HOW TO WATER COCO FOR BEST RESULTS.

[soultouch]

Will be low pressure so can't say if it will work with the drippers i linked. Head of 14.8 ft so about 6.5 psi but 4000L, Water will come out but he should grab a small digital scale or something to measure volume and time the drippers to calculate the new flow rate at his pressure

come on bro... don't be skerred. all the new things, every round. that's the only way the High Times Cup winners grow

No commercial greenhouse grower for any Vegetable or flower or container crop of any kind has used real soil since a little after ww2. Great dirt in the garden makes for suboptimal results in a container. It is simple physics. The airspace is often below 5 to 10%. I like 30% but 15 to 20% is usually required. Plus, you wont get nasty microbes in commercial mixes

 

[soultouch]

It's really tempting but I'm gonna stick with soil. Next grow I'll do coco for sure but there's too much on my plate right now.
I was able to uproot my seedling and move it into a tiny little pot so that there will be the least amount of coco when I need to transplant.

Sorry bud.

gorillaglueaaron what do you mean when you say soil. Are we talking sand, silt and clay? What size containers and what depth are the containers. I am a Soil Scientist and have watched people try to put garden soil in pots for 50 years, very few with good results and even these good results would simply look stupidly spindly next to an engineered soil less media which of course could still have lots of mineral components. So i am just really curious to really know what you actually grow in, EXACTLY

 

[Grownsince95]

@soultouch good morning! And welcome to the Farm. ❤❤

 

[soultouch]

My question would be what strain are they talking about?

Crop steering is a lot more complicated than just high feed and dryback and temps and nutrients. Its changes at specific times. Id say they are not giving all the info and nope I don't claim to have those answers.

Anyone ever done a slurry test on coco, is it accurate? This slight deficiency seems to be getting a little worse and I've read that a slurry test is better than run off testing? So thought I'd give it a go, done it as it says with ro water and I'm getting a pH of 5.4 and ec0.8

My run off reads ph 5.7 ec 2.0

Input is ph 6.2 and ec 1.7

So which one is accurate lol

I did the test 3 times with the same results

Saturated Paste, 1 to 1, all the way to 1part soil to 4parts water. There are all kinds of standardized methods. Saturated paste where you mix in just enough water to have a slurry or pancake batter will show you most closely what is happening in your soil. Many labs use more dilution because they are running many more tests and they use some kind of conversion factor to equilabrate. I have to track down some standard soil test manual to refresh my brain cells. Input is 6.2 but output is 5.7 which makes sense since your soil paste is 5.4 and bringing the 6.2 down as it reacts rinsing through the media. Now as you pout your ec 2 water through, much of it will just rush through the media but some will be absorbed to different cation sites so an ec 1.7 makes sense and shows that most of your nutes are just racing past the roots. The bit that gets left behind is what you are measuring but at least slightly diluted since you are making a slurry. While this may not be completely accurated, lets say you mix in 1 part soil and 1 part water, enough to have a testable solution for your ec meter, well your ec reading should be about 1/2 since you diluted with an equal part water. ec .8 x2 = 1.6ec so close to both input and output. For these growers that are claiming ECs of 3 to 4, i would be interested to know what a slurry test reading would show. I have never heard of such high fertilizer rates ever being used on other crops without damaging them. I started burning my plants when i slowly reached 1000ppm which is equal to EC 2.0

 

[soultouch]

If my pots are light that means I haven’t watered enough and salt buildup is occurring.

It is not that Salt buildup is occurring as much as the Salt concentration has gone way up since you let all the water evapotranspire leaving behind resudual salts. This could happen even if one were using a ppm of 300 or so. And this kind of fert burn or osmotic wilting can occur from even a single watering cycle where conventional salt accumulation is caused over time, especially as ET forces pull the solution towards the top of the soil where it accumulates till flushed with a large volume of fertilizer water or just plain water when an emergency occurs. It is usually better to flush with slightly lower concentration of fertilizer water unless end of life during flowering where one may choose to intentionally flush for a week or two

 

[soultouch]

Best £180 I've spent in a while! No more chasing runoff numbers it's great

I did a test the other day and this shows how important it is to keep coco around 90%+ saturated (some of mine do drop into the 80's not all plants dry at the same pace) I took a few feeds out from the schedule and let coco dry to around 60% and within 24 hours the ec had jumped from around 2.0 to over 3.0. I didn't flush just added the feeds back in and within 24 hours they was back to my input ec levels.

