Over looked growing details . By Sunsim

[sunsimulator]

Flushing goes hand in hand with evaporation, if you flush your soil less medium once a week then you won't have to worry as much about salt build up due to evaportation. Good info Sun, I hope I am not stepping on your feet by adding my 2 cents bro.

no sir bro add all u want! the more we understand the more we can do!:passingjoint:

 

[winta]

that was some more gems sun! i was wondering about ppm for seedlings :) your father/the military told u right! im an army brat my mother and father told me the same things as a youngin! the only way to do it is the best!:)

 

[Kpezzy]

what does this look like

I am thinking Iron

 

[Jalisco Kid]

Opps wrong thread. JK

 

[DazedNconfussed]

I know im a super newb and probly have no biz in this thread but I have this graph I found a while back and thought others may find it useful.....

 

[sunsimulator]

I am thinking Iron

what nutrients are u feeding ,, and what ppms are u feeding them ,, looks like some type of ph problem ,, or it can be your not feeding them enough ,, can u get a pic of your roots ?

 

[chuck uuuuu]

Finding info on growing ( pot, weed, marijuana .) in the info world is kinda tuff due to the laws ,, SO here is what ya do . Study annual, dioecious, flowering herb.Because that is what the plant is .

Careful trying to understand dioecious plants with Maryjane lol ,,, Ya see Mary is the only plant that really can fit into other classes ,, but the others can not fit in her class! This is were we can understand this plants ability to inner sex . But do study this ,, just remember Marijuana plants are a class of their own really ,, but these rules of dioecious plants do apply to marijuana.

u have my utmost RESPECT brother, & I only seen 2 of ur posts so far.
Thank you! Sun!!!

 

[sunsimulator]

Hey Sun, i got a couple questions about this,

? First off why is it bad to water everyday, I grow in 3 gallon smartpots, and my girls drink 2-3L of water everyday or every other day, I have fans on the floor keeping a soft aircurrent around the roots and through the smartpots,

A. HEY MIKE ,
This is all pretty much environmental tuning . If u got to water daily Then u got to ,, But the bigger problem is ,, Your environment , watering everyday is just a band -aid to the fix. When rooms are warm, windy , and dry , we'll see fast evaporation rates , Your plants are not drinking that much water ,, it is the room evaporating it . This is what we don't want .Then we'll see every problem in the book ,, Sweating ,, leaf fungus,
potassium leaching , mold ,, i could go on ,,
Another problem is you could be washing out the immobile elements, due to so much watering . Also you are condensing the nutrient solution . If i put so many ppm in a gallon of water , and the water gets taken away after the mixing , well the ppm rise . This can cause all kinds of problems, One will be PH drift.
Point is we have to find the balance between evaporation and plant usage . IT takes some time of the medium being wet with a certain weight pressure to make nutrients react and become available and to be PUSHED threw the root zone,, Containers and roots have a correlation , It's not really Root bound as much as it is pressure . Osmotic pressure come by 2 forms ,
one will be the difference between the amount of ppm on one side of the roots or the other .. and The other pressure is the container weight , When u add water to the container , it gets heavier . This Force is a type of osmotic pressure also . This type is also needed to push nutrients threw . so we need this over a period of time to make all things work together. Again we have to make sure our room is not evaporating our water .






Also Why do you not want to feed nutes into a dry medium. Organics and benefical bacteria especially rely on the wet to dry dry to wet transition, and I feel grow better when you let the roots/soil/medium dry out until their is Little moisture left in the pot. Thanks Looking forward to your response!:volcano:

Dry this is a huge ? what is dry ? dry to me is when the plants have lost tugor which is when the leaves drop down . containers like that Should be wet . before watering and prolly flushed ! the reason is if we let the containers get dry. we WILL build salts . Take a spoon full of nutrients and let it air dry . You will get crystals forming . these are salts . IF we put more nutrients on dry mediums, The salt builds up faster . It now has something attached into the medium to build off of.
ON a very fast track to salt build up .. Also when the container dried out , we do not know which of the elements in the nutrient solution was used up by the plant IF any were , due to the short period ( wetness)
and loss of reaction time . SO having said that .

