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Anyone buffer their RO with calcium/magnesium carbonate?

bsgospel

bsgospel

Bat Macumba
You could also take tissue or medium samples to determine ratios. Anything else is anecdotal. Even run off numbers. If you want to know for sure what your numbers are for solutions or mediums, spend $50 and get your jazz tested. R/O or tap. You can know for sure whether magnesium or calcium is contributing the way you want to
 
bsgospel

bsgospel

Bat Macumba
And also to your chelation question: most products should chelate adequately. I don't foresee you chelating with citric acid or anything else. They're fine as is. R/O will fluctuate more than tap depending on where you live and your water quality. Check your local water reports, every city publishes their numbers. Buffering is only one part of the question. Do you have the nutrition to sustain your climate and genetics? If yes, then buffering might be not so important, depending on medium. Cannabis will work with you in a range of ph that you can dial in for yourself over trials and time. Not to say it's free floating or negligible but other factors will tell you where to guide nutrition, pH, water use efficiency, leaf areas and veg time.
 
Douglas.Curtis

Douglas.Curtis

Autistic Diplomat in Training
bsgospel said:
R/O will fluctuate more than tap depending on where you live and your water quality
Click to expand...
I've found the complete opposite to be true. I've lived in 5 areas of the country and the r/o was always 5-12ppm and 7.0 pH. The only time it isn't is when your r/o machine needs filters replaced. Don't buy water from poorly maintained r/o machines. The tap water has been totally different in each location. You can travel to the next town nearly anywhere, and get vastly different tap water than the town you just left.
 
D

DreamsCatcher

Member
Douglas.Curtis said:
and this is when I mix the initial reservoir. Plants use nutes, pH goes up. Add nutes back, pH goes back to starting point.
Click to expand...
sorry to resurrect an old thread, is that why you are "keeping them as close to underfed as possible"? because you are adding back instead of replacing. Have you heard of differential nutrient uptake? what about accumulations of immobile elements?

Im with you on the pH theory BTW. With a full pH swing, it is easy to understand when certain elements have been uptaken.
In veg when the plant is absorbing nitrates the pH goes up. In small reservoirs, anything below 40L, the pH will drift depending on how good your environment is and how fast the plant is absorbing, so growers tend to think they have to "stabilise it" when it changes drastically. It is in fact a sign of the plant enjoying themselves.

I have 50L res with 20L of mix for Veg, and my pH drifts up to 6.5 every 3 to 4 days, and thats where i know i have to mix fresh.

RO water reacts with the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere making carbonic acid, so the pH of the RO water will slowly drift down as you're swirling the res (or pH stick while measuring). You only need a little bit of acid to throw the pH off of what is perceived a healthy range. I found that adding 2ml of 8% potassium silicate in 20L of pure RO water buffers it enough so when i add my nutrients, it goes to 5.4. Within 3 to 4 days that is up to 6.3-6.5.

Its good to know what is happening in your res, or with your plant, and a healthy pH swing is the best way to tell, since the EC meter will only measure the salts, that is calcium magnesium and sulphates that are left in the solution.
 
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shishkaboy

shishkaboy

>>>>Beanie Man<<<<
Good info in here...
That tip about the drastic up swings being from too much air is what really got me.

@Douglas.Curtis
How often do you need to add more calcium?
How often do you need to add more nutrients? what tells you to add more nutes?
Are you keeping a steady ppm through out the grow?

Im in 5 gal dwc with r/o and fox farm nutes and and trying to feed as low as possible.
 
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Douglas.Curtis

Douglas.Curtis

Autistic Diplomat in Training
I use KNF water soluble calcium a couple times before flower and the first 2 weeks. Foliar before and root drench after.

I would add nutes when top healthy pH was reached. About 6.0-6.1 with Maxibloom. When starting tds is reached the pH would be back to starting point. Trial and error finds the point where growth is maximum and extra nutes stops making a difference.

Moderate in veg then ramping up through week 3 of flower on a 60 day strain. Physical flower bulking quits around week 4 and nutrient demand drops off. You can track the change by paying attention to transpiration/reservoir refill rates. Drop your nutrient strength till transpiration is high again. Try to maintain a fairly steady rate till harvest.

I've never used Fox Farm in DWC myself, and I'm sure you have a decent chance of a good grow. :)

Btw... (After 20 years of hydro) I dumped all my hydro nutes after using rabbit manure and neutral soil twice. ;) F'cking WOW!! ;)
 
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Ca++

Ca++

Well-known member
A couple of brands sell calmag that is carbonates. Canna sell the calmag agent, which might be one of them. It's aimed at sorting your water hardness out before doing anything else. It's not a feed additive to correct deficiencies, it's a water conditioner.

It was developed for coco mainly. Coco really is very fussy. RO is a solvent, and using a low EC leaves the mix able to take on a lot of the coco salts. This ruins the feeds balance. More typical treatment of coco, is a high EC to enable the feed to take on a little less from the coco, and keep a balance a bit more like the feed lists. Not have a big move towards K and Na from the coco's addition.

The carbonate forms are less available, but this is highly influenced by the acid used. Canna switch acid from grow (nitric) to bloom (phosphoric). The Ca+Mg in carbonate form, are converted into nitrate forms in grow. Phosphate forms in bloom. Though the Phosphate conversion is only 50% efficient. The 50% not involved in conversion, is why Pacid correction is more stable than Nacid.
 
