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[MEGA] Every Year's Community Growing advice, tips, tricks, & experiences

It's hard to say Prelude, I am staying on the light side of the fert spectrum..My 3 part Humboldt ferts and then an additive or two during veg and then when flowering I stop the Roots and use Ginormous. Something is out of wack Prelude, the plants must not be using the fert that is in the soil and it is pulling the mobile nutes from it's leaves. If you pump it with ferts it will lock-out and your screwed.

I seriously think that if you haven't gotten yourself a PPM pen and you aren't measuring what you are feeding your plants..you are doing a grave injustice to them. How can you know if your giving too much or to little if you aren't checking the water before feeding them? Forget the crappy PH kits sold in stores where you gotta match up the color of the water..UGHHH!!! Once you add nutes and change the color, do you realize the margin of error? A digital PH pen and PPM pen is the way to go. I guarantee if you are feeding like 15 ml's of grow per gallon, you are over-fertilizing. Those may have already locked-out and need a good flushing now.

I would also start pulling off those yellow and dying lower leaves, especially that monster to the left in the photo, that bottom is packed with growth...take mad clones and then clean her up so all available energy goes to the tops of the plant. Clean up all of em actually, BUT TAKE CLONES off of everything and label them!!!

If your careful and don't over do it I think you should be much happier with your yield and final product compared to the last time.

Just remember LESS IS MORE. I have finally realized that...believe me, I used to dose mine pretty heavily thinking that I was gonna get alot of potent bud, only to be disappointed with unhappy plants. Now as I feed them, starting as seedlings or clones, I start with a light dose and gradually increase the PPM's week by week, this gets them used to more and more food which they need as they get older...if you give them way more then they need at an early stage, they will lock-out. Also, Hygrozyme works wonders...it's not an instant cure all, but using it all along will keep your medium clean and the root system thriving...have you looked into that yet?
 
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^ imho EC truncheons/pens are only really useful for measuring falling/rising nutrient levels of an unknown amount in a resevoir. If you add 3ml/L grow nutrient (by way of an example) in a drain to waste system and you get a deficiency, increasing it by say 0.5ml/L will be increasing it by a known amount. In other words, you don't need to know the EC to know that you're increasing the nutrient leve in Prelude's case. So I'm not sure I entirely agree 100% that it's the only way to go in his case. The only reason why I believe you might think it's necessary is to compare it to generally accepted values for a specific stage of growth or strain e.g. if an ppm is meant to be x amount at 2 weeks, however, really you should read the plant and judge by looking at the health on whether you should add less, more or the same dose of feed rather than ppm/EC/TDS charts, which IMO are innacurate most of the time anyway. Or maybe this isn't what you were thinking?

I agree that a pH pen are a different kettle of fish and can be useful in coco-based/hydro grows however.

I also agree about pulling off chlorotic leaves as you suggested. They won't be photosynthesising and therefore won't be productive.

You're damn right about higher doses of nutrients affecting the taste. Not only is it important to keep nutrients lower at the end (where some people flush for example, taking it to the extreme) but it's important to keep to this good practice all throughout the whole grow.

edited first paragraph
 
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AE, as far as adding a bunch of additives..I do agree, but depending on your set-up, some of them are essential. Other than the 3 part I use (grow, micro & bloom), I use the Hygrozyme, the Humboldt Roots ..it's works!! (trust me..I've seen how the roots look when transplanting and they are white and healthy). Also they way push the new growth. Maybe 2 or 3 times per month I will use the Flavorful..it is either Folvic (sp) or Humic acid, I can't remember, but from what I was told, it's important cause it helps the plant uptake certain nutrients.

As far as flowering, the Ginormous works, it really does. I've seen them puff nicely about 2 or 3 days after getting a feeding of it. As a foliar spray it works great too, about a week before I change to 12/12 I start foliar feeding them, it helps with the transition and also makes lots of bud sites. Like I said though, I don't heavily feed, they just don't need alot to get nice fat colas.
 
I agree, some of them (not all) can work and be effective. What I was getting at is that at the beginning it's wise to keep it as simple as possible, so that you can narrow down the different variables at play to work out what's going wrong when things go tits up. But yes, I don't doubt the effectiveness of these additives and I use the fulvic/humic acid in my own setup. It also works in coco-based media very well, however the taste aspect wrt potting soils is just my opinion. I've also heard other experienced people smarter than me have found the same. But hey, it might not apply to everyone.

Humic and fulvic acid do help the uptake of nutrients, in a big way and I think sometimes in potting soils this can be a problem, for the reason I stated above and the fact that it can cause nutrient overdoses. However in my setup I've used this to my advantage and cut down doses by 40%! It's amazing.

