Run off coco ?

[Rasta Man]

at the moment im feeding at 1ec = 700ppm... i did make the mistake when repotting not to pre soak the coco in water, the coco was very dry as it had been sitting in the pot for awhile.. maybe that was the problem to...

 

[Seamaiden]

Rasta, not so much pre-soak as pre-rinse. I use a different brand and type that requires pre-charging as well.

did you rinse and check the ec of the coco before you transplanted?

I never considered that the OP might not have rinsed his coco. Big whoops, and good catch!

Wait a minute. If the plant looks happy, why do you want to get the EC dropped?

because 4.2 is ridiculously high - even if the look ok now they prolly wont for long

you said it yourself things happen fast in coco

I don't know what happened with that posting sequence yesterday, but I swear, when I posted your post wasn't there! Weird. And how did EC suddenly morph into pH? I don't remember mentioning anything about pH, nor do I remember the OP asking about it. Although, again, it's extremely important to know what's going on so that if something does go wrong you can correct it.

What's worse is that my meter maxes out at something like 2.0 EC, I have no idea how I'd measure 4.2! Cut it in half with distilled or RO/DI, then go from there I suppose.

Your ec is likely high because you let the coco dry out. You should make sure the coco stays damp and don't let it dry out between watering. Personally I water full strength then at a quarter strength, then full strength, then just water with micros and cal mag. I usually water every other day until about week 3 when they Need watered every day. Personally I prefer to waste a bit of nuts via leeching rather than risk salt buildup. If you get lockout mid flower even if you fix it immediately you will loose way more than the value of the nutes you are leeching. Also if you run drain to waste there isn't a need to check runoff unless there is a problem IMO.

This is what I was originally trying to get across, along with how I prefer to get an idea of media conditions.

 

[Rasta Man]

ye i thats what i did pre rinsed wrong choice of words :) ... i dont mind wasting nutes as long as there healthy and growing well.. think my plan is when they need watering again il water with low ec until i get 30 to 40 % run off and try to gradually bring the ec run off down over a few days... dont want to over water again...

 

[cemchris]

You dont really need to flush if you are drip to waste or top feed. Tables are a different story. You get salt buildup at the water level. Different school of thought for different growing styles. I would say PH is prob the most important thing. Specially when dealing with coco. If coco stays neutral and your run off is like 7 or 4 something mean you have a whole lot of nutes in the medium. Who knows I always flush and check my medium and still never seem to have problems.

 

[Rasta Man]

im hand watering, i heard the ph of your run off is not a very accurate way of reading ph levels..?

 

[Rasta Man]

watered the plants today and the run off was very high up around 4 ec.. i flushed water through until it came down to 1.8ish.. hopefully that will stop any fiuture problems :)

 

[freegrow]

I think

we will all agree if you take a hand full of viable seeds and throw them out in a sunny place they will do what they do correct ?

I use to look at it like one of my things I owend
and was going to make it do what I wanted it to
( had same problems with being a father at 41 im old enough to be set in my ways ......this will not work with children or plants children will resent you and keep things form you plants will too ...well the plants dont so much keep things from you as you dont see them ...you are looking elsewhere )

farmers and plants are or sould be friends
to help each other ...you dont keep a friend you always
make do what you want

just watch them girls they will tell you what they need

now if we could just get ladys to do this ( tell us what they need and really want ) too the world would be at peace
hell war would be a thing of legend lol

 

[Rasta Man]

haha i like your story freegrow :) i dont think even god himself can understand the female race..

when god made the earth he used soil as his medium as i am god to my plants im using coco.. if EC values are important i want to be on it ;)

 

[cemchris]

im hand watering, i heard the ph of your run off is not a very accurate way of reading ph levels..?

Its not but more of an educated guess on what the plants are getting in the way of PH. I like the target of 5.6 to 5.8. So I adjust accordingly.

 

[Rasta Man]

after the flush i had to go away for two days and there after doubling in size.. :)

 

[Darth Fader]

after the flush i had to go away for two days and there after doubling in size.. :)

;-)

 

[cemchris]

after the flush i had to go away for two days and there after doubling in size.. :)

wow thats weird. I guess flushing does help hehe ;)

 

[cheech]

I top feed and have gotten some really fucked up high number from regular feeding of 1.5 ec, even with 15% runoff and using the drip clean product. Sometimes the medium just seems to hold on to the salt.