YellowCanaryConsulting

YellowCanaryConsulting

Active member
Calcium carbonate has no place in Cannabis. None whatsoever. If you need to buffer, whatever you imagine that means, use silicates.

Listen to this podcast, and pretend it's God speaking to you. Because it pretty much is:



John Kempf is the only person making sense about Cannabis. Jeremy Silva is a dipshit (guyliner wearing Raid Shadow Legends sponsored family vlogger). Scott Skamnes is a moron (doesn't grow or smoke pot, has a wife named Karen who also doesn't grow or smoke pot). Clackamas Coot is prematurely senile (and probably a pedo). He's only 50 and plays on the senior citizen angle. Keep It Simple Tad is a scamming gay Eskimo (dare you to measure your KIS purchases). The Shit Eagle, Adam Dunce, and the entire menu at Fecal Cannabis Project are all buffoons who grow reggie.

Cannabis HATES carbonates. I have personally ruined prized mother plants by top dressing with bone meal. My dumb retard dipshit loser ass thought it was the phosphorus. So I ruined another room with limestone. Why? Because my low iq idiot fag brain listened to what dumbass dimwitted moron people who didn't have a god damned butt fucking jew ass clue what they were talking about said. Cannabis likes calcium. Cannabis HATES calcium carbonate. Don't ever, EVER use carbonates. And beat up anyone who says to use them. Beat em right the fuck up.
 
Ca++

Ca++

Well-known member
Calcium carbonate is the most common form of calcium in soil. How would that fit in with the idea carbonates are bad.
Having been through the ground, my tap carries a moderately high load of almost 300ppm calcium carbonate (plus other things, it's a lab report, not my EC meter). My tap grows fine. It's the EC 0.4 that most feeds expect. Using RO offered me no useful gains.

I'm not sure about the Kempf guy tbh. I can use his site to show he is giving facts about his history that are not true. Contradictions that pigeon hole his intellect... somewhere. However I do like the facts he brings together. He spends a lot of time sourcing info for us. Though I don't take how he brings it together as any more authoritative than a post of yours. Or mine..
 
Douglas.Curtis

Douglas.Curtis

Autistic Diplomat in Training
Video unavailable... that was quick
Edit: lol oops... Granit83 below had it right and I completely missed it. :)
 
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Cerathule

Cerathule

Active member
Three Berries said:
I watched about half. Seems that testing the plant tissues is needed? And it is strain dependent?
Click to expand...
TBH it seems to be just basic growing info. There's 0 proof of new insights there, though I just rushed through it. But I'm not willing to spend an hour listening to noob stuff when the person refering to said video could have used an excerpt or timeframe to illustrate his point.
 
Three Berries

Three Berries

Active member
It is the norm here to apply limestone to the farm fields before corn is planted. Usually after the beans as they are legumes and acify the soil a bit. I suppose the corn uses a a lot of calcium too.
 
Douglas.Curtis

Douglas.Curtis

Autistic Diplomat in Training
The John Kempf info is definitely awesome info for sure. Take the time to listen carefully, because you will benefit greatly.

Sounds like bunny shit cannabis to me, really. It has all the biology and macro/trace elements the plant needs for maximum yield, health and resin production. ;)

Edit: He also recommends r/o for reducing fert requirements, increasing crop health and eliminating carbonate and other hard water issues.
 
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shishkaboy

shishkaboy

>>>>Beanie Man<<<<
Just wanted to come back and say thanks.

Something in this thread changed my thinking, which led to me correctly diagnosing and correcting my issue. I figured I should share my story.

I had been fighting a calcium deficiency since I restarted in dwc.

I would add more and more cal/mag until I just hated cal/mag as a product (I never liked how cal/mag gave the res water that little bit of brown) and thought mine had gone bad or something... I started looking at all my bottles to see what was really in there and realized that my profile was missing sulfur after the seedling stage.

As I was making a new profile I realized that the bottle of seedling food I had been using for my seedlings and clones had sulfur, calcium, magnesium as well as all the micros.

I said to myself,

Self, I think you can cut the cal/mag altogether and just use the seedling food with the grow/bloom nutes.

...and bingo plants look better than ever with a super clear res since Im not using a traditional cal/mag product anymore.
 
Thcvhunter

Thcvhunter

Well-known member
Veteran
I switched from hydro to living soil years ago.
But I learned a few things during my time in hydro.

pH swings naturally as roots exchange H+ and carbon for nutrients and minerals.
This swing can be used to naturally chelate the whole spectrum of minerals and food (cations and anions). The key for plant health and metabolism is to keep this swing as slow as possible with no quick shifts. I used to gradually add back to my rez to get to a more neutral pH before changing the rez and then start with RO water to clean off the roots for fresh feedings.

Microbes can help moderate pH, chelation, and pathogens. Unfortunately, most commercial inoculants are predominantly trichy, which eat all the other microbes.

As far as calcium carbonate - I use it, its cheap, but I prep it first. I use organic acid to separate the molecule and the CO2 bubbles out.
Im also a big believer in pushing as much gypsum as possible.
 
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