Re: 420 Consumer Reports Competition - Haight Solid State vs. Hydro Grow LED
I totally agree with OMM, I love coming by your journal just for your photography and for your obvious love of what you are doing. Nice place to hang out
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That's very kind of you MountainHigh.
I do enjoy doing this
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BTW, your explanation of your watering technique has gotten me to adopt it, I was being pretty conservative, just watering until I start to see runoff. I will make sure they get a much more thorough watering each time, my pots happen to fit in a 5 gallon bucket so it works out nicely.
I just love this place, I learn so much about plant care.
brother
I had someone ask me in PM about the watering, so I thought I would expand a little more. I look forward to watering/feeding! It's a bit of work, but so rewarding when you see your plants respond and prosper!
First, I love your 5-gallon bucket idea! I'm going to use one from now on instead of the milk crate over dishpan arrangement I've been using. Thanks!
It's important to avoid having plants sitting in their runoff when watering because we're trying to flush salts, not bathe the roots in them. With that in mind, I will either drill a hole or several small holes in the center of the bucket lid so the water can drain into the bucket, or I may not use the lid and put something in the bottom of the bucket to hold the pots up out of the runoff. Either way should work, the second way probably safer for the more clumsy amongst us
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The container you're going to catch the runoff with, dish pan, bucket, whatever, needs to be clean and neutral. I rinse it out with RO or distilled water and then dry it.
When I start watering, I go slow and moisten the entire surface layer of the soil and let that soak in for a few seconds. That really helps the remainder of the watering to soak in evenly. Sometimes, since the soil is dry and pulled away from the sides of the pot, you get runoff right away because the water is running straight down that gap and not soaking in.
Maybe some of this stuff is very basic, but I sure didn't know it when I started growing. If I saw runoff, I assumed the pot was saturated.
After the surface of the soil is moist, I use my garden sprayer with the spray tip set to a fairly fine but strong spray in order to oxygenate the water, and try to water evenly over the pot until I get a small amount of runoff for a PH check. I measure the PH of the first few ounces of runoff as that's the most acccurate.
I don't check the PH in every pot because it should be very close since all the plants are on the same regimen. In this grow, I'm checking one pot out of each group.
Runoff PH is generally going to be lower than what's going in because soil tends to go acidic.
Then I just use the sprayer to give them enough water/nutes to get 25% runoff. The layer of hydroton on top has really helped keep the soil from being displaced or flying out. That amount of runoff gives me confidence that the pots are well-saturated, and that excess salts have been flushed out. If I need to speed up the process for any reason, I just shake the 3-gallon bottle of water or nute solution to oxygenate it and then use a regular watering can, but I'd rather use the sprayer if I have the time.
As the pots drain, I pick them up and tilt them around so that water comes out of each drain hole to prevent having any dry pockets in there. If the water takes longer to drain out of any particular hole, you just avoided a dry area, and I see that frequently even if I think I'm watering evenly at the top.
I set my draining pots on a couple of old bath towels while I'm watering dry ones so that they don't sit in their runoff. I'm sure there's better solutions.
Wow, that's a lot of words to describe simply watering a pot, but if the devil's not in the details, I know good bud is
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thanks brother
