The Gee Spot - You Finally Found It

[Carmen Ray]

Right @Gee64 , I’m definitely gunna need to get heat on my pots, there definitely too cold

And with the watering, I have 2 ten litre buckets out,
And yeah iv got loads of the yellow ph pens, and the calibration fluid that I do about 20 times each time I test the water, it’s a pain lol,

When I first start my grow, I get a litre of water and add some freshly squeezed lemon juice until I get the water where I want it, with this grow I’m aiming for between 6.2 and just below 6.5.
obviously when I grow with the bottled nutes it’s different,
Anyway, when I know huw much lemon juice per litre, I multiply for the 10 litre bucket, once I add the lemon juice to the bucket, I test again to make sure everything’s where it should be

But here’s where I go wrong. I know that its 2mil of lemon juice to the lite of water,
That was when I first started the grow and I was getting to just below 6.5 and I just carry on with them measurements.
I checked the other day and it’s down to just over 6.1
So I don’t know if it’s dropped even more in the pots.

And yeah as I said earlier, when I get to run off I put them on the towel , I was leaving them in the trays a few watering ago but they started sucking back the run off, so iv stopped doing it like that

I'd like to suggest the use of cake cooling racks to place your pots on in their saucers. They act as perfect raisers. Also, I just bought a reptile heating mat from a pet supply store.

 

[StoneOtter]

And I never got near a train yesterday unfortunately, I was indoors helping to make processes more efficient. Man o man do railways have a lot of processes that don't talk to each other.

Great people tho, they are all train junkies and love what they do more than most industry, and if you show them a new efficiency they are all over it. One improvement makes so many peoples day better there, so it was fun. I'm going back next week. No train for Gee, no improvements for them.

Usually change is a struggle but over there it's embraced. They my bitches now

And man can they work. 12-16 hour days and they love it. They all are doing their passion, it makes you jealous quickly. They get paid really well and all say the same thing. " I can't believe I get paid to do this!"

Lucky bunch they are.

Central control is an amazing place down this way in public transit. I didn't work in that area but they moved my work around every day with automatic operation. Way cooler than anyone could imagine on 100+ year old rails! You doing freight or folks?

 

[Kaldean]

The heat tubes... Those are pretty cool and look very efficient, but they are for raising room temperature not soil temperature.

Heat mats directly contact the pots and raise soil temps.

I'm not saying you shouldn't use the tubes to warm your tent, in fact they look like they are fantastic for that, but you need the direct contact of a heat mat to raise soil temps adequately. And G is right, they do look cold.

Water temps effect soil temps too, so if you warm the tent and store your water in the tent your water won't be a cold shock every time you use it.

Vent it for a day and then put it in the tent to warm if you can. If not, keep it in the warmest part of your house.

Think that warm summer rain that makes the garden outside explode, you want that.

Hello @Gee64
Iv bookmarked that run through you posted on how it all works , great knowledge mate

I will be going over it a few dozen times to get my head round it all lol, my first thought thou is, now I’m starting to understand why having bigger pots is much better, you don’t need to be forcing anything with littler pots. It’s gunna make it hard work, exactly where I am lol

And yeah the heat tube is ok for lights out to keep the tent warm, but it’s not good for the pots,
And @g-one-three was saying about big heat mats for the tent, they sound good but I elevate my pots at all different heights to keep the canopy level, so I’m not sure how effective they would be, but I did find some last night, individual ones that are used for brewing, they will fit under my pots lovely, and they have adjustable heat, there a bit expensive but iv only gotta buy them once, so yeah I’m looking at getting them

And my EWC’s are coming today, am I still waiting for them to dry out and then another water with calmag ? Or do you think that one dose was enough ?

And thanks mate for all your help,
it’s very much appreciated

 

[Kaldean]

I'd like to suggest the use of cake cooling racks to place your pots on in their saucers. They act as perfect raisers. Also, I just bought a reptile heating mat from a pet supply store.

Hi @Carmen Ray
That’s funny cos I was looking at them racks last night, and the reptile heat mats you mention lol

I did find mats that are used for brewing, there round and will fit in my saucers lovely, and yep, I will be getting the racks

Thank you @Carmen Ray for your help

 

[Kaldean]

Most of the major grow tent suppliers will carry those heat mats. @VIVOSUN is where I got my big one, it's pretty inexpensive for the job it's been doing. I will say that I had to put a thick rubber mat under my tent for the heat mat to work more effectively.

