Cheap Nutrient Line for Commercial and Home Grows?

[mexweed]

The strain produces more foliage when vegged for 3-5 weeks, they were clones that were flipped immediately after establishing a root system, as well as being a viney "OG" type

 

[ZK7]

I just moved to powdered nutes

Kristalon brown
Calcinit
Epsom salt

in rdwc I'm experiencing PH drops like i've never seen. anyone have any idea why this could be?

 

[Old Uncle Ben]

"Cheap Nutrient Line for Commercial and Home Grows?"

Yeah, I have a cheap line but you sure won't find it at some cannabis rip off site.

Food cost - Osmocote 15-9-12 with micros - about 1.00 USD for the 9 pots, if that much. That's all I'll need.
Rainwater - free
Soil - whatever I have stockpiled. I have to laugh when I read the word "super" soil stuff. Yeah, I have "super soil". I just grab some bags and start dumping.

Smoke is always smooth and potent. Will go 12/12 on the oldest in a few days, front row, all afghans.

Am I correct that the folks stuck on the cannabis specific foods are from Euro countries and Australia?

Uncle Ben

 

[Ca++]

I just moved to powdered nutes

Kristalon brown
Calcinit
Epsom salt

in rdwc I'm experiencing PH drops like i've never seen. anyone have any idea why this could be?

A few things can lower pH.
What is your water like? Much buffering to it?
I see a lot of K. Plants will take it quite quickly, and it could be a lot of what holds your pH high. Until it's gone.

Late for work.. gone

 

[weedemart]

I just moved to powdered nutes

Kristalon brown
Calcinit
Epsom salt

in rdwc I'm experiencing PH drops like i've never seen. anyone have any idea why this could be?

Check your roots. Dropping ph is often sign of root rot.

 

[ZK7]

There's no root rot for sure, i'm using hardish uk tap water so there should be some buffer

had zero issue when using standard bottled nutes and in veg there has been no issues.

also forgot to mention i'm using silica, the issue got even worse when I added mills vitalize over normal silica I noticed a lot of bubbling and ph went from 5.7 to 4.0 over night. Also put calcium hypochlorite to keep res sterile.

I have now done a full change out with no silicone supplementation and just kristalon, calcicinit and epsom salt. the ratio of kristalon;calcicnit being 3:5 and if the PH continues to drop I will have to go back to the bottled nutes.

 

[ZK7]

A few things can lower pH.
What is your water like? Much buffering to it?
I see a lot of K. Plants will take it quite quickly, and it could be a lot of what holds your pH high. Until it's gone.

Late for work.. gone

thanks pal i've read a lot of your posts you clearly know your npk's lol

how would you combat the quick loss of K from the solution? theoretically it should not be an issue though because I've got a top off res on a float valve constantly feeding a fresh solution as they drink.

 

[weedemart]

Did you tested your meter , maybe its not accurate. Otherwise, drop the EC. how much you feed

 

[ZK7]

the meter is calibrated to 4 and 7 ph, but I will double check that its correct. feeding 600-620ppm on 500 scale the plants look great so i'm pretty confused.

 

[mexweed]

It's possible that the silica is not going fully into solution at first and is solubilized further which will drop the ph

Are you adding it as the first thing in the water and letting it sit and go into solution for a few minutes before adding the kristalon?

 

[ZK7]

I added it first to plain water in my pre mixing res I never add silicone right into the dwc system because theres always a small amount of water with nutes in there, used a powerful pump to circulate but maybe wasn't long enough.

I could be using too much of the silica, I've used the dosages suggested on the bottles so far with no ill effects until now but maybe the mills needs a much lower dosage

I've seen great results from silica, but it does seem to be a bit of a headache sometimes

 

[mexweed]

Actually I misinterpreted the silica will raise the ph, but it could still impact how the ph holds if you're adjusting before it is fully in solution

I use the armor si and even that takes a bit to fully mix

 

[Ca++]

thanks pal i've read a lot of your posts you clearly know your npk's lol

how would you combat the quick loss of K from the solution? theoretically it should not be an issue though because I've got a top off res on a float valve constantly feeding a fresh solution as they drink.

Not a lot you could do. I would watch for signs of excess K in the plants though, to see if it's a possibility.

I'm drawn to the silica comment about bubbling.
I would mix a liter of feed, both with and without. Leave them a few hours, and see what you have. A side by side test, that doesn't involve the plants at all.

 

[Old Uncle Ben]

Not a lot you could do. I would watch for signs of excess K in the plants though, to see if it's a possibility.

What are those signs?

 

[ZK7]

Not a lot you could do. I would watch for signs of excess K in the plants though, to see if it's a possibility.

I'm drawn to the silica comment about bubbling.
I would mix a liter of feed, both with and without. Leave them a few hours, and see what you have. A side by side test, that doesn't involve the plants at all.

I will do that and see

After a res change out with zero silica things are perfectly stable (for now) so clearly silica is the issue, I also tried two different types of silicon and had issues with both. ph dropped much slower with the shogun silicon but as soon as I added mills the PH dropped like a stone.

I had no issues when using shogun silicone with bottled nutrients from the shop, but switching to the kristalon / calcinit combo seems to give ph problems

 

[Ca++]

I will do that and see

After a res change out with zero silica things are perfectly stable (for now) so clearly silica is the issue, I also tried two different types of silicon and had issues with both. ph dropped much slower with the shogun silicon but as soon as I added mills the PH dropped like a stone.

I had no issues when using shogun silicone with bottled nutrients from the shop, but switching to the kristalon / calcinit combo seems to give ph problems

Thanks for sharing this. What I used was potassium silicate, which is again, K raising pH. However the bubbling sounds like a chemical reaction. Not the plants taking it. I can't say what the reaction is, but the K present seems interesting.
You are over the hurdle, which is what matters. I'm going to save this idea for when my pH is soaring up and out of range though. It might not be useless

 

[ZK7]

Yes indeed, I initially thought that maybe nute manufacturers put in some sort of PH stabilizer that the raw materials don't have which was causing me the PH issues.

I rarely see pH climbing, since I'm usually pushing my plants to the limit with feed. Since using kristalon/calc they seem to be able to take a higher feed of 1.2 ec at the end of veg / early flower when usually it's around 1-1.1 ec. I have set the top off resevoir to 800ppm so they will constantly be able to take what they need