The Lounge : Growers Round Table Discussion Thread

[bsgospel]

Thanks for the answer gospel,

On the over-abundance of N: I'm growing plants that are light N feeders, I'm giving them only 1 to 2 weeks veg. And I already had 60ppm of N from the leafmold, then I added 120ppm with bonemeal.
This was way over my target of 60ppm, I did have dark green leafs, but other problems stayed away fortunately.

Mix 2:
I do lime with Maerl, it is my only real calcium source, I don't count on the Ca from bonemeal and TSP. So when I said calcium, I meant Maerl.

I can see your point of the lag in effect, but the weird thing is that the 1l peat + 5g Maerl gave me a good reading after a week if I'm not mistaken.

Plus, I mixed the base (normally with enough Maerl) two months ago.

One other thing I did different than the first mix was that I did not use a microbial inoculatant (EM1).

Should I add an acid to my Maerl to chelate it before mixing?

My bad I thought you were liming and using Maerl for a quick calcium source. Led makes the case though, the 6.2 is the anomaly. I should've asked about other wetting agents.

 

[bsgospel]

And not that it matters but I don't think any acids available to you have the chelating effect we're looking for, nor really the inoculations. More or less, any product you encounter might already have chelation/availability covered. The inoculations are really plant/root dependent. Inoculating a soil without a plant doesn't really achieve anything (measurable at least). [<----Edit- I can already think of a way to combat that but I'm going to let it ride for a minute...]

 

[Charles Dankens]

Thank you bro.

I'll post up a couple pics of how things work out.
Grateful for the expertise, thanks again

Hey Folks, here are some pics showing how that soil is performing.
in these pics plants are about 4 weeks into 10.5-13.5. I may have my dates wrong because this OG looks more advanced.


This Kali Mist clone is showing a lil trouble on leaves closest to light source. This clone stretched way more than I was expecting. I'm treating it as if it were an Mg issue by foliar epsom. I do expect issues when they get this close to the cobs.




It has set loads of buds.

 

[Charles Dankens]

On a separate note i was moving some plants around and discovered this conch shell under some shiso volunteers ( Perilla frutescen). Check out how aggressively the roots got into the shell!






My peppers were content with the soil mix pretty much as is.



Any thoughts on deficiencies or hints of trouble on the horizon please share.


Thanks again for the great thread and the support on soil tests.

 

[led05]

On a separate note i was moving some plants around and discovered this conch shell under some shiso volunteers ( Perilla frutescen). Check out how aggressively the roots got into the shell!



View Image


My peppers were content with the soil mix pretty much as is.
View Image


Any thoughts on deficiencies or hints of trouble on the horizon please share.


Thanks again for the great thread and the support on soil tests.

things look good

Your one flower pic, the latest facing down on plant... You have Mg, K, Ca deficiencies, maybe P, the edge curling could be other things too (loupe closely) but probably combo of the Mg & K deficiencies.

The peppers look good but also show some of the same issues, harder to see in a pepper plant IMO.

just one internet users opinion

 

[Charles Dankens]

things look good

Your one flower pic, the latest facing down on plant... You have Mg, K, Ca deficiencies, maybe P, the edge curling could be other things too (loupe closely) but probably combo of the Mg & K deficiencies.

The peppers look good but also show some of the same issues, harder to see in a pepper plant IMO.

just one internet users opinion

Thanks Led, would some seaweed tea or rockdust make sense?

 

[paradoxlost]

Thanks Led, would some seaweed tea or rockdust make sense?

I used to be a huge fan of rock dusts, but the more and more I play around with them, the less and less soluble I think that they are, for the most part. Clearly like lime and gypsum are soluble, but some of the basalts and shales, they really aren't that soluble. Even if you are using humates or bacterial/fungal inoculants, those rock dusts stick around forever. Kelp I am a huge fan of. I've been thinking about getting more into seed or plant meals. I have hundreds of pounds of hemp seed, which would be an amazing nitrogen and manganese source, as well as iron and other trace minerals. Also moringa seed meals would be great.

 

[djonkoman]

@bcgospel:
I tried to reply to your pm, but I think it's not working, it keeps taking me back to my inbox after I click 'post message', and I don't see my reply appear anywhere.
or maybe it did send them? in that case you now probably have an avalanche of the same message. anyway, let me know if you've received it, then I know it works or not(I never send pm's on here, so not sure if I'm supposed to get some kind of confirmation the message was sent).

 

[bsgospel]

I got it dj. It's all good.

 

[jidoka]

Massive storms kicked my ass for a minute. But fuck them, from fri on good to go

 

[Dawn Patrol]

Anybody got a suggestion for pH up without K?

Calcium Hydroxide?

Sodium Hydroxide?

Something else?

 

[dramamine]

Anybody got a suggestion for pH up without K?

Calcium Hydroxide?

Sodium Hydroxide?

Something else?

I've been using liquid calcium carbonate. Works fine and doesn't take much.

 

[cannascholar]

Calcium silicate

 

[jidoka]

Anybody got a suggestion for pH up without K?

Calcium Hydroxide?

Sodium Hydroxide?

Something else?

What medium are you in?

 

[Dawn Patrol]

What medium are you in?

Peat and perlite, trying to maximize calcium uptake.

Freakin potassium is in everything........

 

[jidoka]

Are you phing water or a nutrient solution

 

[Dawn Patrol]

Are you phing water or a nutrient solution

Both.

Source water is 70 TDS and 4.3 pH.

 

[jidoka]

So if I remember right somewhere around 4.5 you end up with no alkalinity in the water...no caco3 equivalents.

The green house industry makes high alkalinity fertilizers. You could look into that, or how to make that.

Or you could use a micronized calcium carbonate for pH up. I know Nectar for the gods makes one. Probably others. You just gotta keep it agitated

 

[Dawn Patrol]

Thanks for all the suggestions, I've got some research ahead.

jidoka, I did go ahead and contact Brian as you suggested, just waiting to hear from him.

 

[Arnold.]

My thoughts are that the TSP is dropping your pH. Good to see you around Arnold!


EDIT: Yucca extract is the general wetting agent of choice.

Growingcrazy was on the ball yet again!

Did set-up a few experiments and the 6.2 pH reading of the 1l peat + 5g 36% maerl proved not to be the anomaly.

The input of 1044ppm P with 2.6g of TSP for each liter of soil mix (=10g for each gallon) proved to be way too much for the pH. I did not yet investigate how many TSP my soilless mix can take without plunging the pH.

When I used bonemeal for the most part of the P, I did not get pH problems, but I think I got N excess instead.
I used 9g bonemeal and 1.4g TSP for each liter soil mix that round of mixing.

the soilmix here is 5 parts Latvian peat + 1 part leafmold. after amending I add 1 part pumice.

I can not source calphos here, but I hope to have found a lone seller of soft rock phosphate at 200km away. Any known problems with soft rock phosphate? I love me a good trail and error, but it takes a lot of time and effort