Ok. Sounds like a mini flush. My experience when I was doing the wet/dry thing has been that the soil would take about 1/4 of the pot size in water so the 2 gallons is going to be much more than the soil will hold. Is this to ensure no dry pockets?
It is, and it ensures calcium is homogenous. I can't emphasize enough that it must be gentle and it must be even. Then let the plant drink the reservoir dry and follow what the water stick tells you.
If you have a plastic dish scrubby, use that with soap to scour the probe really well before it's 1st use to get factory grease off the metal. Rinse it really well then start using it. Steel wool works good too.
I also do droughting on my plants after week 6 and they go a full 10 days before I see wilting so it will be interesting to see how long it takes to get the meter readings you suggest.
When you drought next time, use your water stick lots just to see what is going on and where, inside the pot. Some spots will register a 2, while others say 6.
For those using cloth pots, stab the water stick thru the sides of the pot at numerous places around the circumference, and at 3 or 4 different levels. When you think it's time to water, stab first. See if the meter says you need water.
Still water if that's your comfort zone, but excess water means inadequate oxygen. One replaces the other. So trust the stick, step outside your comfort zone, follow the brix.
More brix means you are photosynthesizing more. That's the goal.
Just because your plant is under a kick-ass light doesn't mean it's photosynthesizing properly. Correct photosynthesis and now your game went up a notch.
Trace elements and minerals are easy. The trick is correct Calcium, Phosphorus, Carbon, Oxygen, and healthy abundant microbes/fungii under that kick-ass light.
Correct Calcium and Phosphorus need to be in the soil from day 1. Then if you water properly Oxygen is good, and CO2 is free from the air, so carbon is good. Then the plant produces excess exudates, and microbes/fungii become abundant and healthy.
The higher the brix before flip, the bigger and better the flowering. You need good photosynthesis before stretch. Stretch is brutally demanding.
Remember to check the weather before a brix reading. If you are experiencing a storm, or one is looming, add a point or 2 to what the refractometer is telling you. If you are in a good weather high pressure stretch, your brix reading is true.
Plants sense pressure drops and relocate sugars underground when a storm is coming.
And read your seed description. If it says that it likes moister or drier conditions, use the stick to cater to that. What that really means is some plants require more oxygen than others or more calcium than others.
Calcium and water go hand in hand, so if water is wrong, so is calcium.
Water supplies hydrogen, calcium is a buffer, so if watering is wrong causing calcium to be incorrect, PH isn't optimal. You have flux in your pot.
The microlife is exerting too much effort trying to balance the soil instead of doing what the plant needs it to do.
Water creates either aerobic or anaerobic conditions. Microbes are aerobic, that's why they are called beneficial aerobic soil microbes. They like the sauna, not the pool.
See why Emilya is so draconian on good water practices?
I don't care what anyone says or thinks, there is no product that blends air and water better than coarse perlite.
Theres a tip for you all on the next batch of soil you build.
If you insist on a different aereator, at least try perlite so you can have a point of reference.
Don't blindly trust the internet. Don't trust me either, go see for yourself.
Just benchmark what the industry standard gives you first, and perlite is the industry standard. Learn to use it correctly, then try anything else you please after that.
As Keff has said so many times, organics is really easy if you get the basics correct.
Brix is the basics. Plants are dictated by DNA to build sugars.
They are solar powered water pumps that make sugar exhaust.
Microbes sequester that sugar exhaust. They like the sauna.
Help them.
If your doing everything correct and your plant still looks droopy, or isn't growing very fast, there's about an 85% chance your pot needs more warmth. Saunas are warm. Warmth takes standing water and puts it into the air.
Leaves get a slight mottling to them in cold soil.
Temperature sways PH. It's all tied together.
That's why PH pens show temp too.
