Thank you for the great information Cultivator. I've been growing in coco for the last 6 months and its been a disaster, but after reading your post I realize I was underfeeding my plants. I used to grow in sunshine soil and would feed 700-800 ppm total (R/O), daily with no runoff and had great success. That same formula was disastrous in coco. Is this because sunshine advanced #4 "soil" has a higher Cation Exchange Capacity? I don't understand why Hydro can handle much higher feed concentrations than soil (sunshine)...
Also, I have been feeding at your recommended strength with Cyco Nutrients. Their base contains CalMg and supposedly you don't have to add extra CALMG. I upped my last few feedings to 1050-1100 ppm (x700) or 1.5-1.6 ec and my plants look great! (wk 5 veg )Thank you!
My main question is: Do you feed full strength every day? I've had good success with feeding full strength M-Th for example and then lowering the strength to 1/2 or 3/4 strength Fr-Sun. To allow the plants to acclimate to higher feed strengths, but from what I am gathering this is not necessary in your opinion?
One of my friends runs rockwool cubes (recirculating) and he will feed 2 ec Monday through Friday and then add water to the reservoir Friday through Sunday to dillute EC. He wrote a book called 3 a light, it really popular in Colorado. Would you recommend something similar with the coco regimen? Or is this not necessary.
We can't get Buddhas Tree nutes in the states very easily....booo. I was going to try your formula but it seems like a hassle to order internationally, hopefully Cyco works well with coco. Cheer! and thank you for any info in advance.
Welcome
Im pleased you have found my post useful, its always great to hear its working elsewhere as it just backs up the fact that im a genius!!! HAHAHA Only joking mate.
I have a journal in my signature now that i only startes a week or so ago and that wiĺl be all coco i think and plants atr seedlings right now so you will see how i do things right through start to finish if you check it out and there will be other grows in there that i have elsewhere etc, so packes with fun stuff. Please drop by and check it out.
So yeah the biggest mistake people make with coco is treating it like soil. Its definately not soil and doesnt behave like it at all, its far superior to grow in once you have an understanding of it.
There are different ways to approach it however and somepeople keep the coco wet and others allow it to dry out. Neither is right or wrong but there arw pros and cons with both ways. Firstlh i will say never let the coco dry out completely to the point leaves start to wilt. This is bad because the excess salts in the coco will burn the roots and cause nute lockouts.
You definately want to be feeding with nutrients minimum once daily, absolute minimum requirement. Now it depends on multiple varibles also on the number of feeds and quantity given. How much light are you running per m2, small pots usually require more feeds than big pots as they dry out faster, are you hand feeding or running an automated set up and is it run to waste or recirculating?
You dontvwant to keep coco wet in my opinion as it invites pests like fungus gnats which can be a pain to deal with and wet pots will raise the RH of the grow room. Depending where you are located this can be a good thing or a bad thing.
Growing in coco is very similar to rockwool so following your friends methods will likely be sound as long as yoyr ph range is between 5.4-6.2 and in rockwool feeds can be slightly stronger but the methods are almost identical.
I start seeds on 0.6-0.8ec (my starting water is usually 0.2/0.3ec) and i do this to condition the coco the coco to have an even ec and ph throyghout. Its a good idea on the first feeding of coco to give a nice amount of run off, 10%ish, just to ensure coco is same throughout. When the seedlings are small you can feed every 2 or 3 days until you start getting some roots going, mycorrhizae and a good root stim will help enormously with that. Then you want daily feeds and just gradually build up the ec as the plant grows.
Coco cannot be overwater unless it is sitting in a tray or container and the run off cant escape anywhere or if the water is too warm, this will cause all kinds of problems with root rot and pathogens. 69f is perfect water temp but because coco has little air pockets that will trap air also. It just means if the water temp is bang on the plant roots can take on more dissolve o2 which super charges growth.
So that takes me to your question on how is it possible to feed strong daily unlike soil, well it boils down mostly to the rootzone. Coco by itself is very very favourable to the rootzobe. It is light and airy and holds onto the perfect amount of moisture and no matter how much you water the coco will not carry on to hold water, the same can not be said about soil in general. Take 2 pots side by side and fill one with soil and the other with coco. Lets say 10 litre pots, put 20 litres of water through each and watch what happens. The coco will get saturated fullybthen thecwater will just flush through, soil will hold way more water and drain slower. Now pick each pot up and weigh them, there will be a huge difference. Fact most soils arent great for cannabis to grow in as they have to really work for their nutes out of the soil and o2 saturation is low hence why yoy must let the pots dry out between waterings. In coco its much easier for the plants to use up the nutes in the coco, even when using organics and the abundance of o2 in roots makes them expkode. You will rarely if ever see roots like this in soil.......
These roots are the norm for me in coco!!!
So you can adapt your ec throughout the week and it depends on a couple of things really, your room enviroment as yoyr rh and temps will dictate how much ec your plants can handle at a given time, the genetics of the plant will also come into it also as some are more nutrient sensitive than others and finally your experience growing. The last one dictates just about everything because when you can see the plants needs just by walking in the room youve nailed and then you woyld j7at adjust by using youe eyes and senses, problem is that it takes a flipping lot of growing to get there.
Ive not heard of Cyco brand mate but just use it and see. Generally your base nutes need to be coco specific as they have different demands to soil. But most synthetic additives should cross between soil and coco, only the strength and frequency of feeds would differ.
Im sorry this post was a bit long winded, ive probs still missed something out, but its important to understand how different coco growing is to soil but when you dial itvin you wont go back to growing in soil..
Id love to write a book one day on growing in coco and maybe share some of the adventures ive had while doing so, theres def a good story in me haha. But i didnt think anyone bought books any more, especially on growing because of the way the laws have changed over the past 10 years, peoplecare more willing to share their experinces on youtube and forums like this now. I wish id had the tools to learn that are availble for free now!! I remember when i joined this forum 8 years or so ago that the feel was very different, still alot of paranoia about sharing info and i guess rightly so as prison isnt fun. But thanks to forums like this, access to information has never been easier.
Please check out my current journal, im sure you will enjoy it.
