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- #2,781
A quick dried sample from last week.
Weasel Forges Ahead
- Thread starter Weaselcracker
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Skybound
Well-Known Member
If you like the fleshy stuff more bluer, I've found slightly toxic N will get you there. Have you reverted your feed back to what you were used to? If yes, I'd like to hear your experiences. In about a month I will be jacking up my EC targets to see about upping my nutrient density and hopefully the brix as a result and it would be helpful to have more insight into tolerable ranges of any/all elements.
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- #2,783
Yeah the Hydro Buddy mix wasn’t agreeing with them so I gave them an emergency light feeding of my old mix and they are greening up again. I have managed to damage most the plants in flowering, as usual. I think most of them will flower ok though.
Now I’m very curious about what went wrong. The only way I’ll figure it out is do some side by side tests with different nute mixes. Which is a pain in the ass for someone without much time.
Newbie question- do you think there’s any good reason I can’t mix up several different nute mixes in large enough batches that they’ll last a month or so, and then keep the nute mixes in buckets for that long? The usual rule is not to leave mixes laying around a long time, but I’m guessing I probably could.
If so that would make my side by side tests a whole lot easier. I can make mix A,B,C etc, and sacrifice a few small plants for the cause. I’d be able to ID the causes of issues that have been bugging me the last few weeks.
The macronutrient targets I was supposedly meeting with my last couple Hydro Buddy mixes were -
N- 100
NH4- 4
P- 65
K- 170
Ca- 105
Mg- 45
The schedule Botanicare feeding which I’ve switched back to, according to Hydro Buddy as well as another nutrient calculator app I found, gives me
N- 85
NH4- 0
P- 115
K- 275
Ca- 95
Mg- 45
Now I’m very curious about what went wrong. The only way I’ll figure it out is do some side by side tests with different nute mixes. Which is a pain in the ass for someone without much time.
Newbie question- do you think there’s any good reason I can’t mix up several different nute mixes in large enough batches that they’ll last a month or so, and then keep the nute mixes in buckets for that long? The usual rule is not to leave mixes laying around a long time, but I’m guessing I probably could.
If so that would make my side by side tests a whole lot easier. I can make mix A,B,C etc, and sacrifice a few small plants for the cause. I’d be able to ID the causes of issues that have been bugging me the last few weeks.
The macronutrient targets I was supposedly meeting with my last couple Hydro Buddy mixes were -
N- 100
NH4- 4
P- 65
K- 170
Ca- 105
Mg- 45
The schedule Botanicare feeding which I’ve switched back to, according to Hydro Buddy as well as another nutrient calculator app I found, gives me
N- 85
NH4- 0
P- 115
K- 275
Ca- 95
Mg- 45
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- #2,784
As far as this- I could just see that some of the flowers were reaching an especially nice level of ripeness, and when they do that they often move away from greenish colour and more towards a silver blue, and get a little more gooey. I’m not sure it makes sense, but I like it when they do that.
Skybound
Well-Known Member
I think I've seen this before. There is a silvery bluish area that outlines the outer portion of each leaf finger while the inner area is more of a green. I believe my eldest PC is just a tad less into the toxic side.
As to mixing nutes long term. For me, the answer is yes because I know with 100% certainty that I am only mixing in non organic salts, but even still, in my micro blend, I have to use a food preservative due to the organic chelators used (DTPA and EDTA) will break down and form into algae which is catastrophic in micro concentrates as the result is oxidized and precipitated heavy metals, but also a fungus will form and grow islands of green nastyness.
This is the problem that drove me away from GH as my bottles all started rotting. So if your blends have organics or chelators, I wouldn't mix up more than a month's worth of res changes or bottled nutes unless you can find some sodium benzoate. 0.3 grams per gallon of concentrate should extend that out a couple months.
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- #2,786
Thanks. A month would be plenty long enough to see how the victims react to a few different mixes. If you have any particular mix in mind let me know, otherwise I would whip up a couple batches with varying levels of P and K, and possibly Ca.
I’d try messing around with NH4 as well but I don’t have a ready source of it- just some nutes that list it at around 5% and some that don’t list it at all.
I’d try messing around with NH4 as well but I don’t have a ready source of it- just some nutes that list it at around 5% and some that don’t list it at all.
Skybound
Well-Known Member
If you're in coco, I have read that high K causes problems with Ca, so I would suggest a lower K-Ca ratio. Otherwise what medium are you in again?
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- #2,788
I’m in sunshine mix which is peat moss and perlite. Same as promix which D Bud uses. Not coco.
Skybound
Well-Known Member
Just a quick search and I find our an article from our HB guy. I'm reading it now and will share my thoughts later if I have any, but right off the bat I'm lead to believe that the chemistry is always changing due to the extent of decay.
Using Peat Moss in Hydroponic Culture
Using Peat Moss in Hydroponic Culture
Skybound
Well-Known Member
That explains why you need to keep your P so high. It also makes me want to jack my P up now too because my media (RW) leaches everything, lol. The article implies that peat also needs to be prepped very similar to coco.
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- #2,791
Sunshine mix is treated with lime and generally any runoff I test is in the high sixes. Any time I’ve tested ppm of runoff from it- ppm has been low.
But- based on that article I squeezed some wet S. Mix, just now, taken fresh from my latest bale, and am not too happy with what I am seeing. Maybe it’s normal but it doesn’t seem to line up with what I’ve seen in the past. I’m going to email the Sunshine Mix people and ask wtf....
But- based on that article I squeezed some wet S. Mix, just now, taken fresh from my latest bale, and am not too happy with what I am seeing. Maybe it’s normal but it doesn’t seem to line up with what I’ve seen in the past. I’m going to email the Sunshine Mix people and ask wtf....
