How to foliar feed

mogie

Well-Known Member
This was passed onto me by son of chong. :joint:

Foliar feeding instructions:

You can use any full spectrum nutrient to foliar feed your plants. To avoid nutrient burn, your nutrient solution strength, should be no more than 1/3rd of the maunufactures reccomended dosage.

* The best temperature is about 72 degrees (when stomata on the underside of the leaves are open); at over 80, they may not be open at all. So, find the cooler part of the day if it is hot and the warmer part of the day if it is cold out.

* Use a good quality sprayer -- should atomise the solution to a very fine mist.

* Always be sure your light is off and cool before foliar feeding! For extra safety, wipe your bulb with a dry cloth after spraying and make sure H.I.D lights are raised to a safe distance (double the distance is a good rule of thumb) to prevent burning.

* Make sure the PH of your solution is between 7 and 6.2.

* To prevent the water from beading up (acting as small prisms) and thereby burning the leaves, for each gallon made, add half of a teaspoon of liquid detergent (wetting agent).

* Spray leaf surface -- the tops and the undersides -- until the liquid begins to drip off the leaves. Stop spraying 2 weeks into flowering -- use sparingly on bud sites.

* Dispose of excess spray according to manufactures instructions— home made fertilizer sprays will be fine for at least 2 weeks.

* Spray one time a week every week, if any white residue is found, rinse the foliage with plain ph'd water to reduce salt build-up.


EDITORS NOTES:
Personally, I do not foliar feed in any situations other then those mentioned below, as, IMO, it does not seem to be necessary if using a well-managed hydroponic set-up. The reasons I foliar feed, are mainly to reduce nutritional stress situations. I avoid spraying bud sites, as nitrate salts (the "n" in NPK) are very unhealthy to smoke, fish emulsion smells, and Bat guano could be highly unsanitary so stick to hygenic solutions.

Benefits of foliar spraying:

* To provide a quick nutrient fix for root-zone nutrient problems or deficiencies; this allows more time to solve the problem(s).

* To prevent excess yellowing on clones.

* To instantly provide nutrients via the leaves, which reduces stress on the suffering plant.
 

thegreymirror

Active Member
"* To prevent the water from beading up (acting as small prisms) and thereby burning the leaves, for each gallon made, add half of a teaspoon of liquid detergent (wetting agent)."

Good info. I'm just curious what is meant by "liquid detergent"?
 

Colt1911

Member
"* To prevent the water from beading up (acting as small prisms) and thereby burning the leaves, for each gallon made, add half of a teaspoon of liquid detergent (wetting agent)."

Good info. I'm just curious what is meant by "liquid detergent"?
Liquid dish soap. Dont use any that says 'antibacterial' or 'ultra' or 'concentrate', they will significantly reduce your good microbes leaving your soil more prone to disease/mold etc.

I know what your thinking "whats left?"

Ivory still makes some that is labeled 'Non-Ultra' and a 16 oz bottle should cost under a buck. I couldnt find it at the grocery store or Chinamart, I did locate it at the local dollar store.

BTW, it doesnt take much to use as a wetting agent. This is one of those 'Less is more' things.

Good Luck ;)
 

Apache

Well-Known Member
"* To prevent the water from beading up (acting as small prisms) and thereby burning the leaves, for each gallon made, add half of a teaspoon of liquid detergent (wetting agent)."

Good info. I'm just curious what is meant by "liquid detergent"?
Hello, I think that the "liquid detergent" acts as a Surfactant which is:

"Surfactants are wetting agents that lower the surface tension of a liquid, allowing easier spreading, and lower the interfacial tension between two liquids".

Found here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surfactant

I have been thinking of using fulvic acid as an Foliar feed on my indoor plants, Soil. but I am not sure.

Cheers and Happy New Year!
 

Schotzky

Well-Known Member
Liquid dish soap. Dont use any that says 'antibacterial' or 'ultra' or 'concentrate', they will significantly reduce your good microbes leaving your soil more prone to disease/mold etc.

I know what your thinking "whats left?"

Ivory still makes some that is labeled 'Non-Ultra' and a 16 oz bottle should cost under a buck. I couldnt find it at the grocery store or Chinamart, I did locate it at the local dollar store.

BTW, it doesnt take much to use as a wetting agent. This is one of those 'Less is more' things.

Good Luck ;)
DAWN brand probably works great. it is the best soap i use it for everything from washing my truck to dishes to animals even. i remember seeing on tv gull oil spill coverages where people use DAWN on oil covered animals and what not. a very gentle soap.
 

MRpoodle

Member
If I can jump in here with a suggestion...
Buy a bottle of Dutch Master Saturate. It costs about $15-$20/liter (US$'s).
You can use it with 1/3rd strength nutrient solution and apply as above.
I use it regularly in conjuction with their Liquid Light product but also use it for a "foliar" quick fix for nutrient issues.

