guess not, just a place to congregate....
Ill pm ya, but just know I cant tell you who i am for obvious reasons, lol..
-
Happy Birthday ICMag! Been 20 years since Gypsy Nirvana created the forum! We are celebrating with a 4/20 Giveaway and by launching a new Patreon tier called "420club". You can read more here.
-
Important notice: ICMag's T.O.U. has been updated. Please review it here. For your convenience, it is also available in the main forum menu, under 'Quick Links"!
Flushing: Clearex or Water
- Thread starter budelight
- Start date
guess not, just a place to congregate....
Ill pm ya, but just know I cant tell you who i am for obvious reasons, lol..
Not necessarily as cannabis seems to be able to take a lot of abuse. What I am saying is that in my years of experience, I've found that less is more when it comes to feeding. Less doesn't mean you should skimp on the nutes, it's more in regards to the fact that nearly everyone feeds too much and too often. It's a hard concept to grasp but yields will actually increase when a plant is given modest amounts of plant food.
Hydrosun - I think your plants look pretty good. I bet at a minimum you could match those yields by cutting back your food by 25%. I'd actually put money on the fact that with lower levels, your yields would go up and at those lower feeding rates, you could try your pepsi challenge thing. I should add that I do not 'flush', but I do meet my plant's nutritional needs at all times which means my plants are not fed at the same rate all the way though flower.
All pictures were taken on harvest day:
A pheno I culled but her clones were worthy of being grown out:
The photos look great, I personally like to see the fan leaves purple, yellow, and then brown in the ripening stage. The top photo shows it just starting on that plant. Personal preference, I'm sure that is some good smoke.
With my two week flush on a 9 week strain I've cut 22.2% of the nutes out of the plants cycle so maybe 25% less and 9 weeks of nutes would be close to the same thing?
With my two week flush on a 9 week strain I've cut 22.2% of the nutes out of the plants cycle so maybe 25% less and 9 weeks of nutes would be close to the same thing?
HB its not that hard to grasp, thanks for the pics. beautiful, as was the pk hydrosun posted, Ill get up some pics, Im back from hiatus so bare with me guys. (what genetics are those in the pics if ya dont mind?) nice camera btw, or photo skills one..
HB, what are you running for the stretch, I typically run lower levels during this period, adjusting for pk(nutes, not plant) after the stretch, my plants are just as green as yours on harvest day.
HB, what are you running for the stretch, I typically run lower levels during this period, adjusting for pk(nutes, not plant) after the stretch, my plants are just as green as yours on harvest day.
With my two week flush on a 9 week strain I've cut 22.2% of the nutes out of the plants cycle so maybe 25% less and 9 weeks of nutes would be close to the same thing?
That's an interesting thought but I've not found it to be the same thing in regards to plant health and overall yields. My personal view is that in a recirculation system, the salts will find their way to the roots just as easily at modest concentrations as they do at higher concentrations. As long as there is enough food in there to meet the weekly demands of the plant, the plant will do what it's done since the beginning of time. Now, the mineral makeup of said res will affect yield and plant health as well but that's a different topic. I also think if someone is smarter than the average person and is taking daily notes in regards to drops in EC, they can better meet the needs of their plants at all times during the life cycle.
Example: The plant wont feed as much during the last couple weeks of it's life as compared to the first few weeks of flower. But contrary to hydro store information, the last three weeks is when we should be dumping in the expensive PK snake oils, then flushing them out with unneeded 'flushing' agents. That's a stressful time for the plant at the most important time of it's life.
During the stretch, I'm at 1.0 EC and I feed a mix of my grow and bloom bases. The idea is to give the plant enough nitrogen for tissue building while also supplying a balanced amount of P and K for flower production. Ultimately the leaves tell me what to do.
Last edited:
Same here, We use maxi grow and bloom, I teach my guys with lucas only, as modifying requires a little insight into calculating nutrient profiles, something not easily grasped so KISS is it, I run N heavy for the stretch and taper off, kinda going the reverse for the rest of the cycle, tapering down towards the end, I as well let my gals do the talking.
Under my tutelage, I try and show my guys that if you watch carefully, the plant will literally write you a note telling you what she wants, kinda like my wife, except she yells....
Ill be putting up a journal in the next day or so, Ill show you how much a newb ol bonez is... few PK's, few Pre98's and few OGs that are from clones given to me, just a yielder, not really an OG best I can tell.. Itll be in the Vert section, we dont sacrifice quality for weight, we just get weight as a benefit of the vert...
