Yea i started to giv them cal-mag a few times b4 i found out tht i was supposed to giv them jus plain water
Did they appear to have a calcium and/or a magnesium deficiency?
You should make sure that Roots Organics can be used in hydro.
Aurora Innovations said:
SHOULD I USE ROOTS ORGANICS OR SOUL FOR MY LIQUID NUTRIENTS?
If you grow with Soilless, pure coco, or a hydro system, you want to use Soul. While Soul should be the choice for virtually any media that is not soil, it performs fantastically in soil. In contrast, Roots Organics liquid nutrients rely on an active soil to breakdown the fertilizer into available nutrients for the plant. There are still high quality organics in Soul, but there is a mineral backbone that is immediately available for the plant to keep it highly functional in a pure hydroponics situation. You can use Soul with great success in soil, but we do not recommend using Roots Organics base nutrients in hydroponic settings.
So here's the deal. You should add cal-mag to RO water if you have or if you anticipate a calcium or a magnesium deficiency.
Okay, that's already been covered, I see. (I'm behind on the thread - as usual these days :rolleyes3 .)
I use tap water that is de-chlorinated by just sitting out overnight. Let's just call it being frugal.
So do you feel that there's sufficient calcium - and in an a form that is available to the plants - in your water already, then?
I'm using tap water. I got thick skin, lol, so in my case let's go ahead and call it not having the 29 cents to waste on a fancy gallon of water.
I have calcium nitrate available if I need it for calcium supplementation. I was a tiny bit concerned about the "extra" nitrogen, but I was doing some semi-random skimming on a nutrient company's website... And noticed that they must be the only one out there that
doesn't sell a "cal-mag" product. Instead, I saw passing mention that, if one observes a deficiency with either of those, he/she should simply add a little extra of one of the "grow" components. So I'm guessing that company isn't worried about a little nitrogen boost, lol.
I also have some Epsom salt for magnesium. And for sulfur, I suppose :icon_roll .
Besides taking up less floor space are there benefits to the plant itself from starting in small pots as opposed to the final large pot?
Well, the "taking up less floor space" isn't exactly insignificant, lol. It means you can get by with less lighting than if the same plants were spread out into 3x the space.
If you place a little seedling - or clone - into a small container and thoroughly water it, you'll probably see things dry up in a normal amount of time. If, OtOH, you place it into a great big container and thoroughly water it... Your seedling isn't likely to have roots growing all through the media. It doesn't have the leaf mass that it'd need to transpire a significant amount of the moisture. Basically, the vast majority of the moisture in the media will be there until it just evaporates. Now, among other things... In the meantime, your seedling - with its rather basic root system - is only accessing a small portion of that media. Generally, the soil on top seems to dry out first. You have a layer of dry media over a much larger amount of wet media. At that point, the rate of evaporation slows (AfaIK). And your seedling's roots are probably still in the - now - dry portion of the media.
When not running DWC, I like to be in the position of having to thoroughly water every three days or so. For ME, not having small plants in large containers fits this style. But, like much else, I don't really stick to one method (even in the same grow).
K so here is my newest addition to the hempire a purple kush clone in a 2liter but this one is done all bit differently I finally found a use for my giant clippings
take a look at my newest family member lol
Interesting. I've thought about trying to do something similar (only without the big hole
) in order to get the entire two liter volume. But I had concerns, primarily that the stem might get as big as the bottle opening - and be restricted from getting any larger. Although I suppose that could be... an
overly optimistic concern, lol.
I can think of reasons both for and against retaining the bottle's top and growing a plant through the opening. I've never seen someone do it. I'll have to remember to try and keep track of your plant so I can see how it goes (well, I hope).
Also I was wondering if I cud use this or would it not be a good idea I figured since it had silica in it it would be a good idea but I can't read the label since it's worn off and I haven't had the time to look it up online but it's protekt from dyna gro
I've seen the product mentioned from time to time over the years. Ensuring that there is
some silica available is almost certainly a good idea, as it appears to be useful to the plant in maintaining its health. I bought a little tub of General Hydroponics' Rare Earth years ago for that purpose. I still have it, and it's still almost full, lol. I put a tiny little bit - which turned out to be
WAY too much, lmao - into a DWC reservoir one day and returned the next evening to find the plant dead, with most of its leaves on the floor. I think it must have spiked my pH up to 10.0 or above, IDK. I had a working pH meter at the time, but was "a little" upset and didn't bother to check.
