The Proper Way To Water A Potted Plant

Emilya said:
It takes swimming pool concentrations of chlorine products to totally kill off your microbes, and at the levels found in our tap water we will only kill off a percentage of the microbes with each watering. If you are running synthetic nutes and are not really using the microbes or the organic feeding cycle, feel free to use your tap water without causing harm... chlorine does not harm our plants. If you are running an organic feeding cycle, such as a supersoil water only grow, then it is important to mind your microbes. You can care for them by using only RO water or by adding back fresh microbes on a regular basis. That is what Geoflora is doing, fresh microbes come in with each feeding, so many of them in fact, that you can use tap water with fresh chlorine with each watering, and the Geoflora will keep up with things. I much prefer this type of system than the expense of RO water or after cleaning out my holding barrel a couple of times, having to deal with the sludge left at the bottom from dropping out the chlorine products to the bottom of the barrel.
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What about using a product like Prime to remove chloramine, safe for fish any healthy bacteria in a fish tank..!?
 
Brudley said:
What about using a product like Prime to remove chloramine, safe for fish any healthy bacteria in a fish tank..!?
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many of those products are toxic later on after they have passed into the plant and you smoke them. IT IS NOT WORTH THE RISK. That goes double for nasty freshwater aquarium water... all sorts of nasties can grow in there.

This fear of chlorine has been ramped way up out of all reasonable proportions by the internet grow science community, mainly so people that have nothing better to prattle on about, have something to get all up in arms about and make a big deal of, many times just to elevate themselves up on some sort of all knowing pedestal so they can proclaim to the masses and sound important.

If you are not growing organically, chlorine is not a worry. Chlorine is actually one of the 19 raw elements that your plants need in order to thrive. Until the internet gurus came along to confuse anyone who would listen, it was known that if your tap water was ok for you to drink, it didn't kill your pets, and you could water your lawn with it... then it was perfectly ok to give to your plants.

If someone is insisting that you must remove all chlorine, ask them to check their science and explain to you just what the harm is. I laugh at chlorine now that I understand what a non issue it is, and I hope that you will too.
 
Brudley said:
What about using a product like Prime to remove chloramine, safe for fish any healthy bacteria in a fish tank..!?
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Use powder form ascorbic acid (Vitamin C). Check the Amazon. I buy the white bag with an orange and black label.

1/4 tsp per 5 gallons is the ratio we calculated. Shake it up and the chlorine and ammonium is gone. No need to wait 24 hours or whatever.
 
Emilya said:
The reason we pH adjust bottled nutes while getting them ready to apply to the medium is that the nutes have been bundled so that they don't interact against each other while in the bottle. This is called chelation, and without this special trick, your nutes would not be stable and would have an extremely short shelf life, or you would have to mix up to 10 individual bottles of nutrient while getting ready to feed your plants. So, the pH thing isn't a magic thing that makes the plants able to see the nutes... it is simply the mechanism that makes the nutes mobile within the solution and able to be taken up by the plants.

So your organic nutes are not chelated. Whatever you put in there is going to be instantly available to the plants. Ph will not be a factor. Microbes don't "take care" of anything to do with the pH... it simply isn't a factor. The microbes don't care what the pH is, nor does your soil and neither does your plants. PH is something reserved for the bottled nute crowd.

My question is that since you are not cooking your raw nutrients into the soil through composting, whatever you throw in there is immediately available to the plants... the microbes don't even have control over your forced feeding. Without the microbes regulating the feeding cycle, this may be an organic grow as in the sense that it is not using synthetic nutes, but YOU are still force feeding your plants, you are not letting the microbes do their job. Until you take your hand off of the wheel and let the microbes and the soil and the plants work together on the organic feeding cycle, this is NOT an organic grow in the true sense of the term. In the final analysis, this is still a human being force feeding his plants.
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Thanks, Em.

For me, the organic aspect of this is using the natural plant based inputs that I grow myself without chemical inputs. Essentially I grow for medical reasons and the cleaner the inputs the better I feel about the outputs.

I'm not all that hung up on the labels at this stage and understand that this approach may not follow the "rules" of organic growing, with the microbes and such. My pots are too small, well below the 7 gallons typically recommended for a truly "organic grow" so I have to find another way to accomplish my goals.

I'm going to try two different bases to use these natural extracts. One will be a hydroton based Hempy setup, and the other will used a typical organic style mix of equal parts worm castings, aeration and an organic medium like peat (although mine is leaf mold). This latter part will lend itself to a microbe component, but actually I'm ok at this point "force feeding" the plants my inputs and see how it turns out. I get that it won't be as clean or efficient as going with the raw inputs and have the microbes break them down. But it's what I have ATM.

I appreciate your thoughts. Thank you. :thanks:
 
Azimuth said:
Thanks, Em

For me, the organic aspect of this is using the natural plant based inputs that I grow myself without chemical inputs. Essentially I grow for medical reasons and the cleaner the inputs the better I feel about the outputs.

I'm not all that hung up on the labels at this stage and understand that this approach may not follow the "rules" of organic growing, with the microbes and such. My pots are too small, well below the 7 gallons typically recommended for a truly "organic grow" so I have to find another way to accomplish my goals.

I'm going to try two different bases to use these natural extracts. One will be a hydroton based Hempy setup, and the other will used a typical organic style mix of equal parts worm castings, aeration and an organic medium like peat (although mine is leaf mold). This latter part will lend itself to a microbe component, but actually I'm ok at this point "force feeding" the plants my inputs and see how it turns out. I get that it won't be as clean or efficient as going with the raw inputs and have the microbes break them down. But it's what I have ATM.