Say we were in flower . I watered plants in flower ( dry container) I added 1000 ppm bloom food ,, watered with that ,, Ok Now being the container dried up and the nutrients are now no good ,, they are now salt ,, But it was able to uptake SAY 400 ppm outa of the bloom food .
Outa the 400 ppm it took in ,, lets say it was P and K , and lets say it didn;t take up N . now we add that 1000ppm we talk about above ,, AND NOW WE JUST MADE VEG FOOD FOR A PLANT IN FLOWER ,, because the ration of N is now higher than the ratio of P-k , thus giveing us a veg type of food in flower causing the plant to weird out!

The correct mediums do not really need to be dried out.
They will have the ability to provide plenty of oxygen to the roots , What happens to mediums that have problem for being wet ,1 it is not the correct medium , 2.Is the breakdown or nitrification or organic matter , Getting the ph off balance. or the base off balance .
to correct this we have to add lime to our mediums,
ONE other problem from constant watering is washing out lime,, and other immobile elements .


DRY ,, WET .
I use PEAT MOSS (Pro Mix ) You will not over water.
dry is when i can no long keep the medium together when i try to squeeze it into a ball . will not compact ,, falls apart ,

I WOULD NOT USE TRUE SOIL INDOORS FOR ANY KINE WEEDS .

i hope this helps ,, if ya need any more explaining im more than happy to help! the more we understand the better we get!

 

[Kennie_B]

Sunsim your the man & your from the same state as I, well I hope we get to meet at YOUR shop very very soon!

 

[sunsimulator]

1. You talked about a plant only using 400 out of 1000 ppms, and you said maybe it only took up P-k not N, Does this happen, i though plants "find" their own nutrients, And if you provide them with the correct ratios, they will naturally Take up the correct ratios given your ph is good and you are not locking anything out.

A: well this is an example ,, But different amounts can be up taken at different times . so yes. Also they do find their own nutrients from elements being in contact with each other ,, When in flower we need to give it flower foods ,, for the requirements of the fruits , if we don;t meet these requirements , something messes up ,and something gets outa balance . so using a veg food while plants are in flower will make them def, on P-K , Not to say the plant won;t keep growing ,, but will run into problems, Or you could have it the other way ,, and be creating other problems from over ferting the plants

2. How would you suggest i combat my evaporation problem-(I plan on doing a test tonight by watering a 3 gallon container W/O a plant in it and seeing 24 hours later how much water is left/evaporated out of it, to get a better understanding of my problem)-


A: Biggest thing is rooms being un vented to the outside,,
it's kinda like recycling hot air , if the air is hot and dry , it will evaporate , duct the hot air outside , fans blowing on containers is not good idea ,, this will dry them out too fast ,, you can cut out shapes of cardboard that match container and cover the container ,
heat and moving air dries out water , i run fans but they blow the tops of the canopy ,, not the containers ,
i don;t have a wind storm in the room either . lil air moving is all ya need .


3. You state you would not use true soil indoors, why is this i feel like the quality of soil grows are the highest and produce the best smoking and tasting nuggets.

Soil is different than soil less mixes . Sometimes u hear ppl say they using soil ,, but i'd bet it is a peat moss mixture . let me check on soils so i can give u idea.
i haven;t used any soils for indoor in over 10 years .. so i am shallow minded about soils ,, atm .

IMHO SOIL or SOIL LESS grows are the best! But peat moss offers the same results , with more control and better growth due to the air ratio in the root zone,, True soil has problem with containing air for the roots.

 

[ThaKid]

1.) When you flush your promix once a week, does that just consist of straight pH balanced water?
2.) When your flushing the medium out, are you flushing with twice the container size and then feeding the plant there after? FLUSH...FEED consecutively?

 

[PureSugar]

SS- Great thread! I think you're gonna be a very busy guy as more and more people find it.

I saw you post this question to someone in another thread that i can't find now and would like to know more about the subject.

I'll ask the question in a general sense as I don't remember the context of the original posting and think it will be helpful to more farmers this way.

Can you describe the process or more importantly the purpose of testing pH runoff?

You said to make sure to test the first part of the runoff. What is the reason for focusing on the initial runoff? What does it mean if I watered using a nute solution with a pH of 5.7 and the initial runoff tested at 6.0?

