EC/PPM meter for soil

I know how this sounds but ive never really heard people talk about ec/ppm when dealing with soil.

Is this because you only need to test when growing hydroponically after the nutes have been added to the res or is it i am just totally uninformed and didnt realise i should of been testing my solution before feeding it to my soil growing plants?

Peace

That's a great question and I'm curious as well. It seems like in the current environment, for people wanting to "push the envelope" and get better and better grows, all the technology and know how is focused on hydroponics/aeroponics. You don't hear a lot of tech talk about soil grows. I'm quite sure you could measure your solution before you feed the plants, and you could even take measurements of run off after they drain, but I don't know how useful that information would be.

I just ordered one and plan to putz with it with my soil scene, esp. to test run-off and water quality/hardness. And test my total mixes for concentration. Nugs

nugbuckets said:

I just ordered one and plan to putz with it with my soil scene, esp. to test run-off and water quality/hardness. And test my total mixes for concentration. Nugs

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which one did you order? One of the ones designed for hydro systems?

BTW if you're curious about your water, you can get free information rather easily about the PH, and contaminates that may be in the water. See the sticky about water for more info but what you'd be looking for is called a "Consumer Confidence Report" and it's published by your local water supplier. Of course if you draw water from a well you're on your own.

Pretty keen on an answer to this too. I always wondered what makes soil so different...

Well, I got one a couple weeks ago digital one for 20 bux on ebay.. Turns out I thought I was over feeding my plants.. but now I can see I was starving them. Its good to know the ppm of your water, your water after you ph it.. and your nutes going in and the runoff. After using one, I dont know how I ever got this far without it lol. I was using half str nutes on big plants at around 300 ppm.. lol they seem to like 1000 ppm much better.. I hear you want around 200ppm or so for seedlings etc.. so now I feel a lot more confident when I feed my various sizes of plants that they are getting the right amouts of nutrients in thier mix.

Yeah i just got one too, and was surprised to see that the regular rate reccomendation was 5ml per 2 liters... This results in a ppm of 400 which may explain why my plants seem to be looking a bit off.

Does anyone know why people say you dont need one? It seems to be of use.

It can totally be usefull. But soil is much more forgiving in tthese respects. A lot of soil growers learn to read their plants, and when your nute regimen is static there's not a required need. In hydro you kinda have to know exactly what's in your mix (so I've been told, never grown hydro). I want one just to fuck with, but my plants certainly aren't dying without one. In fact they give me the bombastic sticky gooey nugs I love.

Is ppm reliable, as in, does it reliably tell u the strength of nutrients or can some nutes have a lower ppm and be as strong as another type of fert at a higher ppm? What i mean is, if 600 ppm of brand A nute is a good number for a plant, is it possible that nute brand B at the same ppm will cause burn?

got me on that one, im pretty new to all this myself. I did find out I was starving my plants pretty much, when I thought I had a nute burn lol.

Is ppm reliable, as in, does it reliably tell u the strength of nutrients or can some nutes have a lower ppm and be as strong as another type of fert at a higher ppm? What i mean is, if 600 ppm of brand A nute is a good number for a plant, is it possible that nute brand B at the same ppm will cause burn?

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Anyone have any answer to this question? Its kinda hard to search for this question on a search engine.

nizmo said:

Anyone have any answer to this question? Its kinda hard to search for this question on a search engine.

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Well, it will reliably tell you the strength of the nutrients you are adding. It won't break it down and tell you how many ppm for each individual nutrient though. Different brands of nutes recommend different solutions or ppm/EC levels because they are comprised in differing amounts of macro and micro nutrients. Generally you can go by the ppm number and most manufactures have a recommended amount (always start low and work up slowly unless you know your strain). But, for example, if you are running something like 1-1-3 @ 1000-1200 ppm at the end of veg with no micro nutes, eventually you are going to have problems with the lack of micros even though the ppm is an acceptable amount overall (for most cases towards the end of a 1 month-1.5 month veg cycle). Likewise, depending on the nutrient composition, you could be running another brand at 1000-1200 ppm and burn the shit out of your plants. It's also strain dependent as well. Some take high nutes better than others.
Hope that helps

Oh, and I do use a ppm meter that I got for about $20. Worth it imo.

Well, it will reliably tell you the strength of the nutrients you are adding. It won't break it down and tell you how many ppm for each individual nutrient though.

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To my knowledge there is no such thing as a ppm meter which tells you the ppm of each element which comprises the overall ppm. Imagine how handy that would be.

It pretty much answers my question though... i guess it was pretty obvious. The answer is yes, provided that the ratios of elements are the same.

Hey just wondering if any one can tell me how to post stuff on here.... like a question for you guys to answer