I've been thinking about digging that Rare Earth back out of the shed. I'm just worried about using too much again. I don't think I could have killed that plant any faster unless I'd have grabbed the machete.
It says 1/2 to 1 teaspoon per gallon of water in recirculating systems. This is a passive system. If it were me I'd go with less than that recommendation. I'm not familiar with the product though. Maybe someone with more experience'll chime in.
Technically, it's a
drain-to-waste passive system... with a reservoir. The recirculating rate is most likely in regards to DWC. I'd
GUESS that the suggested DTW rate would be a bit higher - but that's just a guess. And, as per above, I'm a little squeamish about potentially adding too much silica. It'll probably help that this product appears to be weaker than the Rare Earth (which is a dry, fine, grit).
When you water your hempies, do you water until you get significant runoff? Or do you stop as soon as you see a very small amount coming out of the hole? That might make a difference in how you mix your nutrients, if you're not regularly flushing any "leftovers" out when you add in new.
It can also be used as a foliar at 1/2 tsp per gallon.
That reminds me, I need to find a little spray bottle. I had an old Windex one that I was saving, but I rinsed the bottle and when I tried to spray a quantity of water through the sprayer in order to rinse it, the thing refused to even dribble. I do have a bottle of Shout that still works. Perhaps I'll have to discover a lot more stains on my jeans tomorrow when I do laundry, lol? I hate to waste the stuff as it's kind of expensive for what it is. But I wanted to spray some DNF Gold (solution) onto a plant before it got too far along in flower and, well... That may have already happened - and, if not, it must be close.
My little ones in hempy could probably use some of that stuff. Stems on mine appear weak but I'm determined to test this whole process with only the Osmocote +.
I'm going to keep an open mind about supplementing. I'll be
attempting to go a little light on the Osmocote Plus for that reason. But the plants will probably be light feeders anyway, lol, so it may not work out all that "light" in practice. IDK.
Although I'm not totally disappointed with hempy in general, my preference is still soil.
Mine will probably always be DWC in large reservoirs (one plant per). I loved everything from the sound of the things (sleep aid
) to the ability to see those awesome healthy white roots filling a 20+ gallon container. I didn't like the few times I tried getting the reservoir to the tub by myself, lol, but quickly learned not to do a reservoir change right after I topped the thing off. And a LARGE plant will go through gallons of water every day, so it was easy to catch it with little left in it. Later I sort of stopped doing weekly reservoir changes and waited to see if a problem would occur that necessitated a change. That
mostly didn't happen; a person gets used to how their plants react when they add a certain thing. It's like not bothering to check pH because you know the plant has used up a good bit of phosphorous and so you're about to add some back - which will drop the pH back to around 5.8 anyway. That kind of thing is probably why I'm feeling so lost now, lol... No meter and no experience with the nutrients (which are old). So I'm flying blind - but unlike the "hapless newbie," I once was halfway decent at IFR
, and can kind of remember the difference between a plant that was in the sweet spot the entire grow and one that was all over the place (or simply in a bad place the whole time).
Rambling. Haven't done that for ages (at least an hour or two).
Does anyone else running a perlite only Hempy use Hydrogen Peroxide in their water?
Personally, I consider consumer-strength H₂O₂ to be a useful supplement, both for its antimicrobial effects and because its decomposition produces oxygen.
But I don't run "organics" as a rule. If you're trying to build an actual planetary biosphere in your container, in which you feed a bunch of microbial life and, therefore, must depend on it crapping out nutrients in a form that your plant can use, then the concept of dosing your plants with an antimicrobial oxidant is probably not a good one to contemplate, lol. I mean... If you kill off Mama Bird, what's going to predigest the nutrients for the plant? But if you're just feeding your plants directly, I'd count it as a beneficial supplement.
Just MY opinion, of course. As in all things, YMMV.
if i didnt use beneficial bacteria and such i would probably use a lil peroxide as well.
Yeah, that's the thing. I actually got a bottle of something or other one day when I was at a nursery and had a few dollars. I got home and actually LOOKED at the label, and it's got lots of different microbial life in it; basically, that's all that it is :icon_roll . I might use it. According to the label, the state of California has determined that it'll cause cancer, so it's probably good stuff. If I do use it, I'll have to re-dose a few hours after using H₂O₂.
1stCavApache. Hempy is an enticing method, eh? I'm sure you'll take to it. The medium is much easier to handle than soil, IMO. Much easier on that healing back too. 