I'd like to know what we learn from the difference in pH readings.

I'm personally using a mix of about 60% Hyrdotron 40% Rockwool crutons in 5 gallon pots and get the results listed above. I use Pure Blend Pro Bloom and most of the Botainicare additives using between 1/2 - 3/4 of the recommended strength which gives me a PPM of between 1050-1300 (also varies due to evaporation) Plants are in first week of flowering and are approx 2.5' -3' tall and wide. (bushes) I hand water as needed usually 3 day intervals. I did just today wait 4 days and they were pretty dry now after reading this thread I'm concerned about the salt build up I think I may have just created.

 

[sunsimulator]

hey pure sugar ,,

when u have a higher number than what went in ,, this means the medium is lil more to the alkalinity side .. means your not getting a true Ph reading . This is were lime comes into play . lime is a buffer so to speak , when lime is added it changes the base to a neutral area . When u put in 6.5 with a neutral base you will get 6.5 out .
when u put in 6.5 and get 7 out then u will need to add lime , to neutralize the base so the Ph will remain constant . In other words This reading will tell you if or not u are needing lime. or if the medium is breaking down threw nitrification , Which will cause a medium to go either more acidic ,, or more of alkalinity side . Either way the medium has to be neutralized before we can tell how much potential hydrogen we have .


i hope i answered thsi clear enough for ya ,, i think my head went crazy after smoking a bowl ..

 

[sunsimulator]

SHit one more thing i forgot to say ,,

Rockwool is naturally leaning toward the alkalinity side .
It will have to be neutralized often ,,You ever read were it says soak rockwool in 5.5 ph solution before taking cuts and using RW. SO watch RW it need summin to neutralize it almost constantly! Or anytime u have a AIRY medium it has to be monitored. Air can bond with hydrogen .. creating a higher PH . Im;a go out on a limb and say this is what is causing your 0.03 difference between you readings ,, Your not in any danger with the plants at that reading .. but don;t let it start getting a greater difference between the 2 .

 

[REGISTRD]

The Kind man has referenced this Nutrient profiler in another thread SUN..
You should check it out it makes alot of sense and breaks down our nutes elemently.
http://www.angelfire.com/cantina/fourtwenty/articles/download.htm

Ive downloaded it and been using for a bit know and have to say its made me realize alot of things.. Im thinking it really doesnt matter what product you buy as long as your getting your NPK MG, CA all up to where they need to be.. The companys put out different ratios NPK in there products but im guessing its like just taking 2 different roads to get to the same place, so why spend all this money on expensive nutes (AN) and hype when everything is still to getting to the same place if you know what your doing??

 

[PureSugar]

hey pure sugar ,,

when u have a higher number than what went in ,, this means the medium is lil more to the alkalinity side .. means your not getting a true Ph reading . This is were lime comes into play . lime is a buffer so to speak , when lime is added it changes the base to a neutral area . When u put in 6.5 with a neutral base you will get 6.5 out .
when u put in 6.5 and get 7 out then u will need to add lime , to neutralize the base so the Ph will remain constant . In other words This reading will tell you if or not u are needing lime. or if the medium is breaking down threw nitrification , Which will cause a medium to go either more acidic ,, or more of alkalinity side . Either way the medium has to be neutralized before we can tell how much potential hydrogen we have .


i hope i answered thsi clear enough for ya ,, i think my head went crazy after smoking a bowl ..

SS- Thanks for the reply I finally made it to a computer today...LONG DAY. Everything made sense even to from one medicated patient to another :) ...except the statement about the medium being neutralized. In a hydro setup isn't the ideal pH range 5.6 - 6.0? So how would you neutralize for example, Rockwool without causing nute lockout due to pH being too high?

SHit one more thing i forgot to say ,,

Rockwool is naturally leaning toward the alkalinity side .
It will have to be neutralized often ,,You ever read were it says soak rockwool in 5.5 ph solution before taking cuts and using RW. SO watch RW it need summin to neutralize it almost constantly! Or anytime u have a AIRY medium it has to be monitored. Air can bond with hydrogen .. creating a higher PH . Im;a go out on a limb and say this is what is causing your 0.03 difference between you readings ,, Your not in any danger with the plants at that reading .. but don;t let it start getting a greater difference between the 2 .

