digi blumat is for measuring only, not for dosing
Need Information on Cal/Mag Deficiencies When Using Led Lights
- Thread starter BB Boomer
- Start date
MrTwist1
Well-Known Member
Ok so it doesn't matter if you put the carrot in and then water, or water and then put the carrot in... as long as there is no delay. The important thing here is not to let the carrot dry out at all.
Secondly I would advise adjusting to 1.5 arrows as you have read, rather than the 2 arrows in the instruction guide. I also find 2 arrows leaves the pots just slightly too dry for my preference. Yes the plants will grow at 2 arrows, but I find they prefer ~1.5 arrows.
For me the fine tuning comes a week or so later when the pots have reached equilibrium. At this point no matter how wet or dry the pot... the Blumat should be providing only what the plant is consuming. That is when I go in and individually check/tweak them.
Your settings are likely fine, but no harm in checking them now. Yes I started with the provided instructions but modified it slightly over time according to my reading and my own experience which seemed to confirm 1.5 is better than 2. Cheers
MrTwist1
Well-Known Member
Hey Cobby G
Zero runoff here and I never flush - I use dripclean to minimise salt buildup, and I never had an issue, which led me to surmise several things...
A) Plants do not in fact need a wet/dry cycle as regurgitated by every man and his dog in this industry,
B) Salt buildup is only an issue if your soil is allowed to dry out and the salts are able to crystallise.
If I had an existing flood and drain tray I guess I would stick with that cos a decent Blumat system with all the extras is not super cheap. But if you wanted to go for it with the Blumats you could always use your tray as a catch pan (this is rather important because of the danger of Blumat runaways). I doubt you will lose any rootmass - plants love Blumats and I end up with a solid mass of feeder roots in my fabric pots. Like rock solid. You will find the roots come up to the surface and even start to grow on top of the soil surface right under the dripper which looks freaky cool. Obviously if the drip ever stops for more than a few minutes those exposed roots will die. This can happen if you handwater any supplements, because that will cause your Blumats to stop dripping for a while. Obviously it doesn't matter because there is just a tiny fraction of the total root mass above ground that dill dry out.
Whether they pay for themselves vs other drip systems I cannot tell you. I find they do help to maximise growth and yield compared to handwatering, but I have never done manual dripfeed to compare. Blumats do get expensive once you start buying the addons (which are actually almost essential), but I still swear by them. With them I can comfortably grow a 2 zip plant in 1 gallon of soil which although not amazing, I think is pretty cool. As far as I know there is not another mechanical system that monitors each individual plant's moisture use and waters accordingly. Cheers
CobKits
Well-Known Member
i just hate hate hate cleaning out reservoirs and replacing all that. it slows me down because i dont make time to do it, and i end up wasting my life handwatering twice a day in lots of cases (esp veg)
MrTwist1
Well-Known Member
Hmmm... this is one of those situations where a little work upfront will save you a lot of work down the road... but I guess you gotta have the time to do that work upfront to begin with.
CobKits
Well-Known Member
eggzactly. every day is groundhog day
3-4 hours sleep
water
go to (realjob) work
spend 3-5 hours doing cobkits in the afternoon/evening which often involves a 1-2 hr roundtrip into town to the post office
go home
water
repeat
were on a septic so i dont dump spent nutes down the drain
if i could reduce my nute solution usage and not be a slave to watering i could be more efficient.right now to get my tent automated i would ahve to hand bail 50 gal of solution and spread it around the lawn, clean all the trays refill it all etc thats a half a day so i would jsut be skipping sleep which im getting too old for. need to simplify something i could change up nutes easy instead of living in the land of monster perpetual veg. i get an extra hour a night on the girls if im lucky
3-4 hours sleep
water
go to (realjob) work
spend 3-5 hours doing cobkits in the afternoon/evening which often involves a 1-2 hr roundtrip into town to the post office
go home
water
repeat
were on a septic so i dont dump spent nutes down the drain
if i could reduce my nute solution usage and not be a slave to watering i could be more efficient.right now to get my tent automated i would ahve to hand bail 50 gal of solution and spread it around the lawn, clean all the trays refill it all etc thats a half a day so i would jsut be skipping sleep which im getting too old for. need to simplify something i could change up nutes easy instead of living in the land of monster perpetual veg. i get an extra hour a night on the girls if im lucky
MrTwist1
Well-Known Member
Not enough hours in the day!