A group in flowering not so long ago started off fantastic.. Fucking awesome deep lush... By week 3 they started to show pretty bad burn, and I stupidly assumed it was light intensity. Within 4 days the burn spread and I finally whipped out the ec meter to check the runoff. 4 ec about. If I had flushed immediately I think I could have saved them aside from a week delay in flower. It all went to bubble hash and butter.

Here they were around week 2 when they started to show signs of burn. This is when I should have flushed to get them back to 1.5 ec.

 

[Rasta Man]

mine never showed any signs of having high ec just slow growth. i also top feed . watered yesterday and ec was over 2 but with the run off i allowed it came back down to 1.8... il try kepping it around this level and hope for the best

 

[Seamaiden]

Rasta Man, may I suggest you go ahead and get yourself a good clearing agent? Clearex or similar is my suggestion. That will go a long way toward helping you fix a problem before it becomes too much, and best of all, those products really help save labor and WATER.

 

[Rasta Man]

ye thanks seamaiden il look into it now :)

 

[cemchris]

*cough cough* drip clean *cough cough*

 

[Darth Fader]

I top feed and have gotten some really fucked up high number from regular feeding of 1.5 ec, even with 15% runoff and using the drip clean product. Sometimes the medium just seems to hold on to the salt.

Yeah, I'm even doing prob 30% runoff and am getting the same thing at the end of flower, even with Drip Clean. The coco gets bone-dry on top - since the root system is so well-developed in 2 gal pots and feeding once per day. I'm feeding around 700 and runoff is still over 1000 nearly every day.

Rasta Man, may I suggest you go ahead and get yourself a good clearing agent? Clearex or similar is my suggestion. That will go a long way toward helping you fix a problem before it becomes too much, and best of all, those products really help save labor and WATER.

I use FloraKleen, same thing right? I'm really happy with it.

*cough cough* drip clean *cough cough*

Hey Chris, I use .4 ml/gal Drip Clean every feeding and still can get highly concentrated runoff. I didn't think it was meant to be a flushing agent per se, but then I'm not really sure - they could in fact be virtually the same. I think they are both good products, but I use FloraKleen for flushing @ 10 ml/gal at the end of flower when I really want to strip the salts from the media.

 

[cemchris]

I use water to flush. Its alot cheaper. Naw its not a flushing agent but it does do the job and cuts down on salt buildup. Good way to tell is the ring on the outside of the pot with drip clean and without. Thats why Im still using it.

Yea darth thats why I have always been more concerned with the PH of the runoff vs the ppms. Seems to be a better judge since coco is neutral. If you get a big jump then time to flush. If its almost spot on or near then you are cruising.

 

[steelcanaries]

nice post free grow...yeah im new to this coir thing...really tricky for me/huge learning curve compared to soil for me...I just corrected a high ec over 3 and a high ph around 7.5....at least this is what my runoff said....im starting to make sure I get lots of runoff, like about two cups worth and things seem to be better...going in ph is 5.6, comes out 6.2 with an ec of 1.4 going in and 1.2-1.4 coming out...im starting to think that lots of runoff is the way to avoid buildup/lockout...I initially flushed to correct, and i would really drech them, almost flood or gurgle the medium, which i read is a sign of stress....I know its almost impossible to over water coco, so when I initially did this they drooped like crazy/look over watered/stressed out...I made another correction the next day and made a drench/flood flush again...this time, they took it a lil better....after feeling i had corrected my initially high ec problem, and then secondly my ph problem... I notice the next day, the plants looked so much better/happier...and the heavy waterlogged pots were light and almost drying on top...wow, just sucking it up like crazy....I fed them 5ml of floranova bloom and 1.25ml of floralicious plus with tap water (164ppm/ph7.8 right out the faucet before adjusment) i drench/soaked/to the point of almost flooding again for maximum runoff, around two cups or so, per one gallon fabric pot , and by this time, the plants just seemed to beast up and love it...they seemed to grow up enough from the correction that they just started to like being water/fed that way....so far so good....plants look the best they ever have, and I feel as confident as ever that Im starting to understand what makes this hybrid coco medium (basement mix) tick...I know a slurry test would prolly be more accurate, but testing heavy runoff, both ph and ec, has made my life a heck of a lot easier....and now, i have piece of mind that I know exactly what is happening to them, unlike before, where I had three different explanations in my head, none were right, and I was just plain confused...lol