Best watering setup for 1 month vacation?

I was looking at reservoirs but can't find any with good reviews, what size would I need? (currently use 10 gallons per 3 days, watering by hand)

I really like growing in coco, so I will probably keep that and use some sort of drip system, any recommendations?

Also, flood and drain probably won't work for me since I'm growing in a 4x4x7 tent and the plants, with one month veg starting from the floor already hit the lights (which are raised as high as possible) during flower.

Auto pots work well but for a month you world need one hell of a res. The size of which would be determined by how many plants, how much water they take up per week or day or few days, Problem with that is they need to be in pots with some clay pebbles in the bottom so potting up may be needed and you may already be in big pots for all I know. Wilmer systems are also good and can be set as drip feed or soak and drain but again the res size would be and issue. The best option would probably be to build your own based on that or a timed water system. You can find all sorts of drip system parts on ebay and amazon.
Thinking about it if you went with auto pots then they run with a little valve that lets more water in when it gets dry, these valves can be bought so technically you could design your own in one big tray for the plant pots to sit in. It would require some testing though. Plus you can with those auto pots link multiple res together all linked to the same valve so that you have plenty of nutes to last. The res can be bought on its own, or you could buy a massive water vat from a garden centre and adapt all the autopot fittings to that.
Look them up, look the valves up too. You could do all this with a drip system too but you want to be sure your drip rate is good enough without been too much obviously. It would take time to work out, I'm sure there must be some folks who could tell you the best drip rate.

I would use a blumat watering system I have left mine for 10 days. As long as you have a lower res that is large and a main res that is elevated properly it should work.

You have to have a pump in the lower res and an overfill line in top res running to the lower res.

I also grow in coco and blumats don't create any runoff so don't have to worry about that. However a month is really long time and it seems like so many things could go wrong. Good luck.

I'd ask a friend to water while you're gone.

Only vegging would be viable for a 1 month holiday while growing in coco, forget about flower really. My 6x 8.5L autopots drink around 20L per week. My 47L res lasts around 2 weeks before I refill (drinking around 500ml per day each is about right). If you had a 150L res you'd stand a good chance of having 6 plants survive a month maintenance free.

Only way flower would be possible for a whole month would be spending a lot of money because the plants would drink too much to make a tank viable for a whole month. If you added a Bluelabs Bluetronic nutrient doser a pH doser and hooked up your mains water supply via a float valve you could maintain a stable reservoir with nutrients mixed on the fly for an autopot or recirculating setup.

anomolies said:

I was looking at reservoirs but can't find any with good reviews, what size would I need? (currently use 10 gallons per 3 days, watering by hand)

I really like growing in coco, so I will probably keep that and use some sort of drip system, any recommendations?

Also, flood and drain probably won't work for me since I'm growing in a 4x4x7 tent and the plants, with one month veg starting from the floor already hit the lights (which are raised as high as possible) during flower.

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a trusted person

no watering system i know of has enough water for a month the longest i know of with out use of a rain barrell feeding it is a 1 week

For that long I'd rig up an automated system that could be monitored and controlled remotely. There are some security systems that can be ran from an app plus monitoring capabilities from cameras and a tstat. Wouldn't cost that much if your good with wiring and plumbing.

I would really prefer my water fitting system. Totally reliant on John Guest Fittings. The perfect setup to my watering system.

Camera system and remote activated solenoid son pumps might work. Month is a long ass time tho......

i've gone 14 days no problem. auto feed hempy buckets.

a bigger res and maybe it could go a month?. i'd worry about my pH being way out of range though for that long a time.

I have tried 2 week vacations twice.... I have lost crops on both occasions....

Find someone you TRUST, completely.... and no matter how good a friend they are, and if they get some free bud or not... pay them to do the job.

Being paid to do the job helps guilt even lazy stoners into making sure the job gets done....

Find someone to help. If you have a res the ph will swing after time and probably fall outside of range you want.

Vacation? Wtf is a vacation?

Aeroknow said:

Vacation? Wtf is a vacation?

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lol!

Your girls will die, or atleast be screwed up, your ph will rise, water will evap.

Find someone to water them.

If you cant, then at a minimum get a big ass res and timers and put on a drip.

You can always get two resiviors, have the second one refill the first one. I like the digital timers, you can set it to run for 20 seconds a day or 24 mins every tuesday.

Either way, goodluck

For being away that long if you could feed for a month I'd more worry about PH and ppm for your nutrients. If a pump dies while your away your entire crop could die. Do you have a friend that can monitor for you?

+1 on a friend to water while gone shoot maybe split the crop 5050 he is raising it for 1month might grow that shit better then you could have or mess it up hahahaha.

Right here man, f'ing money!!

I grew premix organic soil for the most part, have left a dozen girls for up to a month with zero issues ever. runs on a 9v, very low tech but works like a charm. 5 gal rez.


https://www.amazon.com/Claber-8053-4-Programs-Automatic-Watering/dp/B000U5YFR4

so 20 gallons of water a week x 4 weeks is 80 gallons of water for a month. Go buy a 100 gallon trash can just in case 80 isnt enough. buy a pump and set it up to a drip system and you will be good. You also gotta consider ph drifting while you are gone, if you can, go get a pH adjuster and let it do the hard work.

Been doing it this way for years. I use a ring feeder witch I make my self and a digital timer. If the plants are small I run the timer for 4 feeds a day for 15 seconds that way very little waste. If you can not get your hands on a second timer use a digital one minute timer and feed it for a minute a day. Here's some pictures of the set up the smaller tub is waste tub These plants are now 4 weeks old