Since I'm here I'm curious as to what you call "dialing in" I get the concept but what is the idea ratio over a 24 hour period. How much of a EC drop per gallon is ideal. I understand that as we get further into flowering the amount of water uptake decreases as the plant gets older. I also understand that if the food level (EC) gets to high this reduces water uptake as well. I can honestly say that using RO water any EC over 1.5 is a bad thing although my friend that pulls the record numbers runs his EC up to 1.8. we are both using Orion 3 star meters to measure EC and Ph. http://www.thermoscientific.com/en/product/orion-star-a325-ph-conductivity-portable-multiparameter-meter.html
DWC Root Slime Cure aka How to Breed Beneficial Microbes
- Thread starter Heisenberg
- Start date
That is caused by organics in the water. As its been stated here 20 million times NO organics in the water of any sort. The stuff at the bottom is dead bacteria/algae, it will just rinse right out. You may also have an issue with your brew, or possibly adding too much. Make sure the tea smells ok and no excess molasses is left over.
Ive also seen that happen when a sterilizing product was added to water with tea or inoculated roots.
Just noticed you use tap water that could be an issue for sure. Chloramine doesn't off-gas.
JohnnySocko
Active Member
Roger that ^^^^
ditto IME...I've been battling this crap for 3-4 weeks st8 now...lost some absolutley perfect plants in a pretty damn well designed DWC system .... physan, bleach, DM zone, nuke grade H2O2, fucking nothing seems to completely stop it.... it kept coming back every 3-4 days....
sometimes I wonder if its BOTH the cyno crap AND pyth at the same time: one being a secondary infection as the result from the other
I'm giving up on DWC and going coco & Heisenberg tea...I haven't been able to find ANY info on using the tea and DTW coco systems but there you go
Edited to add: I'm now 100% convinced its definitely in the tap water.... I mean I've completely tore down my system, bought all new shit, started from seed with new plants and yet its back ... I'm also pretty sure either it passes through RO filtration OR its somehow literally everywhere
The tea I brewed matched the characteristics of that produced by others; it had no foul odors or other indications that it was bad, and it's highly unlikely any molasses remained considering the amount I used and the brew time. It is quite possible, however, that I used too much. Also did some digging and found the municipal water is treated with Chloramine @ 2ppm; I'm going to be pre-treating in the future with ascorbic acid @ 2mg/gallon H2O to neutralize as described here to quash that concern:
As far as chloramine affecting the quality of the tea -- molasses, EWC, humic acid, etc. (any organic material) neutralizes chloramines quickly:
On the topic of the funk being caused by organics in the water, I'll be switching back to Ionic grow when I take a trip to the store tomorrow. My buddy decided to pick up a small container of the FoxFarm since he was out of the Ionic and I figured I'd use it instead; lesson learned. I just checked the roots an hour ago and no slime appears to be on them. I also took 2 samples of the roots for a friend who has a doctorate in plant pathology to check out under a scope; when I get word back from him I'll give an update.
I'm fairly new to DWC but no stranger to hydro or cultivation in general, so this is a good learning experience for me. Cheers, and thanks for the response.
Not only do none of those products work on the brown slime they also hinder root growth and your roots will need recovery time (or death if used too much). If you use RO water and a proper tea discussed throughout this thread you're problem will be gone. To use the tea properly you need a decent root mass in the water as well as a root system full cleansed of any sterilizers, its helps to wash off the roots as well for excess grime.
I had this stuff too all over and it got horrible specially when using a rooting extract, but now i can run a bucket for prob the whole flower stage with just replacing the water occasionally and never have any build up in bucket on the air stones etc. I can pull the air stones out and they look practically new. Heisenberg advises to use Rhizotonic prior to large enough root ball to begin tea, i however use Zone at the beginning and it works just fine, i try to avoid anything even organic extract based.
From my observation after throwing in 3 cups of tea into my ez clone cloner and reading this thread it appears that once this supper funk gets into and takes hold of a plant or clone cutting its almost impossible to recover from but I think I'm starting to understand what this is. First thing is AIR. Lots of air ...the good stuff we are brewing in the tea needs air and the bad funk wants to rob the oxygen out of the water it lives in so his buddy pythium can come in and have a party. I just bought 2 more air stones and Im going to add them to each one of my EZ clone cloners along with the rhizotonic.
