2x4 tent and tray, House and Garden + Botanicare, coco, 11-2 gal

[One Love 731]

I ran coco ebb n flow for a year and a half with great results, I fed twice a day with a PH of 5.5-5.8, PPM 800-1200. I would still be running my trays but the new spot doesn't have enough power, HVAC or pluming to set everything up yet and the Mrs. is taking care of everything until I can be there permanent. I also let the coco dry some to let roots search after transplant but don't think its a good idea to do for long. Seems the PH goes haywire when coco drys. I use R.O. and CNS 17 coco and rarely drain and fill the rez unless there's a problem. I just top off and adjust. I learned coco ebb n flow from Dongle69, she was an amazing grower. SirSmokesAllot knows his growing fur sure, he's one of IC's finest. Hope things turn around for ya. I'm also running Ken's GDP, Pre98 Bubba and Platinum OG (not sure if its the same as Platinum Kush) Hoping to get out to grab Kushman's Star Dawg soon. Regardless its always cool to watch a CaliG show. Peace, pot and karma. One Love

 

[guest5703]

Almost one week down....Tonight I trimmed a lot from the lowers of the plants, and fed most of them from the top with the same res water with a bit more RO in it. The PPM was about 700 and I PH'd it to 5.9 I'm planning on dumping the res now and mixing a new batch.

PEACE

 

[Ptone]

Subbed Looking great!

 

[Lebniis]

I've been running into similar problems.. I'll check in soon.

 

[One Love 731]

They look like they could use some cal mag for nitrogen. I usually give my girls 3-5 ml's of cal mag previous to and through transition. As far as run off I haven't really noticed a difference without runoff. Right now I have a bunch of LVPK, Blackberry Kush and a few KKSC's that the Mrs. is hand feeding. They only have runoff when I or her feed too much. I want to see these do good for ya cuz next run I have some Chem crosses, OG's and more Kush's + a few of the same your running. I use Botanicare coco as well, 1 and 2 gal containers, So were very similar as far as setup and strains. don't be afraid to use H&G's foliar, I hear that stuff works like green spray paint. Keep the coco moist. Were does your PH fall after the mix before adding up/down? If my mix doesn't come real close with RO there's something wrong with the mix or time to replace filters. Keep up the good work buddy. Peace, pot and karma. One Love

 

[guest5703]

Thanks one Love you are a big help! Lets see, I have been using Cal mag now for years and have been using it regularly with this grow. I also have been using Magic Green, twice now within 3 weeks and it seems to help a bit but not like some people say "spray paint" lol, nothing works that good.

This is in order.....I mix Silica Blast, then Cal Mag, then A, then B, and PH is usually at like 6.4 so I bring it down and then I will be adding Multi Zen and a small amount of drip clean, something like 2ml/5 gallons.

Thanks again One Love, I was told recently that when nitrogen goes through coco it becomes unpolar....? And that I shouldnt be reusing my water like I do during the week. What's your thought on that?

So I flushed the ladies out two nights ago, with the same res water just a little lower in PPM with some added RO. It was like 700PPM I think. So I hand watered from the top until I got a bit of run off from each lady. Tonight I will be mixing a new batch and hopefully start to water the ones that have dried enough.

PEACE

 

[ambertrich]

One Love 731 is on it, I do E&F in coco recirculating. I pretty much followed dongle's style as well, just on a much smaller scale.
I do top feed once a week or 10 days with nute soln. from the res to help prevent any salt build-up. I just take a solo cup and feed each plant till I see a bit of runoff and thats it. Start my pH at about 5.6 and let it drift up to around 6.0 and by then its usually time to add some fresh nutes and pH back down again. I don't do full res changes unless there is some major issue or a funk invasion of the nute soln. Use either GH Lucas/Res/Head style or CNS-17 with good results.
As said earlier, don't let the coco get dry, it does screw with the nute buffering, pH etc.

Good luck with this round. Looks good in there to me.

 

[One Love 731]

The Silica is what is bringing the PH up so high, I use the silica blast for PH up. I was running 8 4x4 trays (8 40 gal rez's) a while back. 5 of the rez's ran without dump all the way through flower, only top off and adjust. I ran an extra pump in half with fountain attachment and large air stone in the other half, didnt seem to make a huge difference. Once a week I would top off add nutes and adjust PH to 5.5, sometimes as low as 5.3. From everything you've mentioned I would say drop the PH a lil but its just a guess. Plants adapt to there environment. I would set the feeding on a timer and leave it at that. With the drip clean you wont have any build up. I wish Dongle was still around, She would be here setting it straight. I used a 1 part nutrient (CNS 17 coco) and very few additives (Sweet, Flora nectar, Hygorzyme and Cal-Mag) only when needed so although are system were similar there also not. The last thing I want to happen is for my advise to cause a problem.