BB Boomer
Well-Known Member
Thanks for clearing that up Mrtwist1. Phew! I was going to redo everything tonight lol. I will back off the others to 1.5 arrows as well. I am so appreciative off everybody's input. Learning all this new stuff has made growing exciting again although getting it to a point of routine does provide a sense of comfort as well.
MrTwist1
Well-Known Member
With pleasure amigo - happy to pass on what I have learned. Watering automation has definitely changed my routine massively and set me free from the chains of daily hand watering. Cheers
MrTwist1
Well-Known Member
If you make sure you keep your res capacity lower than that of your catchtray then this should not be a problem. Fair point tho.
BB Boomer
Well-Known Member
I put a HVAC drip pan under my pots. It was the only thing that I found in a heavy duty plastic tray that was big and didn't cost a fortune. I can already verify it will hold at least 10 gallons of water. Mine even came with a drain plug that fits a garden hose but I capped mine off since it sits on the floor. I got it off Ebay.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/331338987557?_trksid=p2060353.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=STRK:MEBIDX:IT
http://www.ebay.com/itm/331338987557?_trksid=p2060353.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=STRK:MEBIDX:IT
CobKits
Well-Known Member
this one has me stumped. i see this since switching from GH to jacks. last time it happened, i reduced light, raised temps and dropped veg EC with the same formula and they took off like a rocket. these are small girls on the floor that were under a too-bright blurple light while i was building out a new cob rig.
these are GG4 from darkheart moms which were phenomenal just huge and healthy and super vigorous
symptoms:
lanky growth, purple stems, pale leaves. leaves (esp shoots) are really purple and their margins and twisted and contorted. it almost looks like when your tall girls grow up too close to the light and bleach and twist.
possible causes:
too cold (upper 60s to low 70s with LEDs)
EC too high
too much light
micronutrient deficiency or lockout?
salt shouldnt be an issue i water 2x day and have been on the softer side of EC lately, 1.0-1.2
they were healthy green albeit a bit lanky for their first few weeks under 2 foot t5. i thought they were ok to take more light but after a week under the blurple (solarstorm osram 880 on veg ~400W, 30-36" above the girls in a 3x3 tent) theyre not doing well
its like a deficiency but more like a lockout as it seems like multiple deficiencies. other larger plants on the same nute formula (little higher) are raging, like out of control too big overgrowing the tent (at 1.4-1.8EC). these little ones are getting 1.0-1.4 EC, pH 5.5-6.0 hand water every day. i knew these were lacking but didnt know how bad it was until i got them under some white light today. they should be dark green for as much N as im giving them. only micro deficiency that seems to match symptoms is molybdenum but jaks has that unless its being locked out. checkout the crinkly purple center of that one fan leaf where all the blades come together
formula at full strength (~2.2 EC) should calc out to something like this:
help! i dont wanna switch back to GH if i dont have to, but i always had flawless seedlings before the switch. the only other thing i could think about is i always ran from 6.2 up to 6.8 pH but like i said have dropped down to 5.5-6.0 and am pretty rigorous about it. i wonder if something is being locked out by that pH that the little girls dont like
ive got em under ~250W of 3000k 90 cri now with fans blowing the warm air down on them, they should like that a lot. rest of girls are lovin that nute mix. heres the mom tent next to it with 2 1825s at 50-70W each (2700 90 in back, 5000k 70 in front) and a 220W osram solarstorm off to the front left. girls are about 4 feet tall and need to be cloned out but they look great (sour d)
these are GG4 from darkheart moms which were phenomenal just huge and healthy and super vigorous
symptoms:
lanky growth, purple stems, pale leaves. leaves (esp shoots) are really purple and their margins and twisted and contorted. it almost looks like when your tall girls grow up too close to the light and bleach and twist.
