One of the most frequently asked questions in growing period is about nutrients. You could constantly chase your tail trying to find the right way to use nutrients. In my opinion nutrients are necessary but not as important as environment or light. Both environment and light can change the amount of nutrients your plant needs but the nutrients can't say the same about effecting the other two. It is still important to get the nutrients schedule correct but the hard part is everyones grow area is different, requiring different needs for the plants. Learning about nutrients is something worth doing. It's eye opening. I tried to follow people's schedules and realized I never fully understood what I was giving my plants and at what stages they needed boosts or decreases in certain nutrients.
With that being said I use GH products for now. It's the 3 part series as a base with cal-mag. I run a few additives as well. I might add one or two more to the lineup but am really happy with all these. They are affordable and I get very good results.
Here is my feed schedule. If I decide to veg longer then I will just follow week 5's veg nutrients until ready. With that being said, you have to learn how to read your plants. different strains use different levels of each nutrient. Some of them drink more than others. This is just my rough guide.
I also pre-treat any coco that I use with a soaking of 1-1-1 N-P-K and a PPM of around 350 with cal-mag being about 150. Aways pretreat your coco and soak it. Coco is a medium with nothing in it. If you give your plant nothing it will not like it! This is one of the most common problems when transplanting or even from growing the seed from the beginning. The plant needs calcium and it can't get any unless the coco has some sort of nutes loaded into it. I also sprinkle Great White on the roots when I transplant to help the roots not miss a beat when transplanting and hopefully causing little stress when transplanting.
I water with nutes everyday and I usually mix up 5 gallons each time and then use that to water for a couple days. In the beginning I try to keep the coco relatively damp and not saturated. I am a firm believer that roots want to go exploring and if they are have enough water then they won't. A larger root mass means a larger plant and more bud potential. I run a drain to waste system by hand feeding but I don't always want to see runoff. In the first weeks of veg I get very little runoff ever. As the plants get larger and enter vigorous veg I start to get runoff every few waterings. By the time they are late veg/early flower I am watering twice a day. The first watering I don't want runoff and usually if I give the same amount a while later it will cause just a little runoff. This happens daily, by now the roots have filled the pot and the plant should be focusing on bud swelling.
Once a week I water to runoff of about 30% just to flush out any buildup of salts. I usually will only water once the next day to keep things from over-saturating. You will not kill your plants by overwatering in coco but you can do damage to the roots if they are constantly soaked. The very last week I flush the plants about 7 days before I want to pull them and use Florakleen and ph to 5.8. I measure runoff until it is the same as what is coming out and then from there on out I water as needed with regular, unPH'd water until the end. The Florakleen breaks down any remaining salts and the water flushes them out. By PH'ing to 5.8 it allows the plant to grab anything else it needs before I lock it out with regular water so it can finish.
The best way to determine how much to water is to pick your whole plant up right after you give it a full watering (with some drainage coming out the bottom). Use that as your gauge for how much the plant needs. I like to keep my plants to where they are asking for water a little bit everyday. The pots are usually pretty light when I pick them up. I noticed in my last grow the saturation of roots happened at the bottom of the pots mainly. I am using Hydroton this time to prevent that.
My water is a ppm of 34, which is great. I make beer as well and we are known for having some of the best water. In coco it is essential to always keep cal-mag levels at a certain base. Plants in coco use a lot of both. I fill my 5 gallon bucket with water and then add cal-mag until my PPM is 200. After that I add nutes to hit the PPM for the week using the N-P-K ratios listed in the table. These ratios are based on what the plant needs at given points in the 9 week flower lifecycle.
This is why understanding your nutes is important. The guides on bottles do an OK job of getting a plant to grow minus the fact that you should always cut back 1/2 or 1/3 on what is recommended. Their ratios are also ok but won't produce the best results. The Lucas Formula is the same thing. It's a good idea to learn using these guides but ultimately they aren't ideal. I've combined everything I've read and tried and this is the best for me and what I use.
Perfect I have a set of the flora series and need to use them not opened stores in cool dark place basement .
Think they still be good? One day I want to try a different nute so I can practice ph downing lol
But need notes on feeding .
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