Help pH keeps climbing!

[TWINTURBODOGO]

Hello all, we have 2 plants in dwc 4 weeks in veg now.

Started at the end of week 2 we noticed the ph rose a lil every day.
Week 3 after water change it spiked over night from 5.3 to 6.3! We brought it back down to 6.0 and the next day it was back up to 6.2! Brought it back down to 6.0 and again the same thing back up to 6.3!

We began a flush with ph'd r/o at 5.8 it too started to rise, no nutes just root additives. 3 days of flush.

We thought maybe the ph spikes put the girls into lockout. But after posting pics on here and asking for advice.
We got some folks who said they looked hungry and that was probably our issue.

So we added in nutes and bumped up from 600ppm to 1000 ppm. I know that was a huge jump and may not be good. We miss judged our dosage Oops!

Our ph at time of nutes was 6.0 and it has risen up to 6.4 again in one day!

Worried we're going to hurt our plants any thoughts would be great thanks guys and gals!

 

[TWINTURBODOGO]

We plant in 5g of r/o water using rockwool and hydroton in net pots.

Our nutes are
Botanicare pro grow
Botanicare pure blend tea
Skunk labs silica
GH cal/mag
Orca
Hygrozyme
Hydroguard

Can it be our nutes mixture driving up the ph or maybe the rockwool? We didn't see this with our first grow

 

[Croatsan]

Hi TWINTURBODOGO

How much are they drinking daily? Is your hydroton rinsed thoroughly? Are you using R/O water or tap? I see you're using CalMag, then it's probably R/O. If so, I'd switch to tap. Are your res temps fluctuating? Do you see any effect on the plants? I don't. If not, I wouldn't worry too much.

Check your res for algae. They could cause PH problems even before they became visible to the naked eye. Maybe the light is creeping into your res. Perhaps it's the case of too much bennies? I see you're using both, Orca and Hydroguard. I'd ditch the Orca.

PH fluctuations might actually benefit the plant - different nutrients are available at different PH levels. I use Dutch Formula Micro which acts as an excellent PH buffer. My PH is rock solid. And that's exactly what I don't want. Locking down your PH might actually, well, if not harm then, definitely, not benefit the plan fully. As a matter of fact, I have to force my PH to fluctuate "manually". I lower it to 5.5, then raise it to 6.5. Daily.

I bet you have a PH meter which measures PH up to three decimals and that's precisely the reason I don't use it. I use test drops. With PH, all I need is a ballpark value.

There are some PH buffers for aquariums, from what I hear they work well, perhaps you should try that if you insist on a steady PH. It works for fish, it should work for plants

Bottom line - IMO you're using a lot of stuff. Makes it harder to find a culprit. In this stage I use only root stimulator, enzymes, grow, micro and a tiny bit of bloom.

All the best.

 

[TWINTURBODOGO]

Hi thanks for responding, yes we do use r/o.
Our tap water here is horrible that's why we use r/o.
Ph swing I know is good but we thought for hydro the ph should be 5.2 to 6.0 and ours will get higher then that of left unchecked.

We do have plant problems, it's hard to see but the leaves are yellowing can see it better in 3rd pic. While in flush our new growth started to yellow a bit. That's why we added nutes back in.
Our res temps are low 70's I know that's not great but it's the same conditions we had our first plants in and they did fine.
Pretty sure no light leaks into the res. We have our net post covered with panda film to help keep light form getting through.

We're lost as to what's goin on! Lol

 

[Croatsan]

"Horrible" really doesn't explain much. What's so horrible about your tap water? High PH? Chlorine? Too much calcium? High ppm? Low ppm? Bad taste?

Do an experiment. Switch to tap. A friend of mine did and he's delighted. Tap water has PH buffers, R/O doesn't.

There is a chance (although small) that your meter is off. Recalibrate. Get PH test drops and compare the results.

When (if) you do a res change with tap go simple - grow, micro, hydroguard and see what happens. Micro is an excellent PH buffer and by using tap water there's no need for CalMag. Your bennies will be fine in tap water.

IMO there's simply too much stuff in your res, something's off and you need to apply a system of elimination to figure out what it is.

Again, have you rinsed your hidroton thoroughly? I know that can cause high PH. Happened to me.

And one more thing comes to mind - is your air pump working well? Airstones clogged? Enough bubbles in your res?

But before (if) you do any of the above, let your PH rise to the max first. Nothing will happen to the plants for a day or two. See where's the upper limit and how high it's gonna climb. Because, IMO, 6.4 is really no reason for concern.

Regards.

 

[TWINTURBODOGO]

Our tap water has 1500 ppm when tested it tasted funky. And has failed to meet water guide lines a few times and was advised by the city not to drink it. They say all is well now and safe. It has been a while since the last city notice also. So maybe we will try that.

We thought maybe our ph meter was off so we used test drops and recalibrated the meter and still the same.

We did rinse the hydroton but didn't soak the rockwool in ph'd water before starting.

Maybe we'll cut back on the nutes and see how it goes.

Funny our first grow we had just pro grow, cal/mag and hydroguard.
We only added all the other stuff cause folks told us we were missing things like Orca for fungi, silica, and enzymes.
The pure blend tea we just thought would be a good extra boost.