Yes I do soak the Rockwool in water pH'd to 5.5 although usually only til completely saturated not overnight as I've heard suggested and I rinse the hydrotron with pH 5.5 water as well.

I usually try for a pH of 5.8 for regular feeding but sometimes I use 5.6 or 5.9 the acid I'm using is so strong i have to add it almost by the drop or I will shoot way below my target of 5.8.

One more question... I know PPM and pH are temperature sensitive, pH less so I think if I remember correctly. I've been keeping my nute mix never more than 2 days @ 68F up to 70F on occasion (20C - 21C) I need a heater or the temp drops to the mid 50's. I have the smallest one I could find set on the lowest setting and I take my readings at that temp. After I water all my plants I am always left a few gallons of solution so rather than toss it I bottle it and will use it to feed a plant that drys out faster than the others or sometimes if the humidity gets low I will dump some onto my table and let the plants feed from the bottom and allow some water to evaporate raising the humidity... The bottles are not keep heated but still test at the pH number when they were warmer I never tested the PPM (PPM part of the meter is too big to fit in the bottle, I guess I could just pour some into another container to test it... but should this be fine for a few days?

Oh BTW watering them yesterday when they went 4 days instead of the normal 3 I couldn't get over how happy they looked today. Should I be concerned about salt build up since the medium was very dry at least first few inches were bone dry?

Thanks again

PS

 

[chuck uuuuu]

Ur the best SS! Thank you very much.
BTY: Do you know the name of the new auto mh/sodium light? I know it costs more but they say its worth it?

Peace, Chuck:help:

 

[Darth Fader]

SunSim, What process would you use to handle deficiencies that come on late in flower?

I apologize if this belongs in the infirmary.

This is Master Kush, at day 35 (today is day 38). I understand this strain should run 60 days and flush will start on day 50. I'm currently feeding this one GH Bloom only (9ml) + Hygrozyme (5ml) in distilled water @5.5pH. Not currently adding CalMag & not sure if I should.

Rust spots & yellowing (Click pic to enlarge, it will be obvious) - grow slideshow (more pics) link
http://farm3.static.invalid.com/2746/4419276130_e51c6ebc44_o.jpg

There was leaf discoloration starting a few weeks ago, which I thought would clear up after I went from hard water to distilled water w/ CalMag. I knew there was some type of deficiency but it wasn't over the whole plant, maybe 1/4 to 1/3 of the buds and flush was soon approaching. I didn't notice the rust spots until I looked at the photos (plant is in the far corner of the tent so I can't see it up close.

TIA

 

[Kpezzy]

lets keep this thread going it's a good one

 

[sunsimulator]

SunSim, What process would you use to handle deficiencies that come on late in flower?

I apologize if this belongs in the infirmary.

This is Master Kush, at day 35 (today is day 38). I understand this strain should run 60 days and flush will start on day 50. I'm currently feeding this one GH Bloom only (9ml) + Hygrozyme (5ml) in distilled water @5.5pH. Not currently adding CalMag & not sure if I should.

Rust spots & yellowing (Click pic to enlarge, it will be obvious) - grow slideshow (more pics) link
http://farm3.static.invalid.com/2746/4419276130_e51c6ebc44_o.jpg

There was leaf discoloration starting a few weeks ago, which I thought would clear up after I went from hard water to distilled water w/ CalMag. I knew there was some type of deficiency but it wasn't over the whole plant, maybe 1/4 to 1/3 of the buds and flush was soon approaching. I didn't notice the rust spots until I looked at the photos (plant is in the far corner of the tent so I can't see it up close.

TIA

This looks to me like a cal ,,def. and it is locking up micros . Micros show signs of the new leaves ,. the tips of the other plants are lil burnt ,, so tells me u getting macros , This is most time due to cal def , and cause is micro lockup. you should wash out with water ,, and feed cal mag first , and foliar feed plants . then i would feed next day with some ferts not a very strong solution ,, maybe 900 ppm.

Sorry i been very busy and truly sorry i wasn't able to answer sooner.