Right now were running hand fed coco in 1 and 2 gal pots. Were feeding CNS17 1/2 strength, Snow Storm Ultra and Flora Nector. There as frosty as any we have grown. It sucks to see all the trays, rez's, reflectors, AC's etc. etc. stacked in the garage, it looks like a hydro pawn shop out there,lol.

I would throw up some pics but there 300+ miles away at the moment. Ill be there permanent late Feb and will start a journal. The Mrs. wants to get a journal going, were just setting up necessary security on her computer before she gets started.

I guess what it comes down to is I beleive plants adjust to there environment. For that reason I try and keep everything consistent. I water once a day in veg and twice a day in flower, once at lights on and once 1 1/2-2 hours before lights out if my pots are too small sometimes I will add a 3'rd water in between but never when lights are out. When I had my trays going it was always on a timer. I run my coco loosely packed (when packed too tight it seems to hold to much water). Less is more when dealing with PPM epically additives. I run my PH lower than some which I learned from 10k, he's still around but doesn't post his grows anymore and seems to be past helping just to get insulted in return. The PH argument is a funny one, I liken it to the Skunk VA cut, it always turns into an argument and everybody gets their feelings hurt. I usally avoid it cuz it has a way of hijacking threads. please those reading this don't come at me I am happy with my results.

Keep up the good work and have a great New Year. Peace, pot and karma. One Love

 

[hazy]

Hey cali, good to see you with a new thread. You'll get it back on track and be even better than before.

 

[Lebniis]

In that last picture, your plants look hungry for N? I've been fighting a cal/mag issue my entire run. Sorry if you already posted this, what water are you using? Tap? RO? what's the the ppm and ph if you are using tap? Doesn't seem like you are having a problem with cal/mag from what I can see.

 

[guest5703]

hazy-Yo Hazy bro!!! Good to see ya around, thanks for the kind words I hope this time I end up with some dank to smoke.....GRRR!

Lebniis-Using RO water dude, the tap worked well for a long time though. Just started using a RO filter in 2010.


Well some good and some bad. The GDP is having problems, its really yellow and I'm afraid that maybe the PH has gone way off with her. The Kushs are outstanding and large! Should be dank if everything keeps going well for them. The Chem D and Stardog look alright, decent size and not too yellow. The Alien Dogs are kind of ok, they are a bit yellow but do show lots of new green happy growth.

Second week of flower now, starting to see hair clusters forming and in a week or so we should see some frost. Whats wrong with my GDP!?!?!?

Alien dogs down the middle

This is the Chem D or Stardog....Maybe you can tell KRD?? One looks more Sour Diesel-ish to me and I bet that one is Chem D.

This is the one I think is probably Chem D since it resembles Sour D a bit more

And here is the GDP

 

[Herborizer]

Looks like a PH issue, or CAL (not mag) issue, or not enough Nutes issue. Could be a combination of all 3.

would mix your nutes and then come back in a few hours and check the PH again. PH rises usually in COCO so I shoot for 5.7.

If you want to findout if CALMAG is a problem, just foliar spray the GDP with some CALMAG. In 3-4 days you will see the result. FYI, PH issues usually cause CALMAG deficiencies.

All your plants look a little yellow to me. This could be because of PH, Calmag, or both. Or it could be that they need more of your base nutes. You could consider bumping up your nutes by 75-100ppm.

Personally, I would foliar spray calmag first and see what happens. At the same time I would do as I said about and mix up my next feeding and then come back in 2 hours and check it again. I bet the PH rises.

 

[guest5703]

Thanks bro good to hear! I know PH will rise so usually I PH my mix to 5.6 or so and it will rise to 5.9 and then I will lower again if needed....I do believe I need to lower my PH, it is 5.9 after two days after sitting in the res so the ladies could be sitting in a very high PH solution.....I'll try the cal mag spray on the GDP, should I go by recommended dosages??

I feel the PH thing is really getting me. I watered heavily this week so the ladies were sitting for a couple days wet, this is probably when the PH rose in the pots eh??? So I'll make sure I only feed them with PH 5.6 from now on.


You say most look yellow, and could use more food but I am hesitant to just bump up the food cuz some of the plants look completely healthy. One Bubba and one Platinum OG are super healthy and lush green. The others are responding and showing new green growth so I'm pretty sure they are happy with the food. I'll just focus on the PH, thanks again dude!

 

[guest5703]

Just another update, I'm really keeping a close eye on things so updates are frequent. Everything looks stable, we are now exactly at two weeks flower and I am seeing a super super small amount of resin forming, barely but I can see the shine!!! Bad news is I spotted root aphids walking around the medium again, so tonight I watered them with some root aphid stuff my buddy gave me.


Stardog or Chem D

Platinum or Bubba Kush, this is the bigger one...

