@Power OG Nice pics as usual!!! I must say I'm often distracted from the overall bud pic, as I'm always trying to find burnt tips. :D
@SpitXFire happy B-day as well.
@EyeC thank you for your thoughts and I do agree there are too many variables to ever nail a lot of things down to absolutes, when it comes to these plants. One good thing here, with the overall picture I'm getting to; is that I believe I have most of the pieces to the puzzle and know what the puzzle looks like; but there are a few pieces left to fit. So the hypothesis mentioned is a potential "piece" and my hopes were / are to figure those things out. There's enough experience and sheer knowledge floating around on the forum, that I would presume it possible. At least to develop maybe a theory.
@SeaF0ur Thank you as well for your thoughts and info!
With your reference to "the first part" and "root exudate" testing; I'm assuming your talking about the hypothesis, right? I've not looked a ton into exudates, other than to know how / why they alter in order to increase availability of certain groups of elements (cation / anion). I remember jumpincactus had a nice thread on root exudates for signaling and quorum sensing. Guess the only other thing I read was with hormones produced in the roots and their relation to exudates. That definitely seems like an interesting avenue to investigate more!! I'll have to find out if there's a specific exudate relative to nitrogen sufficiency for that to work.
-I suppose thinking another way. Would you consider doing leaf tissue testing as a viable alternative there? Since any transported nitrate that does not have sufficient reductase, gets stored in those leaf tissues as organic nitrogen (dark leaf). Would you think that doing organic nitrogen sampling (of leaf tissues) at a given nitrate level and moving from veg to flower; could also work?
@ ALL of you guys
TBH, I was kinda hoping with the hypothesis that someone might say "oh, no it's because of this". I've not found research specific to it and I don't know if that's been done.
One part that, at least, CAN be stated is that; a plant can utilize less nitrate in flower, in part, because nitrate reductase production (being bound to the calvin cycle) is lowered as a result of shorter photoperiods in flowering.
However, I still feel there are other factors (like possibly sugar diversion) as I would presume the change from this would be seen during stretch. As well it would not seem to explain the variability in the nitrate assimilation capacity of differing strains; transitioning into flower. (few I've tested).
Last again @SeaF0ur With having separate formulas for the different stages; yea, I'm missing the Vegetative and I need to make one specific at some point. Now with the life stages, I guess I looked into that while researching why P is "required" to be higher in bloom (found none outside of grain filling / seed production). I'm looking at things from different "terms" than you brought across, but I'm pretty sure we are talking about the same thing.
Vegetative - I don't have a specific formula here
Pre-Flowering - Since I run cuts or hold seeds to maturity; everything in veg area is in this state (more or less) and gets a specific NPK.
Early Flower - From my reading (and I believe your saying the same thing) this is the period of "inflorescence meristem" activity. The response with short day plants when the photoperiod changes, in which compounds begin to break down the gibberellins (bloom inhibitor). The period lasts until the inibitors are removed. This gets section gets a specific NPK.
Peak Flowering - (Here again I believe your saying the same thing) From reading, this is the period of "Floral meristem" activity and is when floral organs begin to develop. In the research I found, this is what marks the beginning of flower, oddly enough. This section gets a specific NPK.
Late Flowering- Research I found into flowering stages didn't specifially categorize a separate section here; though it was pointed out that certain hormones do behave differently in late flower versus other stages. This section gets a specific NPK.
Flush- I guess many do this stage and I do also, but don't count as a stage per se.
So, I believe, I'm doing all the stages you mention (excluding veg) and that were talking about the same thing; just different terminology.
Sorry to be long or if I rambled. I'm crummy at short posts.
