, and maybe water them a bit more than I have. All of my ladies have popped pistils. My soil grow is going terribly, she has yet to recover. I really want to just pop a new bean of white widow CKS in an 18 liter pot with properly washed coco. I had hopes of a 100g yield from all 5, but that seems highly unlikely. This is clearly an art form I have yet to establish. Will keep you updated on these little ladies as much as I can.

 

[Hedimitrius]

I have cheap Chinese leds also. If you hang the light that close to your plants you're introducing a lot of heat. You might be surprised at how far you can back the lights off. Id use your single 600 watt and raise it to 36" above the ladies. It's a small space so you'll get plenty of light bouncing off the walls too. You want those leaves to be reaching for the light, not shying away from it.
You aren't going to get a giant yield no matter what so my advice would be mix a solution at a quarter of your normal feed strength and flush the plants to clean the coco out. Place them over something that can hold plenty of water like a Tupperware storage container and prop them up do they aren't sitting in standing water then just keep filling each pot. I'll do it three or four times then check my ppms. Aiming for no more than around 200 ppm higher than your watering mix. You'll need to mix up a lot of water I'd you're doing this. Best of luck!

 

[fatconeskills]

I have cheap Chinese leds also. If you hang the light that close to your plants you're introducing a lot of heat. You might be surprised at how far you can back the lights off. Id use your single 600 watt and raise it to 36" above the ladies. It's a small space so you'll get plenty of light bouncing off the walls too. You want those leaves to be reaching for the light, not shying away from it.
You aren't going to get a giant yield no matter what so my advice would be mix a solution at a quarter of your normal feed strength and flush the plants to clean the coco out. Place them over something that can hold plenty of water like a Tupperware storage container and prop them up do they aren't sitting in standing water then just keep filling each pot. I'll do it three or four times then check my ppms. Aiming for no more than around 200 ppm higher than your watering mix. You'll need to mix up a lot of water I'd you're doing this. Best of luck!

would you do this flush at the next watering or now ? I fed maybe a couple hours ago or so. I have raised all my lights and have tried to get them to stretch out. My only fear of a flush would be to over water them.

 

[Hedimitrius]

would you do this flush at the next watering or now ? I fed maybe a couple hours ago or so. I have raised all my lights and have tried to get them to stretch out. My only fear of a flush would be to over water them.

The only way you can overwater Coco is if you do it when the pot is heavy and never let it dry out. It's made to let the water drain and pull oxygen down into the coco. If you flush with no nute water I'd do it later to not waste the feeding you just did. If you do 1/4 nute water for the flush you can do it whenever.

 

[fatconeskills]

The only way you can overwater Coco is if you do it when the pot is heavy and never let it dry out. It's made to let the water drain and pull oxygen down into the coco. If you flush with no nute water I'd do it later to not waste the feeding you just did. If you do 1/4 nute water for the flush you can do it whenever.

Thanks for following up ! will do sir, thank you very much. Hope this turns out ok

 

[Hedimitrius]

Thanks for following up ! will do sir, thank you very much. Hope this turns out ok

As with errything, this is just another learning experience. Chalk it up and when you start fresh you'll already know more than last time. Not sure about other ppl but my second run was way better than my first.

 

[PlumberSoCal]

@Smoking Gun, firstly, thank you for taking the time to help me out. I used a decent coco peat block. After hydration, I mixed up around 30% perlite 70% coco. As for nutrients, gh trio with AN cal mag extra (5%. nitrogen taken into. consideration when dosing grow). Ive been nowhere close to recommended feedings, and. my feeds are always mixed in 1-2 liter batches distributed amongst 5. so around 250ml-350ml per plant in the larger pots, and around a cup for the small pot of the gorilla. I have so far turned off one led panel and the temps are around 71 and rh at 44%.

You can't overwater coco but you can give the wrong percentage of nutes. With autos I'd start at 25% of the recommended amounts with every watering and 3 or more per day.

I saw someone mention rising the coco and I would add charging cation exchange sites of the coco by soaking in a strong, 1000+ ppm calcium solution over night and rinse before use.

Also do not allow the coco to dry out, ever. Watering 3+ times a day and this should never be an issue.

I tried to reinvent the process when I started too. Didn't work out the way I hoped.

Growing in coco coir is incredibly easy. Mix up the nutes in the proper percentages, water often and enjoy their quick growth.

 

[fatconeskills]

thank you to everyone who has shimmed in to give a little insight. I did my first watering till runoff, completely saturated the substrate with water and cal mag extra at the rated dose, it contains N so I opted to just leave the solution as light as possible. I started by putting my ladies over the sink and watered around 2 liters each util I saw some dark runoff, I let them saturate and they are. now elevated using a bottle cap from the runoff tray. I still have one lady to remedy. In terms of my lady in the potting soil coco mix, she is still showing signs of over watering after 5 days or so, and the medium is pretty dry, but still some relative moisture deeper into the pot( inspected with my finger around 5 inches in. As for the lady in the small square pot, I will just water her on her next feed, she seems to be relatively stable, so I won't be as invasive with her as I was with the gals in the larger pot. Thank you @PlumberSoCal @Hedimitrius saved me in many ways lads.