It's good that you're feeding the bare minimum. I'm glad you're doing this as it really does make a difference. Your growth will be better, your yields up and plant health improves along with taste of the bud at the end.

edit: if you're going to choose a humic acid/fulvic acid additive, make sure it's higher in fulvic acid since it will be more effective. Leonardite extracted humic/fulvic acid tends to be lower in fulvic acid, making other options a better choice.
 
I think for experienced growers..maybe your right..PH pens and PPM pens may not be as necessary, but for me..man...I love knowing that after adding nutes my ph is at let's say 5.6 and the PPM's are 550..I know that depending on the week, I can raise the ppms a bit higher and also know that the PH needs adusting to 6.7. I think for beginners and even people with experience, but not necessarily experts..using ph pens and ppm meters allows extra control...just my opinion.
 
I would agree with you on the pH, but my opinion in the case of a drain to waste system (and I don't mean to critisize you mate, you know that) your nutrient level (i.e. your ppm level of nutrients) is only as accurately controlled as finely as your method of measuring out the nutrient, which would be done with a pipette or syringe in most cases. So, if you are able to add an extra 0.1ml with your syringe and not to any greater degree of accuracy, then a ppm truncheon won't help you any more.

However, I do think it has it's place, if you've got one anyway for hydro systems that you might use at some point in the future or something, since it allows you to disregard your syringe measurements and just add small amounts until the ppm level increases to the desired point. For reservoirs containing nutrients they are invaluable.
 
Since I use containers of coco/soil mix...I just pour either 1 or 2 ..4 gal jugs of water into an 18 gal rubbermaid. I have a submersible pump and I just add nutes, I do use a syringe to measure. Once the pump runs for a bit and mixes everything up, I dip in the PH pen, see where it's..most cases I have to adjust, and them take a measure of the ppm's to see where they are at. In my case it's just easiest. After everything is mixed, I pump some water into a gallon jug and give each one that same amount of water, so I know they all just got the same feeding. My method definitely isn't the fastiest that's for sure hahaha. There are better time consuming methods, but heck..it's a hobby as well as medicinal and I love doing it :)
 
Guys, I've found that a really effective way of increasing the humidity in your grow space whilst also cooling it a bit (allows your light to be closer) is to use an evaporative air cooler. Some have built in ionizers, which will cause dust, spores and pollen from hermies/males along with some smell to fall to the floor which can be vacuumed/swept away. They work by wicking water from a small tank onto a cloth that becomes saturated with water. A fan constantly blows air over this cloth, causing the water to evaporate and, as we all know, evaporated water causes the temperature to drop and the RH to rise (which is what we need in veg since an RH of 60-80% is ideal for growth). If the ambient air is dry, which it usually is under hot HIDs, and the temperature high, these air coolers are especially effective. The air needs to be extracted to remove the moisture to allow constant evaporation from the cloth, continuing the cooling effect.

Not only are these air coolers much cheaper to run (they cost next to nothing to power actually), but they're as cheap as chips to buy and hit two birds with one stone by cooling and adding moisture to the air.

They've gotten a bad rap, since people who use them as cheap ACs to cool their houses don't open a window to allow the humid air to be removed to allow the cooling process to continue or use them in rooms that are already quit humid, which obviously slows down the evaporation of the water in the cloth. In the right situation, however, these can be surprisingly effective and cheap to run. Grantedd, not as effective as an expensive, power-hungry AC, but still they certainly fulfill a niche function.

I plan to get one since the RH in my room at the canopy is 30-40%, which would be good in flower, but definitely not in veg. I personally am going to aim for a target RH of 75% since this is sufficiently high for the plants but not too high for the carbon filter to work!!

mr.muncheez said:
Since I use containers of coco/soil mix...I just pour either 1 or 2 ..4 gal jugs of water into an 18 gal rubbermaid. I have a submersible pump and I just add nutes, I do use a syringe to measure. Once the pump runs for a bit and mixes everything up, I dip in the PH pen, see where it's..most cases I have to adjust, and them take a measure of the ppm's to see where they are at. In my case it's just easiest. After everything is mixed, I pump some water into a gallon jug and give each one that same amount of water, so I know they all just got the same feeding. My method definitely isn't the fastiest that's for sure hahaha. There are better time consuming methods, but heck..it's a hobby as well as medicinal and I love doing it :)
Click to expand...

I agree, that's definitely why they can be useful. Not absolutely necessary, but they do make life easier in these circumstances for people like you in this case, I agree.

I however take a different approach when growing in soil (since I use organic nutrients anyway, and these EC/ppm/TDS meters don't work at all anyway)
 
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Here's a top of the range evaporative humidifier with a radio control and ioniser that I found for £83 on Amazon UK. Should do the job. I'm just worried it'll be taller than the height at which I am going to place my scrog screen.

