About flushing in coco.

[kosh]

Hello
I've been reading about flushing in coco in order to remove all kind of nutrients remaining in the coco, but i don't know how often should this be done. Some people say twice, others say each two weeks...

I dont mean flushing before harvest, but flushing to avoid salt acumulation.

Apart from that, what should i do after flushing? Feed the plants again at a correct value of ph and ec?

I grow in 1L coco coir, hand watering almost every day, I dont wait till it dries. I read that I shouldnt treat coco like soil, so I try to feed them every day.

How and how often do you flush your coco?
Thank you and sorry for my bad english!!

 

[puff adder]

I use GH 0-6-9, which isn't too strong. I used to hit the plants with one watering of just PH'd water every 7-10 days to keep buildups from happening. This worked great.

I've dialed things in to a no-runoff setup, and stopped doing the weekly flush, and things have also gone well, but to be safe, if i were recomending, I would do the PH'd water watering every 7-10 days and this should help keep buildups/lockouts from happening.

One thing, every time I check runoff, it is crazy high, so I stopped trying to grow by runoff readings, just make sure you know what's going IN the pot and you should be fine.

 

[TribalSeeds]

I dont flush or check runoff. Feed them lightly and there shouldnt be any buildup.

 

[FlowerFarmer]

6/9 head recipe w/ bloombastic 1-2mL/Gal mid flower...this is in Atami Bcuzz coco used directly out of the bag w/o rinse despite what others are finding regarding high PPM out of the bag. Been doing this for around 7 years now...so far so good (knock on wood).

I have a bit of run off when the plants 1st hit small solo cups after rooting, but after that they go into 2 gallon root pots w/ blumats with zero run-off or flushing until harvest.

At harvest I'll dwindle PPMs in my blumat barrel until they are close to what my RO machine puts out.

I have never used drip clean to prevent salt accumulation but might give it a try next go around.

 

[HighBurn8]

Like tribal seeds mentioned above.. keep your EC/ppms low and water until there's a substantial amout of runoff every watering.
Only time I ever have to leach/flush in coco is when there are obvious issues or at the end of the run.

I keep my EC between 0.8 -1.1 throughout the entire grow. I find that when feeding daily you can feed a lot less.

good luck and stay safe, H8

 

[kosh]

thanks!

I will flush every 10-15 days, try to keep the ec low and see how it works!

 

[Gregster]

I have been using coco for years now and never flush until maybe a week before harvest.If you keep it moist, which you should ,it should not be a problem.Salt's tend to build up as a result of drying.I also use drip-clean and never had a problem .

 

[AOD2012]

Drip clean homey, works wonders. Some sort ionic bonding stops the salts from accumulating. Is super concentrated and a bottle last a really long time.

Hope that helps.


aod

 

[GanjaAL]

Question.. how does drip clean effect benificial organisms in your coco?

 

[AOD2012]

Sorry, can not tell you that. It is a chem based additive, so that may not have the best effect on those. I run GH nutes so it works pretty good for me.


aod

 

[Neurosomatic]

Never had to flush personally. Always given fert's sparingly and watered so that there's significant runoff each time. Has worked so far.

 

[pilotjr]

So after reading this Im thinking of not having to do a flush. Im using Fox Farms trio: OS, BB, and CC with CNS17 as my base, and Bud Candy. All though I quit giving the Bud Candy a week or so ago. Im right at the end of week 8 and was gonna start watering with just plain ph water for the last 2 weeks. I have kept the coco wet for the most part....having to water them everyday for the past 2-3 weeks. I would feed them one day, then plain ph water water the next.

So given what I told you, would you recommend me keep feeding them or what? The hairs are starting to turn orange...maybe 20%. So I have a good week or 2 left and Im leaning on 2 weeks. How should I finish this out?

 

[pilotjr]

Well I cant find where to edit my last post cause I want to add something:

Don't know if this will be useful or not but when I watered I did it to where I didn't have any runoff.

 

[papaduc]

this is in Atami Bcuzz coco used directly out of the bag w/o rinse despite what others are finding regarding high PPM out of the bag.

A coco I've used many times before and would again if I went back to bags.

Also a good example of how many crazy theories are perpetuated by people whose mistakes are blamed on brands and feeds, rather than their own bad practices. Bcuzz is pre-fertilised... so if people rinse and find high ppm, it's because they're washing out the fertiliser that was put in.... crazy. You use it like compost for the first few waterings, then start feeding.

Bottom line: coco shouldn't develop a buildup of harmful salts if it's fed properly.

Cannabis can tolerate feed strengths way over and above what it needs, and so people think that feeding high EC levels is ok, and when their plants burn... it's the salt buildup... or not flushing. It's an ass backwards approach to growing.

Feed it right and it doesn't need flushing once in an entire grow. That's not to say you shouldn't. You could. If you want. But it's not necessary and not doing so won't result in sick or burned plants.

 

[papaduc]

water until there's a substantial amout of runoff every watering.