As far as air stones and pump, they're all all new to this grow and making twice as much air as the first grow.

I'll check the ph now and see what it's done since yesterday.

Thank you for your help!

 

[Croatsan]

Funny our first grow we had just pro grow, cal/mag and hydroguard.
We only added all the other stuff cause folks told us we were missing things like Orca for fungi, silica, and enzymes.
The pure blend tea we just thought would be a good extra boost.

I think you've just diagnosed the problem. One extra boost after another and pretty soon things can get out of control.

You're welcome.

 

[TWINTURBODOGO]

Maybe so we were told by people and read posts about all this stuff being good for it lol.
I'm sure it all is, maybe just not how we're doin it.

Our ph this morning is 6.0. They drink about 1/4 to 1/3 gal a day.

Gonna monitor them a couple days now and if it keeps going weird well switch to less and try tap water.

Here are some pics of the yellow tops

 

[Major PITA]

My only experience with a hydro grow recently used rockwool cubes. I hated it. I was never able to keep the PH in check. I rinsed the cubes first and adjusted their PH down before the grow. I had so much trouble, I decided to measure the PH of the rockwool all by itself. It kept raising the PH of plain water. I'll blame it for the issues you are having with the PH climbing.

 

[TWINTURBODOGO]

Did you switch to soil or use a different medium for hydro.

If it is the rockwool then what could we use to sprout seeds in instead?

 

[Major PITA]

Did you switch to soil or use a different medium for hydro.

If it is the rockwool then what could we use to sprout seeds in instead?

I lived with the mess until it finished. It was by far the lowest producing grow I've had.
I'm not a hydro guy (see above) so I'm not the best one to ask. I switched to soil-less grows and never looked back. The buffering ability of a good mix makes PH worries disappear.
However, I think sprouting in a little rockwool would be fine. A small amount isn't going to have much impact on the PH of a 5 gal. bucket of solution.

 

[Croatsan]

I will go on a limb here and say that PH of the rockwool is not that important. When the seedling sprouts it takes all the nutrients it needs from the seed itself. Only when the roots start developing (granted, that is pretty quickly) PH comes into play.

Same goes for flushing. I'd say there's no need to adjust PH of the water for a flush because the aim is to flush the salt and nutrient buildup with a torrent of water. Absorption of the nutrients is of no significance. You can flush with any PH.

 

[TWINTURBODOGO]

Maybe for next grow we'll use a small corner of the rockwool to sprout seeds.

For now we'll take it easy on the girls and see how it goes hopefully the ph will level out and stop goin up.

 

[Croatsan]

Small corner or a large corner - it's still rockwool. A small piece is not going to behave differently than a large one just because it's smaller.

 

[TWINTURBODOGO]

Ph down to 5.7 today gonna just keep an eye on it and hope it keeps below 6.1 from now on.
Hoping the yellowing of the new growth stops now that the ph is back in range.

 

[Cultivator]

your ph will climb as the plant feeds, its normal. Also diff nutes behave differently. I use advanced nutes 3 part ph perfect and its great for hydro. i set ph at 5.8 it rises to 6.2 after a few days then i readjust to 5.8 and its climbed back to 6.2 by the time i change res.

what exactly are you adding to the res and in what quanties? 1.4ec is strong enough in veg or 700ppm.

Not sure why you are flushing the plant, that will cause you more problems. dont give plain water until the end of the grow.

If your base nute strength is correct and mixed corretly dont worry, make sure its specific hydro nutrient suitable for use with ro water. Just let the plants grow.

 

[TWINTURBODOGO]

We also try to keep or ph below 6.1 in the 5.8 range.
We started week 4 of veg at 5.3 ph and 570ppm. Overnight ph jumped to 6.3 and kept spiking to mid 6's after each correction.
This was going on for the firstfew days after water change.
So flushed for bout 3 days, after noticing some leaf yellowing and spotting.
Figured it was due to the ph, maybe lockout.
We have now upped our nutes and added back to res now and ph was still goin up to 6.3-6.4 the first day or so.
But it's back down, hopping it stays that way now. And the yellowing tops get better.

Only concern is still they upped their drinking from a 1/4 gal a day to 1/2 gal a day. But ppm's are rising instead of staying steady with water drop.
Suggesting their thirsty but not taking up nutes.
Hope they start and it's not lockout!

 

[TWINTURBODOGO]

We have a whole list of our nutes in our first posts.

 

[Cultivator]

yes i saw the list of nutes but was wonering in what quanitities you are adding things.

Is that nute range designed for hydro? I have never ran that base nute. It could be that its not stable enough for DWC hence the large spikes. try changing your base nute to a specific hydro feed. i like AN ph perfect 3part or Ionic hydro veg/bloom. Both work well and stay stable in the res.

 

[Croatsan]

It says on their site: "Formulated for all hydroponics and soil applications". Should be stable. I run also only basic nutes, three-part Dutch Formula - Grow, Bloom, Micro. They're meant to work togethet and they do. Micro is an excellent stabilizer. When I mix everything together, I have to lower pH only 0.5 points. I don't have personal experience with "Botanicare". I just believe other "kits" behave in a similar manner.

It's just that there's also lots of other stuff in the mix and that, IMO, could create problems.

I really wouldn't worry so much about these pH swings. They're within limits.