Unfortunately they don't give dimensions, but I think it might be worth the risk. I may even be able to place it outside my tent just by the intake if I position the intake duct just at the output of the air cooler.
 
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Prelude..what base nutes are u using..N,P,K? Don't you have the FF Grow, BigBloom? Did u get the Tiger Bloom too? I'd get that for your flowering stage, if haven't already done so, especially since your usung the FF nutes, the Tiger Bloom works well!
 
Well, Ive got FF Grow Big, Tiger Bloom, And Big Bloom.
Ive got them all in FF Ocean Forest. with Seaweed kelp added (2-0-1)
and I also have a small ammount of vermiculite.
The Grow big is 6-4-4, Since I started putting them under 12/12, do I water with Grow big once more time, or do I start with tiger bloom?

blah, Im getting frustrated, Ive tried everything I can to get these fuckers happy, and the onlyones that are happy are the small ones., Guess I wont be going over 16 inches anymore before flowering...Fuck Me. What do I keep doing wrong.
This is exactly what happened when my last plant STARTED flowering. :(
 
And Muncheez, the only reason I dosed them hard is because I was dosing them so light everyone said its probably a deficincy, well, I dosed a bit harder, the it stopped spreading as fast , but its still spreading, I do have a PPM pen, my water from my RO system comes out at .01

Ive been watering around 200-400 ppm and usually on the higher end of the chard, depending on size. , is that bad?

Also, Ive been noticing theres ALOT of different grow bigs all Fox Farms, a 12-7-7, a 3-2-6 and the one i have is 6-4-4, whats up with that?
 
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That ppm range is good when they are young..so no problem there. Heck my seedlings were only 2 weeks old and my clones were barely upsized after rooting and I made up a batch of nutes and the ppm's were 136, and my seedlings/ clones were put in FF Ocean Forest as well. I will be upsizing to new medium soon. Anyway, by now, you could be up in the 500-600 ppm range. If there are deficiencies, it doesn't necessarily mean ADD MORE nutes..you need to find what it is lacking and add more of that.

Since you are now going to flower, I would start using the Tiger Bloom and cut back on the Grow. You can still give it grow nutes the 1st 2 weeks of flowering, but then taper off and use Bloom ferts exclusively and maybe real light doeses of nitrogen, like 1 ml per gallon..something like that. Some people don't like to use any nitrogen during flowering. The nutes I have is a true 3 part and it calls for grow, micro, bloom throughout the entire cycle, but depending on what stage it is in, the amounts of what to use vary.

All I can think of is that the plants locked out early on and stopped being able to use the nutes in the soil and started using the mobile nutrients in the fan leaves, that's why the lower ones are yellowing...the plant is moving nutrients from those leaves and sending it to the other parts of the plant that need it..probably the top (new growth). This could be caused by either over-fertilizing or PH imbalance. You stated that you would adjust the PH and then add nutes...that is totally counter productive...have you started adjusting the PH of the water AFTER adding nutes? You may need to give em a good flush and not feed them for a week, then start w/ the Tiger Bloom & Big Bloom. Do you have any Cal/Mag as well?

Wish I can be more help, im far from an expert and it's tough to diagnose problems by pictures and just an explanation of what you have been doing...
 
Autoflowering seeds

Hey Guys,

I did a quick search and couldn't really find what i was after...

I have recieved some autoflowering seeds 5 dinafem roadrunner and 5 lowlife blueberry. all are feminised and all autoflowering...

I will be growing a small scale hydroponic bubbler setup (just for personal use) and cant seem to find any info on the nutrients time frames...

i dont know weather to start with veg nutrients and just keep it running with the veg nut or do i swap over to bloom??

with all my other setups i know what to do but that with regular seeds. these apparently start flowering in about 8 weeks!!! :D

any help would be greatly apprieciated...
 
Also does anyone know if its possible to take clones from autoflowering plants??

Ive read many different opinions on it.
 
As far as I know...no.

I know that you can't keep a mother plant in vegetative mode because of the autoflower
 
looey said:
Also does anyone know if its possible to take clones from autoflowering plants??

Ive read many different opinions on it.
Click to expand...

I have grown autoflowers.

No you cannot take clones.

As far as a nutrient schedule... I always used fox farm soil w/ perlite in a 2:1 mixture. I didn't give any nutes for the first 5 weeks at all or the auto's will get burnt. Then I gave very small doses of nutes until the week before chop.

Any other questions?
 
flowering in 8 weeks?
man what are you on about they practically begin flowering after they sprout their first few sets of leaves!

if they flowered after 8 weeks wtf would be the point in calling them autoflowering? :\
 
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