There's no need for this either. This is something else which is massively overrated: the need for run off every watering.

I've done entire grows with no run off whatsoever and not even had tip burn. Like I say, if you feed properly there's no need. People using raised beds have been growing with no run off for years and it's done them no harm.

Again, it's something you can do if you want, but not something that's necessary in order to have healthy plants, as long as you're feeding them right.

 

[pilotjr]

Ok then. So your saying no flush. I just want to make sure we are on the same page here. When I mean flush, since Im using coco Im not talking about dumping gallons of water into the coco. What Im asking is as of today, I am at the end of my 8th week, (56 days). Starting now or very very soon should I stop feeding them nutes completely and just water them with straight ph water?

Ive been kinda thinking of feeding them another week. My reason is because over the past 2-3 weeks Ive been needing to water them everyday. Skipping every other day, I would feed them nutes then plain ph water. So for example: Monday watered with nutes, Tuesday watered with ph water, Wednesday watered with nutes, Thursday watered with ph water, etc. I was just wondering with how much plain water they have been getting if I should feed them a lil extra. But I can go the other way and say they been getting nutes every other day and that's plenty. I dunno....that's what Im asking.

 

[papaduc]

pilotjr, I'm talking in a more general sense. The subject of feeding is one on which everyone's got an opinion.

For me, there are so many variables and so many factors which decide when you should start or stop feeding what.

The main thing you've got to focus on is actually harvesting the fruits of the work you've put in. You need to give the plant what it needs to finish and you need to judge the point at which your fruits are fully set, and then it's up to you what to do from there.

Personally I like to give a higher potassium and low phosphorus feed during that last stage once they've swelled their calyxes, then give them plain water. I try to reduce the phosphorus as much as I can while still giving the plants a balanced feed to metabolise the remaining nutes. I do that by giving them about 0.6-0.8 ec of formulex for a few days, then down to 0.4, then I give water for a few days. That's always given me the cleanest purest burn.

Sometimes you can get into the trap of flushing early, then you don't get the right finish, so you start feeding again... but you've got to remember that it's a plant and it takes days for it to even begin to react to different things such as feed ratios etc, so you usually just end up wasting time doing a number of things and seeing no real effect.

It all depends on what your plants look like at this stage. Have you got pictures?

 

[pilotjr]

No I don't have any pics. The very best I can describe it is I can tell the plant is starting to die, or trying to seed....whatever. All the buds still has a lot of white hairs on them, they are just now starting to turn red Im giving a guess of around 20% max of them are red. All the crystals I can see with my naked eye look pretty clear, I don't have a magnifying glass so I cant say for sure. Pretty much all the big fan leaves are turning yellow or browning, especially the ones on the bottom of the plant are crunchy. Ive been removing some of these just haven't got all of them yet. The strain Im growing is White Russian and they say somewhere around 65-70 days. Im at the end of day 56, so around 10 days or so should be left.

The problem is, Im not a complete noob to growing I have done it in the past with bagseed and minimal nutes. This is the first time Ive grown anything nice with some decent nutes and Im trying to be perfect even though it hasn't been, I just want to do the very best I can. With saying that I don't fully understand the plant so Im not real sure what its needs are. Like you said I need to be the judge, Im just trying to gather all the facts to make a decision.

So it sounds like you keep giving a minimal amount of nutes up until the last week and then water with just straight water? That was sort of my thinking of what to do with mine. I don't have an EC meter, I just mix up my nutes following the directions and just ph it out. So if I do that Ill do like half the strength of what they list or something. Ive read a lot of people feed them till the end of week 8 and then water with straight water for the last 2 weeks. Its just to me, it looks like my plants are not at that "done" stage. Unless they decide to take a drastic turn and ripen up this last week, I still say they have 2 weeks left. I understand these last 2 weeks the plant is eating the rest of the nutes it has stored and in the medium, its just I have a hard time grasping the fact they will go that long without nutes.

 

[papaduc]

If you can get some pictures up that would help a lot. Pretty much all of the things you mention could be one thing or another, so it's hard to say without actually seeing the plant.

Do you know what the calyxes look like? That's a good indication as to how well set your buds are, not exactly how ripe, but how well developed. If they're firm, then I suppose the worst you could do is pick them when they're not quite perfect. But if the calyxes aren't swelled then you'll lose a lot of your weight in the drying process and end up with really fluffy bud.

 

[pilotjr]

Ya the calyxes on the lower part of the buds are swelled up it looks like to me. The top part they are still small. The lower ones look like they could have a seed inside. Im not saying there is a seed, that's just about the size of them, of a small pea maybe. The ones on the top, well....try this: (). Maybe about that size. The lower ones about this size: ( ). The buds seem pretty hard. I give them a slight squeeze and theres not much give. I did give them some more nutes yesterday at about half strength. Im debating that might be the last time I give them nutes and start giving them plain ph water the rest of the way.

What do you thing?