Hello mate @g-one-three

And sorry mate, I got lost again with all the notifications, no stop here in it

I didn’t even think of the big heat mats like your saying, that would of definitely help out on all my other grows too lol

I did manage to find some individual ones thou mate, there used for home brewing and will fit in my saucers lovely,

Thank you mate for your help

 

[g-one-three]

Hello mate @g-one-three

And sorry mate, I got lost again with all the notifications, no stop here in it

I didn’t even think of the big heat mats like your saying, that would of definitely help out on all my other grows too lol

I did manage to find some individual ones thou mate, there used for home brewing and will fit in my saucers lovely,

Thank you mate for your help

Awesome! Those brewing warmers would work great for plastic pails. Hadn't even thought about those. Going to keep those in mind when I use my SIP buckets.

 

[Kaldean]

Awesome! Those brewing warmers would work great for plastic pails. Hadn't even thought about those. Going to keep those in mind when I use my SIP buckets.

I just ordered mine, be here tomorrow lol, and now to find one of those thingymajigs that measures brix, I like

 

[StoneOtter]

I used them like this when the tent's cold. Worked fine, I'm going to do it again this next grow through winter. 2 on 1 controller and the probe gets tucked in between them and the pot.

 

[Kaldean]

I used them like this when the tent's cold. Worked fine, I'm going to do it again this next grow through winter. 2 on 1 controller and the probe gets tucked in between them and the pot.

Cool mate, that looks nice and snug in there

Is that a cover over your soil ?
What’s that for ?

 

[StoneOtter]

Cool mate, that looks nice and snug in there

Is that a cover over your soil ?
What’s that for ?

Yes, the bucket is a EarthBox SIP and they use a solid plastic mulch cover. I'm not sure I'm going to use it for future grows. Although they do work for me in LOS I still have to feed cal/mag in the rez. I'm thinking I might be better off with bark chunks.

 

[013]

one feature of the soil cover is light blocking and (if the cover material is thick enough) it allows roots to propagate on top of the soil…

yup the elusive weed air-roots cuz they won’t develop unless it’s dark AF and moist too

also the ones that fit in saucer under your grow bags are potentially risky business… runoff water, the whole combination of electricity & water thing. Plus seedling heat mats are larger and can be tie wired or duct taped to sides of your smart pots as shown, but if heat mats are sitting up on cookie sheet above the drip pans then that should be ok

 

[Gee64]

Central control is an amazing place down this way in public transit. I didn't work in that area but they moved my work around every day with automatic operation. Way cooler than anyone could imagine on 100+ year old rails! You doing freight or folks?

freight for sure, maybe both? I didn't really get into product. It is an amazing system.

Tons of little systems, some old some new and one change anywhere has spiderweb results.

 

[Kaldean]

Yes, the bucket is a EarthBox SIP and they use a solid plastic mulch cover. I'm not sure I'm going to use it for future grows. Although they do work for me in LOS I still have to feed cal/mag in the rez. I'm thinking I might be better off with bark chunks.

There seems to be a lot of people using the sip and wick methods,
It would help me out loads, I have problems getting the watering done,
I may need to invest lol

Ole and what is the mulch thing actually for ?

 

[Kaldean]

one feature of the soil cover is light blocking and (if the cover material is thick enough) it allows roots to propagate on top of the soil…

yup the elusive weed air-roots cuz they won’t develop unless it’s dark AF and moist too

also the ones that fit in saucer under your grow bags are potentially risky business… runoff water, the whole combination of electricity & water thing. Plus seedling heat mats are larger and can be tie wired or duct taped to sides of your smart pots as shown, but if heat mats are sitting up on cookie sheet above the drip pans then that should be ok

Hi @013
I was just asking @StoneOtter what the cover was for lol, thanks for the info mate, now I know

And now your worried me about the mats
I do have inserts that go in the saucers to keep the pots off the runoff, and when I water, I take them out if the tent, and when runoff happens I sit my pots on a towel for a minute or 2 to soak up access,
Then I put them back in the saucers, so there is no runoff happening after their been watered, and these mats iv ordered are meant to be water proof, it just says don’t submerse them in water,
So I thought they would be ok ?

 

[Kaldean]

Hi @013
I was just asking @StoneOtter what the cover was for lol, thanks for the info mate, now I know

And now your worried me about the mats
I do have inserts that go in the saucers to keep the pots off the runoff, and when I water, I take them out if the tent, and when runoff happens I sit my pots on a towel for a minute or 2 to soak up access,
Then I put them back in the saucers, so there is no runoff happening after their been watered, and these mats iv ordered are meant to be water proof, it just says don’t submerse them in water,
So I thought they would be ok ?