Some of the best growers Ive met dont get online and talk about it, best grower I know and my mentor was hitting 3lbs on the reg....
heath was running critical mass, so I doubt hed put up mickydees numbers with my cuts, not the best yielders but we manage..
i thought everyone learned this in weed bootcamp? this site needs a READ FIRST section that people have to read before they can post and grow if they are n00bs. like on og.
i used to follow formula's and junk (when i tried hydro) using meters and following what everyone else was saying. then i went back to my roots and decided that what everyone else was saying seemed to be a lot of bullshit. eventually i got to the point where i saw my plants were fine in a pH 7 dwc at 80 degrees F res temp as long as the root zone was health. and that 400ppms is plenty for my plants in my cab. all the while im trying do follow someone else's recipe and adding bleach to my res and ice packs and all kinds of shit. changing the res every week with fresh nutes blah blah.
soon as i stopped listening to other people and listening to my plants again i found out how piss easy dwc could be. no monitoring pH and ppm's and all that jazz necessary if you just let the plant tell you what it wants.
I hear that! Not that I would run DWC at 80 or a ph of 7, yikes! lol... But Ive seen plants in worse conditions that seemed to be pretty decent, not the yield tho..
I use a GH ph test kit, and truncheon someone gave me, otherwise I dont see the need for all the techy stuff, only thing it did was hurt my pocket...
I love how DHF constantly refers to "grows under your belt" dude couldnt be more spot on, only way to learn....
Sorry to cut in but I can't see what the argument is here. If you flush you starve the plant of mineral nutrition and thus the plant utilizes what is available in the tissue turning into biomass. end of day a cleaner product because no residual ferts are in the end product. I mean you could get all technical and discuss other facets of this process but end of day this is not rocket science.
I agree to an extent with what you are saying.. Problem is and we can all agree on this is that the last few weeks are the most crucial in bud development.. I prefer to feed my plant healthy levels until the chop.. I wouldnt know what a burnt unflushed plant tastes like....
Also, in support of what you are saying, and in theory, wouldnt allowing the plants to finish full term and then flushing make more sense??? The only problem with this is it takes us past our harvest date, so its a double edge sword.. I for one will not starve my plant when time after time healthy plants have yielded far better product than inferior starved plants.. If you are telling me that we are able to discern literally in ppms of residual stored nutrients by taste any difference whatsoever, then Id have to disagree..
You know, Im curious to know what the naysayers are doing when processing and curing.
Wet or deceptively dry bud burns and crackles and leaves a black ash and will smoke a little harsh. Dont believe me, next time you harvest prove me wrong or Im going to do a smoke report from uncurred improperly dried bud to prove this, and with pics... And dont tell me you guys never tried smoking your bud wet, at some point we all did....
Bud dried and cured properly even from a burnt plant cut down with no flush will leave a white ash... You know how many rookies Ive trained and how time after time this is proven.....
This is almost more about curing than flushing... Initially and a long time ago, flushing was nothing more than a cure for over ferting our plants and saturating the medium with nutrients to the point that further development was compromised.
Again, keep it civil and we can take this 100 pages... the technical stuff doesnt matter when opinions are so heavily biased. That is an observation, Im not some idiot trying to get people to smoke bad weed...
thx for posting.. I agree with a great deal of your logic..
People reading this thread will learn so much if we can have civil debate over this topic, much as your post was, so thank you for that...
I wonder what a human being, sickly and unhealthy from starving to point where our muscle tissue is actually being dissolved from starvation would taste like compared to a healthy one to a grizzly bear..... I doubt hed care lol...
I agree but unfortunately as MJ is illegal there is no serious research going on into how to best protect the consumer while ultimately ensuring large yields (which really comes down to dollars). On the other hand if MJ was legal we could grow fields of the stuff with flushing and lesser yields and sell it for $10 a kilo (what a wonderful world that would be). It's a complex debate but at the end of the day flushing from a scientific perspective results in less chemmy produce, so I'm still sort of perplexed here as to why the debate. ??? Flushing is good but may reduce yields if handled incorrectly while not flushing will likely result in chem tasting smoke (hence probably not great for the end consumer who is constantly exposed to synthetic chems - e.g.
Burning phosphorus with sufficient oxygen results in the formation of phosphorus pentoxide (P4O10 but often simplified to P2O5 due to this being the simplest molecular breakdown of P pentoxide).
Phosphorus pentoxide is an irritant to the skin, mucous membranes, and respiratory tract/system (lungs etc) even at concentrations as low as 1 mg/m3. What this means in simple terms is that if phosphorous is present in a combustible crop (after drying and curing) the produce when ingested, via inhalation, will be harsh and chemically tasting. This may have health implications on the end user if they are ingesting phosphorus pentoxide on a regular basis.
and so on. Personally I flush heavily and always have done but then I actually give a shit about my health and the health of my friends. How can we call it medicine if what we actually do re growing practices actually endangers health?
What about veggies and other foods we eat everyday? Tomato growers run high EC from 3-6+ as it has been known to produce the best tasting fruits. I'm sure this could be the case for many plants. And they sure don't 'Flush'. I know its smoking something compared to eating it but im sure thers some relation, Im curious on what everyone else thinks of this?, Me myself , i have tried both , I found too long a flush will diminish yield and taste extensively but is definitely a smoother smoke. The unflushed tasted better but had more of a bite in the smoke. Overall i found if you lower the nutrients gradually in the last week to about 0.3-0.6 EC it provided the best product for me.