I appreciate your thoughts. Thank you. :thanks:
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Nothing at all wrong with what you are doing, but the microbe portion of this will make things much easier for you. You may not be using the organic feeding cycle, but you are growing naturally... so in my mind that is one step better than an artificial synthetic grow. Somehow you have some misconceptions though, for it is NOT necessary to have large containers in order to grow organically... I have done it in 2 gallon final containers.

Check out Geoflora. it gives you a totally organic grow in about the easiest form I have ever seen. You won't need to play with soil mixes or anything... its flawless. Or, continue to experiment with soils and mediums, and as long as you consistently get your dry amendment mix correct so that you have no overages or underfeeding, your method should work just fine.
 
Emilya said:
Nothing at all wrong with what you are doing, but the microbe portion of this will make things much easier for you. You may not be using the organic feeding cycle, but you are growing naturally... so in my mind that is one step better than an artificial synthetic grow. Somehow you have some misconceptions though, for it is NOT necessary to have large containers in order to grow organically... I have done it in 2 gallon final containers.

Check out Geoflora. it gives you a totally organic grow in about the easiest form I have ever seen. You won't need to play with soil mixes or anything... its flawless. Or, continue to experiment with soils and mediums, and as long as you consistently get your dry amendment mix correct so that you have no overages or underfeeding, your method should work just fine.
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Thanks. I did get the Geoflora suit, but plan to use it as a backup for now. First I want to see how my homegrown stuff works.

A year or so back I asked about running organically in 1-2 gallon pots and there seemed to be near universal agreement that 7 gallons was the minimum. I have since learned that I asked the wrong question and the responses were based around a water only approach that required loading the pot with enough amendments for the entire grow, cooking it for a period to let the microbes do their thing and a pot smaller than 7 gal wouldn't allow for enough preloaded nutrients to last through flower.

I've since seen the GSC comparative grow with the Geoflora nutes, and read The Rev's TLO book and see that he accomplished it with added spikes and teas during the grow, but when I asked the question I didn't know enough to ask it in a way that gave me the answers I needed.

But, it's all good. The answers set me off on another path using the KNF and Jadam inputs, and I've learned quite a bit in the process,
 
AdaminCO said:
Use powder form ascorbic acid (Vitamin C). Check the Amazon. I buy the white bag with an orange and black label.

1/4 tsp per 5 gallons is the ratio we calculated. Shake it up and the chlorine and ammonium is gone. No need to wait 24 hours or whatever.
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I’ve added some to my cart, thanks!
 
AdaminCO said:
Use powder form ascorbic acid (Vitamin C). Check the Amazon. I buy the white bag with an orange and black label.

1/4 tsp per 5 gallons is the ratio we calculated. Shake it up and the chlorine and ammonium is gone. No need to wait 24 hours or whatever.
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OMG!! I can’t believe I haven’t tried this sooner. I got my powered ascorbic acid today. What I did not know is it lowers ph. I found out today that I can add 1/16 tsp (or a pinch, I actually have a measurement spoon for this) of the powder to my water jugs which are a little over half a gallon, it brings my tap waters ph to exactly 6.0! I’ve been researching and worrying about this crap for over a year or two!! Thanks for this tip, glad I finally tried it. So happy I’m gonna smoke another bowl!
 
Brudley said:
OMG!! I can’t believe I haven’t tried this sooner. I got my powered ascorbic acid today. What I did not know is it lowers ph. I found out today that I can add 1/16 tsp (or a pinch, I actually have a measurement spoon for this) of the powder to my water jugs which are a little over half a gallon, it brings my tap waters ph to exactly 6.0! I’ve been researching and worrying about this crap for over a year or two!! Thanks for this tip, glad I finally tried it. So happy I’m gonna smoke another bowl!
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Thank @InTheShed
I think he told me about it a few years back.
 
What a great thread! Thank you. I am reading all of the variants, also.
 
I love it when you can see someone has found this thread for the first time and immediately knows it's value, as in el gringuito's post. I am all too familiar with this feeling and it's a good one. Thanks Emilya.
 
Thanks, Jon.
Em, one question (and if you already answered this somewhere, please just point me to it)--but does this apply to Subcool's Supersoil, as well?
Or is Subcool's Supersoil different?
Thanks.
 
Em, thank you very much for your great articles. I have very limited time, but I am trying to soak them in.

For up-potting photoperiods, may I please ask you some questions?

Have you tried and how do you feel about those allegedly biodegradable nursery bags? It seems like it could help to avoid a little bit of transplant shock.
(I am not sure if it is ok to post a URL, but anything like these:)

Different Sizes Biodegradable Non-woven Nursery Bags Plant Grow Bags Fabric Seedling Pots Eco-Friendly Aeration Planting Bags - AliExpress 15

Smarter Shopping, Better Living! Aliexpress.com
www.aliexpress.com

Or would regular pots be superior for up-potting photoperiods?

Thank you.
 
el gringuito said:
Em, thank you very much for your great articles. I have very limited time, but I am trying to soak them in.

For up-potting photoperiods, may I please ask you some questions?

Have you tried and how do you feel about those allegedly biodegradable nursery bags? It seems like it could help to avoid a little bit of transplant shock.
(I am not sure if it is ok to post a URL, but anything like these:)

Different Sizes Biodegradable Non-woven Nursery Bags Plant Grow Bags Fabric Seedling Pots Eco-Friendly Aeration Planting Bags - AliExpress 15

Smarter Shopping, Better Living! Aliexpress.com
www.aliexpress.com

Or would regular pots be superior for up-potting photoperiods?

Thank you.
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Regular pots are easier and can be used over and over again. If you do it right, there should never be a transplant shock. Check out my current journal's last post to see how I am uppotting from solo cups to 1 gallon, with zero shock.
 
Ok, wow. I will search for your post.

Hard up-pots make sense. But do you finish in a plastic pot? Or a soft pot? Thank you.
 
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