What I also found is feeding at 1.4-1.7 with little to no runoff I could let the coco dry to around 60% and the ec would drop in the pots, when increased to 2.0 if the coco dropped to 60% buildup would happen. Some might say 1.4-1.7 is a good level to feed at because ec is dropping so they're eating all that's being given, but I'd rather push my plants just that little bit and from what I'm seeing it's working.

It's a brilliant tool I know exactly what's going on in the root zone, I have 3 plants that I'd grown from seed the ec drops so fast in the pots after a feed that Im now having to feed them at 2.8ec and the ec is still dropping slightly, before I had the pulse I thought I was over feeding them because the buds just wasn't really growing, since I've upped the ec for them I've seen a increase in growth

What is this app and sensor you are using?

 

[Mr.GreenthumbOG]

Welcome @soultouch . AMan will be happy your contributing!

 

[soultouch]

Tha

Welcome @soultouch . AMan will be happy your contributing!

Thank you, AquaMan posts a lot of solid, detailed info

 

[soultouch]

I used let my run off drain to a tray if it was a small amount I'd use a cap from a air fresher or hairspray cap to check ec/ph.

This is my watering schedule for 1 gal fabrics in flower... (in veg I started at once every other day after a few days went to every day after a week or so twice a day and worked my way up like that)

6pm lights on
7pm 610ml. little run off on some plants
8pm 225ml. Nearly all 50ml run off
9pm 225ml. All with run off
10pm 225ml. All with run off
11pm 225ml.
12am 225ml
1am 225ml
2am 225ml
3am 225ml
4:30am 600ml
6am lights off
12pm 225ml. To keep coco moist when lights off

On next run I will be having lights on in the day time to track all run offs better, I've always had lights on in the night to keep room temps down because I've only been using a AC for past 12 months.

excellent documentation!

 

[soultouch]

I dont think its bad, for me it was a sign that my pots were always damp, since i let them go a bit more dry, leaves are back to normal, and roots poking is gone.

I both top water and sub irrigate and fine furry roots always bust out of the bag right at the waterline then grow out and drop into the water where they transform for aerial roots into aqua roots, a bit thicker with fewer root hairs.
\

Ok learned something today...those vpd chart requires the difference temp between the leaves and the air, the one i was following assumes that to be 1 C. Was using it wrong, thank you for letting me know

Vapor Pressure Deficit is the difference between the humidity in the stomates [considered to be 100 percent and the relative humidity of the surrounding air which could be drastically different. Of course, RH differs with temperature, Warm air can hold more water than cool air. Leaf temperature is usually expected to be lower than ambient air but since it is difficult to measure the temp of the underside leaf surface even with an infrared gun, many growers just use the temp recorded somewhere in the leaf canopy to get close enough to use a VPD chart. Pulse has a very good VPD chart which varies with growth stage

 

[soultouch]

Yeah under LED it will likely be a difference of around 5f but can be even more.

Yes you want the temperature of the leaf canopy and not the air just under the lights.

 

[Mr.GreenthumbOG]

I both top water and sub irrigate and fine furry roots always bust out of the bag right at the waterline then grow out and drop into the water where they transform for aerial roots into aqua roots, a bit thicker with fewer root hairs.
\

Vapor Pressure Deficit is the difference between the humidity in the stomates [considered to be 100 percent and the relative humidity of the surrounding air which could be drastically different. Of course, RH differs with temperature, Warm air can hold more water than cool air. Leaf temperature is usually expected to be lower than ambient air but since it is difficult to measure the temp of the underside leaf surface even with an infrared gun, many growers just use the temp recorded somewhere in the leaf canopy to get close enough to use a VPD chart. Pulse has a very good VPD chart which varies with growth stage

I use the grobot vpd caculator app. Simple.