 

[fatconeskills]

so I have some "premium" potting soil, the NPK is too high. I had mixed a 50-50 coco soil mix for one of the pots. That grow is hard to gauge as I have overwatered her. I was considering starting a white widow auto flower from Crop King. My thinking was to set a layer of pumice on the bed of the pot as the drainage holes are a bit large, then a solid layer of said potting soil mixed with 30% perlite as this stuff hold water too well. Then I would apply a layer of coco around 4inches deep. My thinking is that during the seedling period it will have sterile substrate, and as the roots develop, it will reach the soil. My concerns are that the feed is still too hot, and secondly, would this amended soil carry me through harvest, or would the medium need additional nutrients.

 

[fatconeskills]

You don't need to worry about pH so much when using Advanced Nutrients, they have buffers right in the bottles so even if the pH looks too high or too low it will still find a proper point for the plant to utilize all nutrients. The foliar spray should help, but keep your eye on the new growth from here.

this really helped when they were severely overwatered, they kept showing signs of cal deficiencies, so the foiler was a top idea.

 

[Moshmen]

The only way you can overwater Coco is if you do it when the pot is heavy and never let it dry out. It's made to let the water drain and pull oxygen down into the coco. If you flush with no nute water I'd do it later to not waste the feeding you just did. If you do 1/4 nute water for the flush you can do it whenever.

Overwater does NOT mean to much water, it actually means to often tough to overwater coco

 

[PlumberSoCal]

so I have some "premium" potting soil, the NPK is too high. I had mixed a 50-50 coco soil mix for one of the pots. That grow is hard to gauge as I have overwatered her. I was considering starting a white widow auto flower from Crop King. My thinking was to set a layer of pumice on the bed of the pot as the drainage holes are a bit large, then a solid layer of said potting soil mixed with 30% perlite as this stuff hold water too well. Then I would apply a layer of coco around 4inches deep. My thinking is that during the seedling period it will have sterile substrate, and as the roots develop, it will reach the soil. My concerns are that the feed is still too hot, and secondly, would this amended soil carry me through harvest, or would the medium need additional nutrients.

Soil is a different animal from coco especially soil with nutes added. Use it to grow vegetables, not autos.

After growing in soil 50+ years I won't put soil in a pot again. Coco only in pots from now on.

Coco takes all the guess work out of the equation. Mix up the nutes to the required percentage and then you can mix with more water for a weaker mix, especially for the first 2-4 weeks or always with autos as they normally do not require the amounts of nutes as the full size plants.

Water (fertigate) 3-6 x's per day with 20-30% runoff and that's it until the flip to flower. Once light is reduced to 12 hrs less cal/mag, I cut to 25% both calicum and magnesium.

I'm using a 3 part nute, MasterBlend and I highly recommend!

All coco grown in 1/2 & 1 gal pots

While they are in a greenhouse it's winter and there's no heating.

These girls are outside in 1/2 gal pots of coco.

The only thing I'll change on my next grow is using 3-5 gal pots and grow some monsters.

Use soil for veggies and coco for weed.

 

[fatconeskills]

Soil is a different animal from coco especially soil with nutes added. Use it to grow vegetables, not autos.

After growing in soil 50+ years I won't put soil in a pot again. Coco only in pots from now on.

Coco takes all the guess work out of the equation. Mix up the nutes to the required percentage and then you can mix with more water for a weaker mix, especially for the first 2-4 weeks or always with autos as they normally do not require the amounts of nutes as the full size plants.

Water (fertigate) 3-6 x's per day with 20-30% runoff and that's it until the flip to flower. Once light is reduced to 12 hrs less cal/mag, I cut to 25% both calicum and magnesium.

I'm using a 3 part nute, MasterBlend and I highly recommend!

All coco grown in 1/2 & 1 gal pots
View attachment 935245
While they are in a greenhouse it's winter and there's no heating.

These girls are outside in 1/2 gal pots of coco.
View attachment 935247

The only thing I'll change on my next grow is using 3-5 gal pots and grow some monsters.

Use soil for veggies and coco for weed.

really impressive ladies, you really make it look effortless, as I now know it is far from it. I'm still having trouble grasping how to water coco and im basically treating my coco like soil. Today I gave them enough water to get the whole substrate saturated and there was 20% run off. So to understand you clearly, I must keep the substrate saturated ? or can I leave them until the pot gets light and water again.

 

[Hedimitrius]

really impressive ladies, you really make it look effortless, as I now know it is far from it. I'm still having trouble grasping how to water coco and im basically treating my coco like soil. Today I gave them enough water to get the whole substrate saturated and there was 20% run off. So to understand you clearly, I must keep the substrate saturated ? or can I leave them until the pot gets light and water again.

You don't want the whole substrate to dry. Top layer can dry and you can let the pots lighten up a bit. Don't let coco get completely dry though. Now that you're getting runoff every feed, your numbers will slowly start to come back to correct as long as you're ph-ing around 5.8

 

[fatconeskills]

all the advice given has been superb, I apologize for the blurple images but I didn't want to mess with the runoff trays. Unfortunately my half gallon grizzly purple is still not doing well. She's in a 50-50 coco potting soil mix watering at 6.2-6.8, I watered two days ago but barely anything to saturate, just to see if she was drinking. Any advice ?

 

[fatconeskills]

should I prop up the 150MH projector ? or should I wait till bloom