So this summer I decided to grow some peppers and see first hand the difference between growing in straight perlite versus a mix of perlite and vermiculite. I'd heard that the roots in the vermiculite perlite mixture were larger than those in pure perlite. Using the bato buckets would allow the perlite to wick from the reservoir at the bottom allowing the perlite to perform as intended.
I grew in bato buckets on a recirculating drip setup over a chilled reservoir. I used gh nutes twice during the growth; a lucas veg mix for the first bit and then just bloom later on. They were topped off constantly with filtered water kept at 68 degrees by an aquarium chiller located in the garage off to the side. I was surprised at how well the peppers grew despite barely adding nutes but i knew i wasn't going to be able to flush out any nutes in the peppers while they were growing so water it was.
I had a ton of peppers that were nice and clean tasting but i was really interested in what the roots looked like. If you can't guess the larger ones are the mixture. The results speak for themselves.
In conclusion i think the 70/30 perlite/vermiculite mix kills the perlite by itself.
I grew in bato buckets on a recirculating drip setup over a chilled reservoir. I used gh nutes twice during the growth; a lucas veg mix for the first bit and then just bloom later on. They were topped off constantly with filtered water kept at 68 degrees by an aquarium chiller located in the garage off to the side. I was surprised at how well the peppers grew despite barely adding nutes but i knew i wasn't going to be able to flush out any nutes in the peppers while they were growing so water it was.
I had a ton of peppers that were nice and clean tasting but i was really interested in what the roots looked like. If you can't guess the larger ones are the mixture. The results speak for themselves.
In conclusion i think the 70/30 perlite/vermiculite mix kills the perlite by itself.