 

[soultouch]

Maybe @Homesteader or @glo or another one of the science types could chime in.
I've run 1250ppm for many years, the only time I had any concern about RH is if it was too high. About a year, year and a half ago after not being able to turn around without hearing about VPD being the holy grail of environmental factors, I spent thousands on commercial hard plumbed humidifiers, their controllers and remote hygrometers hanging all over the place reporting back to headquarters. My honest results of it all are butt loads of dehumidifiers working overtime during lights out and the inability to grow any strain remotely sensitive to PM.
I'm not saying VPD is hogwash but I sure would like to understand in dumb guy terms how it relates to CO2.

Cannabis is a C3 plant and not sure the upper limits using Co2 and light but there will certainly be a diminishing return on investment between 1200 and 1500 ppm i would think. I think Bugbee says something similar. No one ever seems to run over 1500 ppm for any crop unless they temporarily want to drive up to 12000 ppm to kill off spider mites or something

 

[soultouch]

Yeah I get up to 1200ppm sometimes, gorilla is on that now, 900 base nutes plus a boost and some fulvic, but I'd never give seeds that much, or an unknown cline, its only once I see how they feed, and only in certain conditions, like I pump my lights up to 660w fir the 2 weeks I feed that high, but I also supplement co2 for those weeks and slowly lower the light until its at the sweet spot, then I taper the nutes down until flush but again its only gorilla and bignug that I've got that high with, the glookies is a lighter feeder, never pushed her past 900, but once the sog is in full flower, I'll push them a bit more this time see how they fare in optimum conditions and a bit of tough love.

Also its worth pointing out that in the US you guys use the ppm/500 or the 650 scale, and in UK its the 700. In Australia it could be any of the 3 scales, so say 1200 ppm on the 500 is an EC of 2.4, but on the 700 scale, 1680ppm is 2.4 EC. Now please don't think I totally have my head round this, bcos I really don't. I'm just wondering if the different ppm's people throw about, what scale are they running on. Because my 1200 on 700 scale, suddenly becomes 900 ish on the 500 scale.

Yeah my ppm meters must be 500 because if my ec meter says 1.2 my ppm meters read 600 ppm. I prefer ppm to ec because ppm is used for individual fertlizer elements as well as the total salt load whereas the EC is just really the total Salt electrical conductivity which is useful to know if you are worried about torching your plants, but ppms will tell you the same thing

 

[soultouch]

Coco slab 5 cuttings per slab 25 cuttings per square meter. My technique works better Also in small 2L pots.

More yield with coco saturated Max 70-80% in My experience an many people i know.
U should test i Will help u if u want.

Yes more complete info would be better. Also could you provide the dimensions of your coco slabs and maybe a link to go look at the supplier. Here is what i am suspecting where some of the difference of frequency, duration and volume of watering may be due to the fact you are using short slabs compared to deeper pots. If you have a 6 inch high slab that is 10 liters for instance vs a taller pot which hold 10 liters, the shorter slab will proportional hold a greater percentage of water, there will be less air space so too frequent of watering will possibly stunt the growth as the slabs will be wetter as far as the plant roots are concerned with less than optimal oxygen. I can not provide much more useful information with out knowing the exact Coco and Perlite particle size for those using that mix and the physical properities of the slab. For any kind of grow media for all soil, soiless, across all particle size distributions, with containers of equal volume the taller container will always have a higher AFP Air Filled Porosity and be less water logged through out a larger percentage of the container since a taller volume of media will be above the perched water table which will vary from media to media but within different container geometries, the perched water table will be the same height regardless of geometry. In other words, If the perched water table for a certain kind of peat is 2 inches high, it will be 2 inches high in the 6 inch block and 2 inches high in the 12 inch pot. The 6 inch block will only have 4 inches of more optimal growing conditions whereas the 12 in container will have 10 inches of non saturated media for roots to explore. Under such conditions one could surmise that the taller container could be water more frequently and probably more heavily without adversely affecting growth whereas the short slab would need more attention to avoid stunting the growth

 

[soultouch]

It's easy and to do with Arduino and aliexpress sensores, Also automate watering. I Will show My new Arduino setup.