It's not a wetting agent... here's what their website says about it:
===================================
Gold Range SATURATOR introduces a radical next generation technology that gives Gold Range SATURATOR a unique Dual Action Delivery that takes the nutrients or supplements that you spray on to your plants and delivers them deep inside the active leaf tissue where it is explosively released with high energy uncoupling, saturating the cells with your foliar payload! We achieve this via our proprietary Protrans Technology, a unique and exacting technology that piggybacks your foliar applied elements using custom designed high-energy proteins. The Results.... A new and exciting Second Generation Foliar Delivery Agent that performs totally superior to regular SATURATOR and DOUBLES THE POWER OF Gold Range LIQUID LIGHT!
Gold Range SATURATOR should be used with any mineral / carbohydrate / amino-acid based specialty fertiliser foliar product to make it penetrate more effectively!
==========================
Cheers and good luck!
:leaf::-P
 
I use kelp extract and aloe gel for foliar feedong, and the plants love it. Just use homegrown aloe, because the gel you buy in stores has preservatives in it.
 

Doer

Well-Known Member
DAWN brand probably works great. it is the best soap i use it for everything from washing my truck to dishes to animals even. i remember seeing on tv gull oil spill coverages where people use DAWN on oil covered animals and what not. a very gentle soap.
And I learned in sailboats, DAWN is the only thing that can make suds for dishes in cold sea water. Wow. So, just be careful. The tiniest amount. :)
 

Doer

Well-Known Member
Foliar feeding, no thanks.
AH, it must have been in the Art of...thread, but there was a guy that went on about how it does not work, at all. So, I'm not picking on you.

But, it DOES work. Studies with Radio-isotopes were done. The tagged nutrition can move about a foot an hour from the leaves transported throughout.

http://www.ogtno.com/pdf/FoliarExperiment.pdf
CONCLUSION:
We have seen that materials are absorbed by the plant and move rather freely in the plant. The amounts may at first seem relatively small, but to offset this handicap, the efficiency rate is high. In fact, this is the most efficient method of applying fertilizer to plants that we have yet discovered.

If we apply these materials to the leaves in soluble forms, as much as 95% of what
is applied may be used by the plant. If we apply a similar amount to the soil, we find that only about 10% of it is used.
----------------
This from Dutch Masters
Taking his findings to another level by studying leaf (foliar sprayed) versus root absorption of radio-active tagged complex carbohydrates and amino acids at a prominent Vancouver University and discovered that these molecules are just too big to be effectively absorbed by the roots, but can be easily and effectively absorbed by the leaves.
 

tkowitha123

Well-Known Member
I am definitely about to try me some foliage feeding I have this sample of nectar for the gods bloom khaos I believe its called, either way I'm gonna try it tomorrow my plants are right around a month old some seeds some cutting's either way I hope to see some good results!
 

Doer

Well-Known Member
"That is why it is important to use a wetting agent with most sprays to spread it out, so that you do not get beads of water as prisms to burn the leaves."

I am finding good results for this, but I think it is right what the article says. Certain times for certain things and don't forget your wetting agent.

I use Dutch Masters Saturator, a superior WA for me and it is amazing how fast the spray is absorbed. I have 3-4 spray bottles with different concoctions. And I have tried a few different wetting agents.

What I really like is that it let me separate feeding from water, especially early on when the clones can't have much water.

- Cal/Mag spray, for that early clone problem where they need supplement but can't take much water
- Rizotonic spray, rooting hormones
- Dutch Masters Liquid Light, is a conditioner for the photosynthesis effect under artificial light
- Urea based Nitrogen spray, keep the green, green

http://www.ars.usda.gov/SP2UserFiles/person/4947/PDFs/2007/2007BiFoliarUreaNMPRO.pdf

And I really wish more people would do what the Bird and I do. Get past the cannabis industry hype. The USA is a farmland, We don't need no stinkin' hippies selling sucker crap, about how different this plant is.....it isn't. We feed the world here and already know how to grow.

The USDA and the main stream, horticulture producers know full well what it takes to grow bumper crops. The commercial fish tank people know how to keep life indoors. Lots of tomato is produced indoors, etc.

Of course, if we were growing indoor, commercial tomatoes we would have to sort all the crap out of that, or go under.

Caveat Emptor
 

FarmerGee

Member
I'm new to foliar feeding myself. But aren't you suppose to use a delivery agent along with a wetting agent? I myself was foliar feeding with Bloom Khaos, Ful-Power, Sea Green, and Hygea Hydration Yucca as a wetting agent but always wondered if a delivery agent would make it MORE effective. I seen a side by side grow with the only difference is one was foliar fed, both given same feeding schedule otherwise. Foliar sprayed plant exploded bud sites faster than without. So I'm a huge fan of foliar now!
 
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