possible causes:
too cold (upper 60s to low 70s with LEDs)
EC too high
too much light
micronutrient deficiency or lockout?
salt shouldnt be an issue i water 2x day and have been on the softer side of EC lately, 1.0-1.2
they were healthy green albeit a bit lanky for their first few weeks under 2 foot t5. i thought they were ok to take more light but after a week under the blurple (solarstorm osram 880 on veg ~400W, 30-36" above the girls in a 3x3 tent) theyre not doing well
its like a deficiency but more like a lockout as it seems like multiple deficiencies. other larger plants on the same nute formula (little higher) are raging, like out of control too big overgrowing the tent (at 1.4-1.8EC). these little ones are getting 1.0-1.4 EC, pH 5.5-6.0 hand water every day. i knew these were lacking but didnt know how bad it was until i got them under some white light today. they should be dark green for as much N as im giving them. only micro deficiency that seems to match symptoms is molybdenum but jaks has that unless its being locked out. checkout the crinkly purple center of that one fan leaf where all the blades come together
formula at full strength (~2.2 EC) should calc out to something like this:
help! i dont wanna switch back to GH if i dont have to, but i always had flawless seedlings before the switch. the only other thing i could think about is i always ran from 6.2 up to 6.8 pH but like i said have dropped down to 5.5-6.0 and am pretty rigorous about it. i wonder if something is being locked out by that pH that the little girls dont like
ive got em under ~250W of 3000k 90 cri now with fans blowing the warm air down on them, they should like that a lot. rest of girls are lovin that nute mix. heres the mom tent next to it with 2 1825s at 50-70W each (2700 90 in back, 5000k 70 in front) and a 220W osram solarstorm off to the front left. girls are about 4 feet tall and need to be cloned out but they look great (sour d)
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CobKits
Well-Known Member
i couldnt find a tray to fit my 3x3 tent, home depot sells plastic 32x32" tray that goes under clothes washers and dishwashers, like $30. doesnt hold a ton but has like a 1" lip and is pretty stout molded plastic (and is white
) mine was like $30 heres a cheaper one online
http://www.simplyplumbing.com/64542-washing-machine-pan.html?gclid=Cj0KEQjwioHIBRCes6nP56Ti1IsBEiQAxxb5G4a1T_TIMnUqOrQhPkuQFin5EG_EQfK8gH2HWuPVj54aAu0K8P8HAQ
Yodaweed
Well-Known Member
Looks like phosphorus to me, good luck and happy growing.
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sixstring2112
Well-Known Member
that mix dont look balanced at all for anything in veg.the ca and sulfate are way higher than they need to be and the moly seems low as hell.the secret of gh 3 part is in the micro where all the moly is.but hard to say whats up,i would think a few weeks of that mix on babies would have a ton of excess cal,iron,and sulfate not getting used.seems like nitro tox would be easy to do with those NPK ratios,idk but when i see mixes like this i get confused as hell lol.
Micah Metts
New Member
I find that my plants do very well under LEDS with some supplemental CFL lighting and a nute tank dedicated to organics. I mostly use the Vegamatrix line, with some added cal/mag and lots of kelp early on, pulling back as flowering matures..
While my gals are grown in a soiless mix, they have been supplemented with guano, kelp and worms castings to allow for more constant microbial activity within snd around the roots. I also give them sugars, (typically organic molasses) and plenty of H2O2 in the water. Haven't had an issue with serious disease, root rot, etc in many years.. I chalk that up to a healthy, living environment under ground.. balanced bacteria/fungal colonies..