 

[bbing]

Quit clowning around Cali, show us the turn around.
make sure your nutes aren't off. Happened to me not long ago.
this shit should be kicking absolute ass in a wide range of ph any way. Everyone should see you have had good momentum and enough plant structures developed, looks like something happend.

You use any PK product lately? Shooting powder etc?

One mistake i was making was attempting to compensate re-circ'd nute solution with too much CalMg. It needs alot added back in to flood coco in late flower but you can creat a condition of excess ca and Mag def. I started using 1 part tap to 3 parts RO. (I am presently using H&G cocos) I also found augmenting the coco w/ tupur mix does not inhibit drain and provides alot of bene's like silica and moderates salt leaching. Salt will accumulate if media is not completely wetted. It will rise to the highest level in container and tend to accumulate there. I fuggin hate scrubbin the shit after runs i know. Completely wetting also pushes trapped gasses and oxygenates the entire root mass. If you are running res in tent make sure your air pumps draw external air for stones especially w/ CO2.
I havew built custom flood tables and run containerless in shallow beds just so I can go on fishing and surfing trips once in awhile.

Modified Coco Baby! Benefit of soil...Speed of Hydro...sort of!

I think you could monitor any ion change (the "unpolar" comment) expressed in PH.
re-Dissolved O2 levels ahould be adequate with ventaltion (airstones) for 6 hours.

As they feed; salt to water lowered
As they drink water to salt is lowered
These seem to be a bit more organized than random, but they do cycle differently depending on strain

 

[guest5703]

26 days of flower now. Feeding a simple mix of Aqua Flakes A and B and havent gone over 6ml per gallon until this week when I did about 7ml per gallon. Also cal mag at 6ml per gallon. So my mix was at 800ppm and 1.6 EC which made sense I suppose.

I've been PH'ing every time at 5.6 and it raises to 5.8-6 but by that time I'm already done with my 5 gallon jug I mixed, so they get a new fresh batch at 5.6.......The girls drink a lot, the Alien Dogs in the middle drink the least, they just werent healthy enough at the beginning but they are doing ok now. All the others drink water just about every night, I give them about 3 red beer cups full of feed/water, Once at the end of each week I feed the girls maybe 5 red cups of low feed water, at about 300-400PPM of just A and B and I'm sure this is helping dissolve salts, so no worries there. No more ebb and flow for now.....I'm seeing better results from hand watering, what can I say? I suppose I havent dialed the ebb and flo, but I know it has been dialed by many before.

My biggest concern is probably the root aphids, at this point I dont really want to use any pesticide, and I'm hoping they wont get so gnarly that they take over....But that is just me hoping to get lucky.

Other than that, the ladies are chugging along with resin and starting to get thicker now. Week 5-6 should be awesome, though I dont have any bud boost...Maybe I will pick up some cheap blackstrap molasses, what say ye???? (yea in a pirate voice, I dont know why haha)

Alright enough talk, check the bitches.

This is either Stardog, or chem D....Comparatively this girl is the faster one if that helps....Shes further along for sure.

This is either Platinum or Bubba, both look too similar for me to judge.

The GDP....Not sure about this one....

This is either the Stardog or Chem D. This is the one further behind.

This is either the Bubba or Platinum, again I'm not sure at all.

Alien Dogs

So why are the alien dogs yellowish...? I think the GDP has recovered, she is gaining in weight quick and I see bits of purple on her already large calyx. She just looks a bit yellow and I dont think she can come back from that now.


But the Alien Dogs....I think they are sitting soggy for a day or two longer than the others and perhaps their PH is a bit high??? Let me know what you think, thanks!!!

 

[redspaghetti]

Whats up cali

Nice to see most of the plants start to turn around

Do you know what cut of the GDP you got?

base on my experiences running GDP, shes a hardy hardy hardy girl, she could take a shit load of nutes and wont burn i had my gardener fuck up the ph on one of my table and GDP was still nice and green while others look like shit,,,,,

Now i have problems with A dog yellowing as well, i fixed the problem by giving them a good flush, and start my nutes program little in the begining and full dose once they made the full recover,

also i had to move my lights up as well, i believe they were getting bleach

but knowing you, this aint your first run and you got a lot of experiences, soo i hope it'll work out for you

btw love the pictures on your journal, you did a great job

cheers

 

[KRD]

Hey bro the first one is chemd the second one is stardog. Hey on another note, I usually water with 5.8 to 6.0-6.1 I go back and forth. If they look a little pale I go on the 6 range then go back to 5.8 a few days later. You will know soon which one is the chemd by the smell alone, everythings looking good your gonna like that stardog.

 

[guest5703]

I'm wondering if the Stardog takes longer to flower or maybe it was just stunted? It seems behind a bit.....The Chem looks further along thats for sure. Thanks for the comments guys!

 

[redspaghetti]

stardog always behind other when in blooms, well in my garden it is ... but she is a keeper, thats for sure

cheers,