Flushing VS Leaching?

[Dubya]

I'm a little confused here. What is the difference between the two?

I grow in coco.

In my searching of how people harvest, I'm seeing two different types of 'flushing' that people do...

One is where people dump lots of water through their medium until it comes out clear or very low ppm's, then they just feed water for the next week or two.

The other is where people just switch to water for the last week or 2, without dumping all the water through it at once.

So is one called flushing and the other called leaching?

Which do you do and why?

 

[watts]

depends how you have been feeding throughout flower and if you want to take the time to heavily flush each plant. IF you fed heavily throughout flower, then it's best to flush fully at the end.

 

[notorious646]

im wondering the same in 2weeks to finish i stopped all foxfarm trio and am just feeding them water will this be sufficient? i didnt feed heavvy just there feed chart.

 

[Guest 18340]

I switch to plain water for the last 2 weeks of flower and I always say I'm flushing. But I guess maybe it would be better described as leaching? Semantics

 

[Dubya]

Thanks for the replies so far everyone. So I guess there is no definitive answer?

Hopefully someone who knows whats up can chime in.

I'm not looking for advices on one or the other, just want to be clear on the correct lingo.

 

[watts]

you'll just have to do a comparison test yourself. flush one or two heavily, and leach the others

 

[Dubya]

Come on now stoners!!!

I'm not looking for advices, just want to know the lingo.

What is it called when you just switch to water, and what is it called when you dump lots of water through your medium?

Are they both called flushing? Is one flushing and the other one leaching?

 

[Hammerhead]

Flushing is used to get all the extra salts out of the medium. This requires large amounts of water. This is done to fix plant problems.. Some use this to method to speed up leaching.


Im not familiar with leaching but if I where to guess thats what I do. I stop using Nutrients and only use tap water or RO until the plant is ready to harvest. This slowly gets the extra salts out of your medium.


I could have these backwards since Im not familiar with these techno babble lingo

 

[Dubya]

Thanks Hammerhead for your input.

I also always thought flushing was to rinse out the medium completely.

It seems most people are talking about just switching to water when they say they flush, so I don't know if I have it backwards or what.

Never even heard of leaching until recently, and still don't know exactly what it is.

 

[Dubya]

I used to just switch to water, but then after 2 weeks of that I harvested and then out of curiousity I decided to run some more straight water through my coco and read the ppm's. They were at like 1500! I only ever feed my girls like 900 ppm's at the most, so that's just how it compounds over time I guess.

After that I decided to flush everything out completely at least a week before harvest.

 

[Hammerhead]

I stop feeding food(nutrients)only tap water for 2-3 weeks...All of my leaves turn yellow when she is taken. I want tall the nutrients gone from the medium as well as the plant. She should be dieing feeding off of herself..

 

[benny blanco]

I run clearex for the last week

 

[growshopfrank]

FWIW a couple of drops of liquid dish detergent added to a straight water flush or leach as a surfactant helps

 

[notorious646]

does the soap do anything bad to finished buds like flavor?

 

[Avinash.miles]

im guessin flush refers to fresh h2o put thru ur medium (if any) and leaching is flushing w a flushing agent like clearex or the like,
i like drip clean, use it from start to finish

 

[medmaker420]

I get the question

flooding versus flushing more than leaching

There are some who think by flushing it actually means to FLOOD the hell out of the medium to where you drown the poor plant and then keep doing it. I think the only time to FLOOD would be if you really fucked something up in the solution you just fed them and want to fast rinse it out of the medium before the girls can drink any of it.

Leaching to me is to be bottom fed and in coco isn't recommended. I suppose you could run the h&g and break the salts down so it doesn't cause issues with the plants but not sure as I haven't tested it myself.

 

[Green Supreme]

By the time I start to leach, the plant it has used most of the nutes in the soil. I leach the rest if the way with pure water. This forces the plant to metabolize the nutrients within the plant itself, allowing it to burn with a white ash. Peace GS

 

[teemu shalanie]

If it dont burn white!, it aint right ! ( I run hydro so flushin is easy! I do it for like 10-14 days)
TS

 

[Dubya]

Wow long time I forgot about this thread. I guess my trolling served a purpose after all.


Anyways, I've been playing around with different ways of flushing. I used to flood the medium with 3x the pot size warm water. Then I just started leaching with tap. Then I started adding ph up to the tap as I leached. My thinking was if the ph is way high it will lock out all the nutes anyway so the plant can't access them. Not 100% sure on that though but makes sense to me.

My most recent run, I actually went back to flooding 3x the pot size because I need to get my girls out of there and free up some space. It seems to me that flooding 3x will speed up the process although it's probably more stressful. If I wash out all the food in the medium it forces them to cannibalize immediately and speeds up the process. That's my theory at least.

Another interesting thing I've noticed...

It seems many people prefer to get a nice fade going by harvest time. When you time your flush seems to make a big difference from what I've seen. If I wait until the plant is 'done' and then flush, as one friend of mine does, most of the time the plant doesn't fade very much if at all.

I'm thinking the reason for that is that the plant is done, so it doesn't need any energy anymore. It's not growing, not developing buds anymore, not really doing anything, so it won't fade because it doesn't need to eat.

If I time the flush and begin when the girls are close but not done, then I immediately see a nice fade begin and continue through till harvest.

What do you all think?

Is a nice fade crucial to getting a good smooth smoke?

When do you time your flush and why?

 

[Avinash.miles]

dubya, just curious, what medium u in.
im in promix hp, amended w ewc & chunky perlite, or sometimes just straight.
8 weekers flush 2 weeks, 10 weekers flush 3, i just use fresh h20, but also use drip clean nearly every watering when i have it around, its worth it imo. im not big on clearex or "flushing agents".
supernatural has a product called "qualtity cure" im interested in, u feed to plants 12 hours before harvest.... any1 got exp. w it?

im not a fan of 3x flushes, ime when i did it, the plants just stalled from overwatering untill harvest, where as if i did it gradual, like reg d2w or top water, the plants continue to swell thru flush.

also @ leaching thru bottom watering (in ebb & flo style or ebb & gro buckets) if u wanna leach proper u have to change ur water almost everytime. fresh h2o pulls so much salts from your medium... u wana toss that h2o & use fresh again or u r just feeding it right back into medium. same kinda concept as water curing. fresh water removes most from media.
does that make sense?


(& u r welcome for re-awakening this thread, even if it was due to ur troll flames, lol)