Y
YosemiteSam
I personally think flush is about removing nitrates (supplying other things so that existing nitrate can be tied up as complete proteins) and removing P.
I don't see other elements as being an issue.
I want fans completely yellow, red, purple though. I do not want to see green fans when I harvest. imo, if you have not reached that point you cannot say which tastes best.
Fruit/veggies taste best when brix is highest. That cannot be accomplished with excess nitrate...but it can be with plenty of P, Mg, Ca, B...and all the micros.
I don't see other elements as being an issue.
I want fans completely yellow, red, purple though. I do not want to see green fans when I harvest. imo, if you have not reached that point you cannot say which tastes best.
Fruit/veggies taste best when brix is highest. That cannot be accomplished with excess nitrate...but it can be with plenty of P, Mg, Ca, B...and all the micros.
Having grown veggies and fruit on commercial farms I can assure you that some of the practices they use to sweeten fruit are nothing short of totally unethical. Such as dumping tons of P and K on Nectarines a 10 days before harvest. sure it will lift the sugar levels but that don't make it good for your health. End of day the main thing to me is people are getting the cleanest medicine possible - how to achieve that really comes down to research on optimal growing practices. Seems tissue tests at harvest and resin tests at harvest would be an easy way to achieve some knowledge of the subject. The main thing is if its tastes chemmy that is because it is. So the argument hopefully isn't an argument - I think most of us agree that chem free is best but are simply disagreeing a bit on how to get there. Peace
cchem, you are insightful...
Ive got an idea that may even challenge my own hypothesis, to an extent lol...
Some growers who may not be privy to the more exotic strains that are KNOWN for their taste may be attributing that to not flushing.
I stick with the exotic cuts primarily, and Im starting to wonder if that has something to do with my ability to rationalize not flushing..
Pre98 bubba even if not flushed has a nice taste, whereas 5 females from a pack of seeds may not naturally exhibit the characteristics of taste inherently... regardless of flushing or not..
Im going to start confusing myself... I need to shut the fuck up and put this theory to rest, as the only time I flushed was when I was growing from seed, and not clone...
Make sense? shit, I may have to revisit the drawing board, just as their are those that advocate not flushing like myself, there is an overwhelming amount of people that attribute the quality to this directly...
I think my head just exploded...
Ive got an idea that may even challenge my own hypothesis, to an extent lol...
Some growers who may not be privy to the more exotic strains that are KNOWN for their taste may be attributing that to not flushing.
I stick with the exotic cuts primarily, and Im starting to wonder if that has something to do with my ability to rationalize not flushing..
Pre98 bubba even if not flushed has a nice taste, whereas 5 females from a pack of seeds may not naturally exhibit the characteristics of taste inherently... regardless of flushing or not..
Im going to start confusing myself... I need to shut the fuck up and put this theory to rest, as the only time I flushed was when I was growing from seed, and not clone...
Make sense? shit, I may have to revisit the drawing board, just as their are those that advocate not flushing like myself, there is an overwhelming amount of people that attribute the quality to this directly...
I think my head just exploded...
LOL - it all does my head in too if that is any consolation. I think though that there is some point to flushing at least from a scientific perspective in that the plants utilize excess nutes held in the tissue/cells and turns them into biomass (i.e. they are converted to carbs and sugars and used in photosynthesis). Just how much to flush is a major question and does too much flushing result in reduced resin production etc? How much is enough? How much it too much?? Ouch!! I mean these things can easily be tested in the lab but I bet they are also genetic specific to some degree - it just seems no one is running the tests. Hmmm - may have to do that myself some day. Peace and smoke a pipe to help with the head ache.
Guessing that vapeing or ingesting would remove or drastically reduce the unquantified risk from excess nute levels.
Smoked conventionally you have already accepted a proven high health risk , the additional risk from unflushed bud is tiny in comparison , but best avoided.
Found the yield difference between pushing the nutes all the way with a flush , compared to running lean all the way , was about 25% more with higher nutes , bud smoked the same , low levels allowed perrenial room with one resevoir , 60 - 65 days both ways with one well worked clone in ebb and flow.
Smoked conventionally you have already accepted a proven high health risk , the additional risk from unflushed bud is tiny in comparison , but best avoided.
Found the yield difference between pushing the nutes all the way with a flush , compared to running lean all the way , was about 25% more with higher nutes , bud smoked the same , low levels allowed perrenial room with one resevoir , 60 - 65 days both ways with one well worked clone in ebb and flow.
Uh, we have had front page atricles stating that a regualar cannabis smoker has NO increased risk of lung disease as compared to a NON SMOKER. Therefore I dispute your statement about "a proven high health risk."
Secondarily we have NO idea what the risk from unflushed cannabis may be, however I will agree with you that the risk if any seems minimal, BECAUSE there have been millions of cannabis smokers for hundreds of years and NO EVIDENCE of increased health risk. So nutes in the plant matter are probably not unhealthy, just untasty.