The nute tank itself is kept very oxygenated and the solution is constantly moving with one pump dedicated purely to circulation, a bubbler, and a hose connected to a second pump which, when not watering my gals, is contributing to the constant flow of liquid and air through my system, taking water from the bottom and showering it back over the top.
End result is this: I water every other day, at most, with healthy gals in 3.5 gallon pots, and pump out any excess off the ground.. Pots are kept slightly suspended by narrow beams with a waterproof lining underneath. Simple, yes, but very effective. In my experience, happy roots tend to be one part of the ecosystem one must maintain.. no matter how good the air circulation or lighting is above, if the root system is not thriving, the rest of the plant is soon to follow suit..
Hydro-organics seems the best way to get the most out of a rapidly growing cannabis plant.. Some growers even have worms and pill bugs living in their soilesss mixtures to complete the cycle!
I produce medicinal grade product, and weight, with no nasty after taste, etc.. And I do so with LEDS, CFLS and a good extraction fan up top...However, If not for the health of my roots, my plants would not come close to maximizing their metabolism and growth rate.
Keep it simple. Oxygen, relatively balanced organic nutes, a good coco based mix and clean water... If you can't keep a plant thriving under these conditions then you're either very unlucky (rare disease, genetic issues) or you're not keeping up with your grow. Better to have 6 healthy plants than 20 half dead ones...
Enjoy the grow! Cheers!
While my gals are grown in a soiless mix, they have been supplemented with guano, kelp and worms castings to allow for more constant microbial activity within snd around the roots. I also give them sugars, (typically organic molasses) and plenty of H2O2 in the water. Haven't had an issue with serious disease, root rot, etc in many years.. I chalk that up to a healthy, living environment under ground.. balanced bacteria/fungal colonies..
The nute tank itself is kept very oxygenated and the solution is constantly moving with one pump dedicated purely to circulation, a bubbler, and a hose connected to a second pump which, when not watering my gals, is contributing to the constant flow of liquid and air through my system, taking water from the bottom and showering it back over the top.
End result is this: I water every other day, at most, with healthy gals in 3.5 gallon pots, and pump out any excess off the ground.. Pots are kept slightly suspended by narrow beams with a waterproof lining underneath. Simple, yes, but very effective. In my experience, happy roots tend to be one part of the ecosystem one must maintain.. no matter how good the air circulation or lighting is above, if the root system is not thriving, the rest of the plant is soon to follow suit..
Hydro-organics seems the best way to get the most out of a rapidly growing cannabis plant.. Some growers even have worms and pill bugs living in their soilesss mixtures to complete the cycle!
I produce medicinal grade product, and weight, with no nasty after taste, etc.. And I do so with LEDS, CFLS and a good extraction fan up top...However, If not for the health of my roots, my plants would not come close to maximizing their metabolism and growth rate.
Keep it simple. Oxygen, relatively balanced organic nutes, a good coco based mix and clean water... If you can't keep a plant thriving under these conditions then you're either very unlucky (rare disease, genetic issues) or you're not keeping up with your grow. Better to have 6 healthy plants than 20 half dead ones...
Enjoy the grow! Cheers!
Micah Metts
New Member
If they are well processed, clean nutes, they should all be okay in the tank together... I start with H2O2 and water, let it bubble or sit exposed a 24 hour minimum, then begin to add my nutes. I like using the base first, as this is more than 90% of what the plant actually needs for growth, typically, and I then add cal/mag and boosters, including silica and some carbs in the form of sugars (molasses is great, but can clog up your pumps and filters, so I usually do a separate 'carb load' watering a few hours before or after the main watering.. ). When one is using certain compounds, they can potentially bond together and become unusable, (like cal and mag forming gypsum) but most well made, organic based nutes are not susceptible to this.. So go clean, organic, and know your supplier.. a little extra homework can really make a big difference.