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University of Guelph paper- Flushing is a myth!

CharlesU Farley

Well-known member
What do you think?
Flushing is a waste of time, imnsho.

The idea first started with hydro growers back in the early to mid '90s, was total and complete bullshit then... as it is now.

If you have a basic understanding of botany, you know why the basic concept is fatally flawed.

But just like cutting back fertilizer close to harvest to induce a "fade", old bro science ideas never fucking die.
 
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Ca++

Well-known member
A sap test would be interesting. That might as simple as having a chew on some twig.

I feel there can be a difference, but you make that difference in a day. It's simply about what is in the moisture content, as you chop. All the P fixed in during bloom isn't washing out. The feed used has left it's mark.

I started to put less importance on flushing, long before you could admit to such things. As a hydro guy, I had no build-ups to shift out my compost, so saw no logical need for days of flush. It just gives dying plants. However that one day, seemed to make a difference. Which is bending the idea of what a flush is really. Something we have no real definition of anyway. I just think I can tell if the plants were fed that day, or not, in hydro. Hence, I should revisit this with some stem chewing. Not just gargling tank water.

Overall I see no gain, and I'm happy to see the forum is also leaning that way. Time is money, so time spent flushing should bring a gain that pays for that time. If we take a 7 week plant to 8 weeks with flushing, I need to see a 15% gain, to break even. I don't need leaf drop, or throttled growth. That's not a happily performing plant. It would be a bad week, before chop.


A point worth airing, is that most P in our plant is accumulated at luxury levels, just sat around, ready for seed production. This means that withholding P at the end, isn't making the plant use up what it has. As if there is some process that will make the P into something more palatable. That P is just sat there. It's going nowhere.
 

Normannen

Anne enn Normal
Veteran
The one time I flushed my plants was due to salt buildup...otherwise I leave it to the toilet...
 

Azeotrope

Well-known member
Veteran
Great conversation!
Let's assume that flushing is pointless, yet a number of people claim to get some weird flavors or a harshness typically not associated with weed.
Crusty suggests carbon being the source, I find this plausible, hear me out.
As a homebewer I keg my beers and apply co2, if I get it wrong I get a carbonic acid burn when tasting the beer. ( think the burn when drinking Coke)
So could what people are getting is carbonic acid ? Someone in another thread mentioned that he was curing his jars upside down on a screen so as to allow the co2 escape.
Without a way for the co2 to escape in a closed jar, I would think it would have a negative effect on the weed.
What do you think?
Flushing makes no difference at all. Complete bro science.
 

Dime

Well-known member
JMO but I think you're better off imitating nature and dealing with the rest of the variables best you can like lowering the temp at night light distance/intensity etc and adding other pressures now and then , as there will still be fertilizer in the ground when they ripen outside. I've never flushed and I don't believe one can add more ferts during flowering to make bigger buds and force feed either,they are somewhat selective and as long as there is enough and they don't run out,that's all you need. Others may know more but it works for me
 
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mexweed

Active member
Veteran
How do you explain bud that burns black and sooty or sizzles and sparks, that is harsh and tastes like crap?

Of course you can't literally rinse the plant out by pouring huge volumes of water through the medium, but plants uptake water and if there are more nutrients in the water than they can metabolize where does it end up, do they just magically uptake the water and leave the nutrients behind?
 

Normannen

Anne enn Normal
Veteran
You can actually water cure your bud if that's the case, not the best smoke, but worth it when dealing with shwag
 

DoublePlatinum

New member
here’s some statements I’ve found that were liked by jbeezy when he posted about this topic. The order is scrambled btw

One thing I’m trying to hammer down is getting the super chalk white ash and not the usual salt with a slight dash of pepper

Anyone care to chime in on how to get it there in no till?

————————-

sulfates help ripen. and the plant isn't dying, you're just coercing it to a slow senescence through a proper taper of input bulk EC, environmental cues, light intensity, CO2, (high light+co2 at the end of the cycle = stored sugar in flowers that will not combust). calcium sulfate seems like a good idea for crop longevity once harvested and for translocation and metabolization of sugars and complex molecules. but only when combined with the factors above.



so keep the lights & co2 high all the way to the end? And any recommendations on a quality sulfate product?



it's a gradual taper, and then ambient CO2 levels for the final 10-12 days ish.. depending on how the crop ripens up. you just gotta think. the process of photosynthesis is literally turning light and carbon dioxide into sugars. sugars don't tend to combust very well, leaving a black ash and a caramelized taste.



so if I lower co2 levels then I would have to lower light levels also to avoid bleaching right? Being that led's are inches away from canopy ?



they play together. high light intensity requires that CO2 for photosynthesis. so they have to taper together. i can't give you exact specifics but i would play with tapering levels in your own rooms. there are a lot of factors at play, and there is no single answer. you must fundamentally understand what's happening in & around the plant based on your inputs.



Some people think if you totally stop feeding all elements in Coco and rock wool the plant will hold onto nutrients instead of consuming them. Same friend says to decrease Cal Nitrate and replace with Calcium sulfate.



Finished & flushed are two different things.

Most people's problems come from too much

Magnesium at the end. Calcium is for finishing, not mag



Flushing translocates phosphorus, k and other micros from the rootball to the plant tissue. Opposite. Dialing down cal nitrate towards the end and replace with cal chloride.



Mineral content does not change feeding plain water vs feeding minerals. The point of flush is to force finish and bag appeal. Stop feeding nitrogen the final 2 weeks and give it what it needs to put out fire. We have been ahead of the game.



Less nitrogen less magnesium no flush needed



it's about a calculated wind down of nutrients so the plants naturally senesce and use up what they have stored in their tissue and root zone. Just waiting until the last 7 days and then blasting them with straight water, using Fade or Winterfrost is not actually helping that process. It's masking it and just shutting them down



ash color has damn near nothing to do with moisture content. Damn near nothing to do with the dry. And everything to do with how the tissue is built. Now moisture will impact how smooth it is (lil wet it will be a lil hot). Heavy Calmag offers fake white ash that looks like plywood and burns better than it would have potentially. But by no means does heavy Calmag do it, otherwise everyone would have good smoking flower.

And last time I checked, that's far from the case.



I did notil for 3 years.

You have to let the plant finish its cycle and it can't really be manipulated to finish faster in notil, so if it didn't break everything down it's smoking peppered and personal I don't like it. I personally think tapering down closer to harvest when using salts and then flushing is a must. Notil gotta let the plant finish. Dumping water in isn't going to help notil much.
 

mexweed

Active member
Veteran
Never been an issue for me, but in both cases the bud was dried and cured properly, the black and sooty was from a buddy's soil grow, the sparking has happened a few times from other buddies' grows, the pgr theory is interesting because foliar spraying with kelp stuff is pretty common and there is something in kelp that is technically a pgr

Everyone else that was smoking it thought it was dank, but it tore up my throat, it actually tasted like the flavor of the strain but way over saturated not in a good way, at the time I thought it had probably been loaded up with bud candy or something up until chop
 

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