The interesting thing I noticed is when this funk feels threatened or its colony numbers decrease dramatically ...it does whatever it can to survive and usually come back with numbers that are out of control. I threw 5 cups of bleach into a rez because I was just pissed off to no end and the plants survived. I kept thinking ....no phucking way in hell. but what threw me for a loop is that this funk not only survived ...it went wild...I mean wild after 3 days. I dont know what supper funk can survive what Ive thrown at it but I understand the reason for the tea.
we are dealing with numbers here. The tea has more of the good stuff than the bad stuff and the good stuff overwhelms the bad stuff. But ...in order for the good stuff to survive ...we need oxygen. lots and lots of bubbles. You also have to repopulate the rez every day with the good stuff to keep the balance in your favor. This thing were fighting is tenacious. Its doesn't care ...it will do anything and everything it can to win. I just went out and bought the rhizotonic. I'm bound and determined to solve my problem with this bullshit. I've spent Thousands of dollars and countless hours trying to figure out a solution. Not to mention that I've gone completely full goose bozo in the process. I WILL WIN... its come to a point where I dont care anymore ....I WILL WIN !!! I will do whatever it takes to win. I will figure this thing out and I will solve the problem if it takes every last breath I have. Its personal now.
And Once I win ...I will post my results on this thread just like Heisenberg has so that all of you wont turn into Syd Barret like I have....
The interesting thing I noticed is when this funk feels threatened or its colony numbers decrease dramatically ...it does whatever it can to survive and usually come back with numbers that are out of control. I threw 5 cups of bleach into a rez because I was just pissed off to no end and the plants survived. I kept thinking ....no phucking way in hell. but what threw me for a loop is that this funk not only survived ...it went wild...I mean wild after 3 days. I dont know what supper funk can survive what Ive thrown at it but I understand the reason for the tea.
we are dealing with numbers here. The tea has more of the good stuff than the bad stuff and the good stuff overwhelms the bad stuff. But ...in order for the good stuff to survive ...we need oxygen. lots and lots of bubbles. You also have to repopulate the rez every day with the good stuff to keep the balance in your favor. This thing were fighting is tenacious. Its doesn't care ...it will do anything and everything it can to win. I just went out and bought the rhizotonic. I'm bound and determined to solve my problem with this bullshit. I've spent Thousands of dollars and countless hours trying to figure out a solution. Not to mention that I've gone completely full goose bozo in the process. I WILL WIN... its come to a point where I dont care anymore ....I WILL WIN !!! I will do whatever it takes to win. I will figure this thing out and I will solve the problem if it takes every last breath I have. Its personal now.
And Once I win ...I will post my results on this thread just like Heisenberg has so that all of you wont turn into Syd Barret like I have....
JohnnySocko
Active Member
I am VERY hesitant to even post this as it is borderline irresponsible (esp. since I'm not 100% sure of the dosages) BUT; potassium permanganate cleaned up my roots and that slime pretty damn good....in fact it appeared to work better than any of the aforementioned chems ... being a total neophyte non-chemist hobbyist I have no clue what other reactions such a powerful oxidant might do; so I only used it once experimentally and didn't try it on my whole system (its a known sanitizer for aquatic plants so thought I'd try it here)
...all I know is bleach & H2O2 neutralizes it and it stains like hell.... again, I say this with some hesitation, trepidation and a big disclaimer, esp given we already have a very competent solution.....: 2nd disclaimer: again, this was totally experimental in uncontrolled conditions
The tea takes care of everything, I allow my roots to become a little dingy and dark in the water before i switch to the tea. The tea can feed off these roots and keep alive, which keeps the water aerobic while not adding carbs in res keeps them feeding on roots. Ive found as long as you dont overdue the tea and avoid all organics it cant be matched as far as root health. I've dabbled with the chemicals and everything needed to be used in an excessive amount to really clean up the roots, but they all damaged the plants, and the younger ones dont even survive. I wouldn't even recommend using them ever in any situation even before the tea. If roots are that bad simply wash them off real good with tap water and rip off black roots and rot, then just soak them in water/tea for the night period (1 cup/gal) then move them back to reg nutrients with 1 cup per 4 gallons ev 3 days. It just works, but need to brew a good tea also.
Ive read all this before. like i said if you have a healthy root system, pest free canopy, well balanced and available chemical nutrients, and moderate to great environmental conditions these additives will show no improvement. The only thing i havent tested and would like to would be spraying the fulvic acid lightly on the leaves during bloom which is said to increase permeability which increases yield.. but I wouldn't believe it till I try it.
What all these additives really do is either help nutrient availability or keep the root zone healthy, both of which will show a good improvement in soil. but that write up isn't titled right imo because its basically saying how to convert your hydroponics to a organics method, these additives aren't going to show improvement in a chemical dwc. When people talk about growth hormones well chemical nutrients in a dwc system with roots always in an environment with available nutrients and air that's really as good as it gets. Which in turn invites other obstacles like increased root disease etc, but Heisenberg has given us the solution.
rh2050
Active Member
Despite reading the entire thread, I cannot recall the advice regarding Rhizotonic. Can someone please advise me on how and when to use Rhizotonic both in cloning and with younger plants?
Thank you in advance. Peace.