Skybound
Well-Known Member
Irregardless, it seems that nearly all stages of decomp are workable, it just has different rules that apply to work around/fix. Correct me if I'm wrong, but the way I took it was when you buy peat which i assume is half decomped at least, it only gets better the further into decomp it goes until it gets to black peat, no?
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- #2,793
Yes I’ll just have to find the right ways to compensate for the situation.
Yes also- and that’s been my assumption- that the old stuff is more stable. Sort of. I’m not so sure it ever stops decomposing though. What does? I’m surrounded by peat bog with patches of forest in between. The old stuff I can dig up a few feet down must be pretty ancient. The peat bog is like a giant organism of sorts. It’s very acidic and tends to kill and stunt most of the plants around it, so it grows and takes over areas very slowly as circumstances allow. It’s got a living layer on top, but whatever is below the surface in the older peat is preserved in an anaerobic acid bath that never dries out. This is why they’ve found such well preserved bodies and artifacts in European bogs. People also used to bury and preserve certain types of food in the bog.
The older peat that’s down below the surface must be decomposing and changing slowly, but mostly I look at it like it’s in a sort of cryogenic state. It probably starts to morph a lot faster once you dig it up.
All the gardeners I talk to tell me it’s really only good for one season then you should start fresh.
Apparently that’s not totally true since the Kit growers use it repeatedly with a lot of amendments.
Yes also- and that’s been my assumption- that the old stuff is more stable. Sort of. I’m not so sure it ever stops decomposing though. What does? I’m surrounded by peat bog with patches of forest in between. The old stuff I can dig up a few feet down must be pretty ancient. The peat bog is like a giant organism of sorts. It’s very acidic and tends to kill and stunt most of the plants around it, so it grows and takes over areas very slowly as circumstances allow. It’s got a living layer on top, but whatever is below the surface in the older peat is preserved in an anaerobic acid bath that never dries out. This is why they’ve found such well preserved bodies and artifacts in European bogs. People also used to bury and preserve certain types of food in the bog.
The older peat that’s down below the surface must be decomposing and changing slowly, but mostly I look at it like it’s in a sort of cryogenic state. It probably starts to morph a lot faster once you dig it up.
All the gardeners I talk to tell me it’s really only good for one season then you should start fresh.
Apparently that’s not totally true since the Kit growers use it repeatedly with a lot of amendments.
That's what I got from it. I'm interested because I've seen the decomposition of the peat in my own soil. 3rd run is much heavier and darker so I added more perlite, apparently exactly what I was supposed to do. I was also interested in how CEC affects the nutrient availability in the soil as well as what we add to it. It adsorbs differently.
Is there a source of clay in your area, Weasel? That'd be a great additive to increase CEC and buffer pH.
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- #2,796
Yes there’s clay around. Its actually under my garden if I dig too deep. Which I try not to do. But I can grab more of a clean pottery grade clay from a spot I know on the way to town sometime.
Skybound
Well-Known Member
You should be able to dig some clay from the top. You might need to clarify it in a bucket of water, but I bet you can get it out easy enough.
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- #2,798
Yeah it’s defintely around. I can think of plenty of spots. Usually spots where I slip and fall a lot 
That should raise pH too.
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- #2,800
~P Chunk #3~
As usual not winning in the ‘best overall plant appearance’ category. I’ve been continually flopping the buds together into a small enough pile to fit under one of the new LEDs.
I decided to harvest this one tonight. On a couple of the ripest buds the sugar leaf was starting to die right back into the bud, which is the time where I have to make a decision - trim now or pay later with difficult trimming, and sometimes mould from those dead leaves festering inside the bud.
I have to say that this is like the perfect looking bud, for the kind of people who like this sort of strong indica cross. I’d probably die if I smoked it.
It’s very dense and chunky, easy to trim. Stinks. Looks great. And hopefully is.
As I mentioned before it doesn’t have that wet stickiness of the old PC, which is of the most extreme sort. In fact it’s not really very sticky at all.
Does a plant have to be sticky to be potent, does anyone know?
What is it- this stickiness thing anyway? Not all trichomes are created equal, that’s for sure.
Here is the beginning of that silvery blue colour starting to come out that I mentioned.
This is exactly what my old Pc used to start to look like at 90- 100 day’s flowering. Blue and gold, with royal purple starting to come into the mix. I can tell that this one would look incredible if I left it another week. But right now I feel too busy for silly things like growing pretty flowers. Next time.
I pollinated a half dozen girls with the male GT. I have a nagging feeling that I just pollinated most of my flowering room
As usual not winning in the ‘best overall plant appearance’ category. I’ve been continually flopping the buds together into a small enough pile to fit under one of the new LEDs.
I decided to harvest this one tonight. On a couple of the ripest buds the sugar leaf was starting to die right back into the bud, which is the time where I have to make a decision - trim now or pay later with difficult trimming, and sometimes mould from those dead leaves festering inside the bud.
I have to say that this is like the perfect looking bud, for the kind of people who like this sort of strong indica cross. I’d probably die if I smoked it.
It’s very dense and chunky, easy to trim. Stinks. Looks great. And hopefully is.
As I mentioned before it doesn’t have that wet stickiness of the old PC, which is of the most extreme sort. In fact it’s not really very sticky at all.
Does a plant have to be sticky to be potent, does anyone know?
What is it- this stickiness thing anyway? Not all trichomes are created equal, that’s for sure.
Here is the beginning of that silvery blue colour starting to come out that I mentioned.
This is exactly what my old Pc used to start to look like at 90- 100 day’s flowering. Blue and gold, with royal purple starting to come into the mix. I can tell that this one would look incredible if I left it another week. But right now I feel too busy for silly things like growing pretty flowers. Next time.
I pollinated a half dozen girls with the male GT. I have a nagging feeling that I just pollinated most of my flowering room