That’s em here
Brewing Mate Home Brew Heat Pad Mat (Adjustable Power) https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0B11KG...sw_r_apin_dp_JRH1BX6TDDZJ0ZJBJPD7&starsLeft=1

 

[Ramblinrose1965]

Ok, grab a coffee.

RR those are solid readings. Your soil is working well and also nicely balanced if you are in the mid to upper teens. Well done!

Follow that line, it will easily tell you 2 things. One is the state of the calcium, which is vital, and 2 is the amount of sugars that your plant has created and stored by the end of the day, and sugar in the leaf is a direct reflection of how well you photosynthesized during the day. So 1 is the state of your calcium, and 2 is the state of photosynthesis.

Now here is where it gets a little tricky. To raise photosynthesis, and this applies if your brix is 7 or 17 or 23, think of each day as a lap.

The plant takes in nutrients at the root, moves it up to the leaves, and photosynthesizes it into sugars, which are carbon based energy molecules.

Then the plant uses as much sugar to function as it requires and pushes the remaining sugars down to and out of the roots. That sugar going to the soil is called exudates.

It feeds myco, which is a fungus that lives in the dark so cannot photosynthesize it's own sugars to get carbon, and the soil microbes that require carbon. The fungus in return tells the roots where to squirt those exudates so the microbes will eat the sugary dirt to create the poop that contains what the plant requires that day.

Then that poop (plant food) goes into the root and the next lap starts.

So in most peoples minds photosynthesis is created by light exposure, and they aren't wrong, but the amount of light exposure both in intensity and volume over the day must not be greater than what that lap can create for food into the root, or the plant will suddenly require more food than it can get for the intensity of the light and the forced photosynthesis rate.

So what that translates into in plain english is if you crank up the light to speed up growth, then don't force growth to be faster than what the roots can provide or the plant will rob the missing ingredients it needs to keep up to the high rate of photosynthesis, from it's lower leaves.

By turning light too high, mathematics says you will create a deficiency where there actually isn't one. Make sense? The roots simply can't keep up.

So you need to get the most out of every lap and if your plan is to raise your brix higher then you can turn your light up but only a small amount, let a couple laps go by so myco forces more root growth with exudate placement, so the plant can keep up with photosynthesis from the soil not the leaves. Patience and balance are key here.

At a certain point above 18 brix and usually about 20.5, strains start to hit the wall. Their DNA simply does not allow higher photosynthetic rates.

Some strains are capable of 23's or 24's and my personal highest was a 26. That was the plant more than me as I didn't do anything differently but the plant had higher abilities.

So now you can plainly see the value in a big rootball. If you concentrate on growing your roots to always be bigger and stronger than what the plant needs for the next lap you are golden. Grow the roots and the foliage will just happen. So will brix and plant health.

We all judge plants by how pretty they are, and how big, and we like to show them off, and thats a beautiful thing as we love our plants and should be proud of what we grow, but if you think about it for a sec, we should be showing off our rootballs for bragging rights, because thats where potential lies. So balance is key or you will damage leaves, and damaged leaves can't grow the roots as well as healthy leaves.

You are about to cross the threshold into true high brix, and everything above becomes vital as you are close to the edge and need to be cautious that you don't get greedy and try for too much at once. Do your laps.

Then it comes down to ensuring you have minerals and light available, and the 5 key things for high brix. Calcium, phosphorus, carbon, oxygen, and healthy microbes/fungii.

Calcium is 1st on the list. It ensures tilth which allows oxygen, so it's a two-fer, and it sets your cation platters which supply minerals, so now it's a three-fer, and the balance of those minerals on the cation platters sets soil ph, as the last few platter spots are filled by hydrogen. Thats a large part of how calcium buffers PH in soil.

Phosphorus needs to be in balance with calcium and is vital for creating ATP, which is the energy that powers the laps, and ATP is created thru photosynthesis, so again balance or you run out of energy.

Carbon for photosynthesis comes from atmospheric CO2, not soil carbon. Soil carbon is microbe food not plant food, and what is left behind when the microbes eat it is the husk of the carbon molecule.

That husk is the cation platter that we talked about above that calcium balances both mineral flow and PH on. It's called a humate, or soil humus. Clay particles called colloids also perform the same function as a humate.