I read somewhere that capacitance sensors work better than resistance and some recommend painting nail polish along the edges to extend life of sensors which sometimes only last a season. I just bought a Vegtronix which i have yet to try out. It was $114 for the 4 port model i bought

 

[soultouch]

Every operation is unique and the variables are endless. You will figure it out. A couple things I will say, in no particular order. Familiarize yourself with the weight of your pots.
If you let them dry out so much that your fan leaves are even drooping, you've done damage.
Be careful when you pot up.
As long as their drinking it, growing fast and looking beautiful, feed as much as you can, it's a good thing.

While draining water will draw Oxygen down into the root zone. Watering for the most part drives out oxygen from the macropores and saturates these voids with water. In fact to determine airspace one takes oven dry media in a pot with no drain holes, floods the media to the surface, waits 24 hours for max absorption, tops off with a little water if necessary. Weighs the Saturated media, then freely drains the water by poking holes in the container, removing a cork or tape, etc. For some media, Free Drained could be 15 minutes for a practical result, soil labs would tend to keep overnight or 24 hours. Weigh this drained but wet media. The difference between the flooded weight and the Freely Drained Weight will tell you how much water just drained from all the MacroPores. Since water conveniently weighs 1 gram per cc or 1 gram per millilters, the weight in grams is equal to the volume in MLs. SatW -FDW = AFP. The micropore space aka the voids filled with water after drainage is the WHC or Water Holding Capacity of the soil aka CC or Container Capacity. Container Capacity Weight minus the Oven Dry Weight aka ODW equals the amount of water that volume of soil media can hold in that specific container geometry. CC-ODW = WHC aka Water Holding Capacity. Now not all of that micropore water will be available for plant root uptake but to determine EAW and AW aka Easily Available Water and Available Water and permanent wilting point one needs a porometer with a vaccuum pump attached to effectively reproduce the tensions that plant roots can draw water from different substrates. This data can then be used to produce soil moisture curves. From mytmmemory, water at CC is held at 0 Kpa Matric tension and Permanent Wilting Point PWP is at 1500kpa, but i am forgetting the AW and EAW tensions. With precise top watering, one can try to target your irrigation system to turn on somewhere between AW and EAW and turn off somewhere close to the EAW number or to keep the water as close to easily Available as possible. Subirrigiated systems always present water at 0 Kpa when averaged throughout the entire soil colum though at zero tension the bottom centyer of the container would always be wettest and depending on the plant species some plants would find this area too wet, some plants could adapt, so if sub irrigating it is probably a better practice to always keep the water level constant in the water tray so that air loving roots do not invade the normally saturated soil space which would happen if a wet dry wet dry water cycle was used. In such a scenarion, plant roots have water maximally available with the least expenditure of energy. If you want to argue that stressing the plant is better, that is another conversation. Stress of various kinds could produce more sugars of certian types, and more terpenes, but stress will not normally create more biomass

 

[soultouch]

Go

I have a heat source that never lets the grow room get below 60* F at night. During the day the vent thermostat is set to 76* and fans circulate heat from the lights. Brick coco was strained to get rid of smallest particles and double buffered with CalMag.

I will try coco gain next grow. Try to get better with it. I was hoping to make it easier for consistently healthy plants by going to coco. Faster growth, higher grams/sq.ft. and the like was never a goal. Currently I'm thing coco is harder to grow in than "soil" mixes.

Thanks!

Go with the 50 50 instead of the 70 30 next time though i find it curious that coco mix was any wetter than the peat mix. Even though peat fibers can be hydrophobic sometimes, their micropore spaces is usually around the same as Coco and tend to be a little more water logged than a coco. Also were your root temperature the same as your air temp because soil temps are often colder. No doubt you symptoms are classic overwatering leading to cupping leaves and a Cal Mag deficiency and stunting which if AM is right is also a consequence of cold soil which also drys more slowly. Depending on how root bound your 1 gallon clones were, these should have exploded in all directions in your 3 gallon pots

 

[soultouch]

Thank you. Nice thread

@soultouch good morning! And welcome to the Farm. ❤❤
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[soultouch]

I use the grobot vpd caculator app. Simple.

Thanks i will download it