B-1 isnt going to do anything, its for stressed plants that have slight root damage such as during a transplant. Heisenberg would say to use Rhizotonic in the cloner. Personally I would rather just use rockwool cause its so easy. I've had plenty of success even with clones in rockwool without any clone gel in 65-70 degree weather in well vented dome and never misted, they turned out fine and rooted in 12 days. Only thing i added was Rapid Start during the rockwool presoak. But if your going to stick to ez cloner then use the Rhizotonic, he knows his sht.
Malevolence
New Member
It would seem from your reply you havent really read the post because a lot of you are saying is addressed in the post or in direct contradiction with facts backed up with references. Also it is possible to use some organics in dwc... pure blend pro, liquid karma, and kind come to mind... and yes... even bennies. While you do have to be careful, run bennies, and I wouldn't go dumping molasses in the res.... staying 100% organic free is mainly advice for fighting slime.
Anyway feel free to not use additives but telling people all additives are useless and then recommending pk boosters is pretty much bad advice.
Heisenburg says to use 10ml of Rhizotonic per gallon to the cloner. I'm going to drop the clonex gel and the clonex food and do what heisenburg says. Normally I never have an issue but I recently took clones and the funk hit the new roots and they turned orange brown color. So I hit the cloner with some physan 20 and when my first batch of tea was ready I washed out the cloner and added tea without an airstone . I thought the spraying water would add in enough oxygen to keep the Benny's alive but after a few days I have found this is not the case. It appears that whatever this bug is....it retreats up into the plant or clone anytime something like zone or physan 20 is added in or sprayed on the plant or clone as a way of defending itself. I've seen it with bleach...H2O2....zone. Its really amazing because no matter what combination I try ...it always locks itself up in the plant or clone and everything dies. For instance....the fan leaves on my clones are turning yellow with a brown spot in the middle and the new would be growth is wilting even the clones I took that haven't rooted yet. I understand how the tea works but how do you deal with this bug on fresh clones that haven't rooted yet ?. I have been battling this thing for 3 years now. I ran 4 years with no problems what so ever and then 3 years ago...whamm. something else I've noticed is that this bug retreats to the fan leaves and the stems turn dark purple.
I didn't say they were completely useless, I said if you can grow really healthy plants they are useless. The heisenberg tea does more then just fight slime it keeps the root zone in great health altogether. You clearly dont know much about science nor do you have experience with really healthy plants without using additives. Im not going to repeat myself because i clearly pointed out why chemicals in dwc are as good as an environment can get in cannabis cultivation.
All additives have mixed reviews and its because they only work for certain people with certain problems where the additive is more of repair others find no improvement, but just as often they increase problems with disease in a hydroponics system. Clearly there all lots of people with problems growing and additives will help here and there so how can I say its useless, but good growers in hydro say additives are for noobs.
If you want to call the heisenberg tea an additive then so be it, that's all that's necessary to obtain very healthy roots.
Malevolence
New Member
Sure making nutrient absorbtion easier across a wider ph range is not required. Increasing disease resistance, branch strength, and heat and drought tolerance is not required. I guess foliar feeding as a way to deliver organics in water cultures is a practice you can do without also. So yes technically you don't need additives. I guess you also missed the part about hydro nutes already having too much P since you recommended a pk boost. The reason there is so much conflicting info about additives is two-fold: the main reason is because this is a forum full of typical stoners. Which feeds reason number two: very few people run controlled experiments or give any scientific reasoning or measurements for their conclusions.
I would call anything that isnt water, ph down/up, base nutes, or air bubbles an additive... but who cares anyway. What line are you using that doesn't have enough P?
I would call anything that isnt water, ph down/up, base nutes, or air bubbles an additive... but who cares anyway. What line are you using that doesn't have enough P?
Well its complicated sort of at least for bloom, but in veg its pretty much just Sensi A B (not ph perfect) plus a little calimagic. In bloom i use two diff bottles (not designed for each other) to get the perfect npk while getting the proper cal and mag, and i found 1:2.5 ratio of them plants drink up rapidly. Other then that I keep the tea flowin in small amounts, and I only add about 40-70ppm at most of a pk boost wk3 or 4 to about 7 or 8 and its Open Sesame then switch to Cha ching. I use to use Silica till I was able to obtain perfect health top to bottom thanks to dwc and the tea at which point i found even stronger branches.
Soilwatcher
Member
Just so were not plugging the same companies all the time, I would like to add Everwood Farm (http://www.everwoodfarm.com/Water_Conditioners/Flying_Skull_Z7) to the list of awesome vendors. They are at $36.90 for the 16 oz Z7 and ship priority mail or UPS. Very cool thing about these folks is if they can ship it cheaper they refund you the difference automatically. Never had anyone do that for me without asking. And their tech support guy has always given me good advice, although they are more into organic soil than hydro... saved my girls from more than a couple disasters.