Healthy microbes eat more soil carbon creating more humates to supply more cations, so the laps help here too, as you need more cations today than you did yesterday, so it's part of the laps.

Oxygen is what microbes breath just like us, and in soil, water and O2 share the same passage ways and those passages are created by tilth (the fluffiness of the soil), and tilth is created by calcium's charge. Think static cling fluffing dust here.

So calcium builds the hallways that O2 and water share.

Now basic math applies and the more water in the hallways then the less room for air, and every speck of food created must have an O2 attached to it by the microbes in order for the plant to recognize that food as food. It's how plants know what to eat.

So overwatering causes starvation by oxygen deprivation.

If you get Calcium, Phosphorus, Carbon and O2 correctly balanced, you get very healthy microbes because exudates are now bountiful and exudates are pure carbon squirted on the dirt that the plant wants, and healthy microbes can eat more sugar-dirt in a day than unhealthy microbes can.

It's a closed loop and only as strong as the weakest link, so do your laps, maintain balance, and when everything can keep up without deficiency then turn your light up a smidge, watch carefully, create more exudates to build better microbes that can keep up, and repeat.

Eventually you either reach the plant's DNA dictated maximum or you reach deficiency. Or you can be very happy and content in the mid to upper teens and enjoy healthy robust plants that are bug free and grow great weed hasdle free. You don't actually need to push brix higher once you reach 17's and 18's, but heres the good part. If you get to where you are at and can maintain it the soil will take on a life of it's own and continue to raise brix until it naturally finds it's limits for what's in the pot, and all you have to do is maintain. High brix will naturally provide higher brix. The rich get richer.

Now think ahead to your next hrow. Would you want to start it with used soil full of exudates and healthy microbes and dormant myco spores from really healthy myco, or would you rather rebuild from soilvwith low sugars and poor microbes/fungii?

You really do have opportunity to pay it forward to yourself here, and if you do you will hit 20 in veg next round with the rebuilt soil as you have raised the floor at the starting line.

You need soil carbon as it's microbe food and humates, and it absorbs water to hold it for the plant, but not in the hallways, and overwatering is the fastest way to piss off a plant. Now you know why

This whole cycle is referred to as synergy, so if someone says your synergy appears off, this is what they mean.

Hey Gee man that makes total sense. That's the best explanation I have ever heard or read. You truly are a Organaholic!

Someday I would really love to go fully organic and grow my weed in LOS.

Thanks Much for the schooling brother!

 

[Gee64]

Hey Gee man that makes total sense. That's the best explanation I have ever heard or read. You truly are a Organaholic!

Someday I would really love to go fully organic and grow my weed in LOS.

Thanks Much for the schooling brother!

You're Welcome

 

[Gee64]

Hello @Gee64
Iv bookmarked that run through you posted on how it all works , great knowledge mate

I will be going over it a few dozen times to get my head round it all lol, my first thought thou is, now I’m starting to understand why having bigger pots is much better, you don’t need to be forcing anything with littler pots. It’s gunna make it hard work, exactly where I am lol

And yeah the heat tube is ok for lights out to keep the tent warm, but it’s not good for the pots,
And @g-one-three was saying about big heat mats for the tent, they sound good but I elevate my pots at all different heights to keep the canopy level, so I’m not sure how effective they would be, but I did find some last night, individual ones that are used for brewing, they will fit under my pots lovely, and they have adjustable heat, there a bit expensive but iv only gotta buy them once, so yeah I’m looking at getting them

And my EWC’s are coming today, am I still waiting for them to dry out and then another water with calmag ? Or do you think that one dose was enough ?

And thanks mate for all your help,
it’s very much appreciated

I use vivosun heat mats and have 1 under each 10gal pot. I can't remember now how much I paid, it was probably 5 years ago, but they were surprisingly cheap, I do remember being happy about that.

 

[Gee64]

I just ordered mine, be here tomorrow lol, and now to find one of those thingymajigs that measures brix, I like

If you start researching refractometers make sure you get one that is analog, not digital. Digital won't tell you about calcium. Also make sure it's for brix and alcohol, and that it can be calibrated. Most can. Your gonna love being able to keep an eye on calcium.

 

[Gee64]

I used them like this when the tent's cold. Worked fine, I'm going to do it again this next grow through winter. 2 on 1 controller and the probe gets tucked in between them and the pot.

That's awesome Mr McGiver!. I bet it works really well.