PH etc. questions. Incredible Bulk Photo

Grow Cycle Flowering
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1

I am growing ILGM Incredible Bulk. Today begins my fourth week of flipping the light to flower. I flipped them on Dec 8. I’m trying to get dialed in on nutes. I am going to finish with the GH Trio. I’m growing in soil with not enough Perlite. This is my second grow. My first grow was 4 Strawberry Pie Autoflower that yielded 1 lb exactly. I inherited these Incredible Bulks. I just fed them water in November because I was too busy to deal with them. I had to cut them back before flipping them because they got to big in the tent. The first couple weeks of flower I fed them some samples I got from the MJBiz in Vegas. They look good. I don’t have a recent pic. The biggest issue is fungus gnats. But I’m letting them dry out. I’m using a Mars Hydro light with additional red light bars. I pay close attention to DLI with the Photone App. I bought the optional diffuser.

So here goes:
I started with tap water. I’m on a well.
I have a 2 gallon jug I mix nutes in. I shake it vigorously in between ingredients…
I have a Hone Forest and Apera PH20 meters.
After I filled the jug with 2 gallons,I took the following readings:
EC was 204 micro Siemens, PPM was 96, PH was 6.2
I then added in this order
Cal mag 5ml
Micro (hard water) 4ml
Gro 4ml
Bloom 6ml
Nectar 20ml
I shook it vigorously in between and at the end.
I took the following readings
EC was 892 micros, PPM was 411 and PH was 5.8
I added PH up and raised it to 6.5 final PH.
Am I on the right track?
The picture is from Dec 17th

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2

I really expected an incredible bulk of photos… :man_facepalming:t4:

3

Looks pretty good from the photo.

4

Your going to need to up your EC to feed them in flower.

5

How do I do that? Also what do you think about the other values? TIA.

6

Watering issue

It looks like you have 3 plants. What size pots are they in?

From what I read it looks as if your feeding/watering 3 girls with only 2 gallons of water divided up to the 3 girls. (That’s less than 3 quarts per girl)

I’m not familiar with general hydroponics but it’s simply a synthetic nutrient line. Synthetic nutrients are salty and need to be administered to the plants in a volume that would allow sufficient runoff of at least 15% to assist in proper release of built up salts in your roots and soil.

I see no mention of you feeding to achieve run off.

Example:
If you had 3 gallon pots. Every single time you feed each girl it would require 1-1/2 gallons of feed/water to properly run off 15%

If you were growing in 5 gallon pots it would require 2 gallons of water/feed to accommodate a 15% - 20% runoff.

Also, we use a bucket, pot, or pan to catch the runoff and we measure the PPM and pH of the runoff water to dictate the soils pH and how much the girl is eating.

I’ll be honest, your plants look good but your headed for disaster if you don’t get on top of properly feeding and running off these plants. You also mentioned that you do not have sufficient perlite added to your soil. This is more reason to obtain sufficient runoff.

Again I see no mention of runoff PPM or pH numbers. You need to start doing it!

Proper feed mixing
I’m assuming when you’re mixing your nutrients you’re using the general hydronics recommended feeding chart to do so???

You mentioned your last feed input was 411 ppm and 6.5ph (seems like a low feed ppm)

Was this feed mixed at 1/4 or 1/2 strength of what you’re GH feeding chart recommends?

You’re in what’s called mid flower stage your runoff ppm should be approximately 1000ppm and 6.5 ph (this would mean you’re feeding them perfectly)

Your goal through the rest of the flowering stage is going to be obtaining and maintaining 1000 ppm / 6.5 ph (when measuring your runoff)

How do we do that
If your runoff is less than 1000ppm you simply feed more

If your runoff is higher then 1000ppm you simple feed less

It’s that simple…

Tip
When you were a new grower using any line of nutrients from a manufacturer you should use their feeding chart and feed what they tell you and how much they tell you to the exact timeline they tell you.

I strongly suggest not using full strength on your first feed. (Sometime the manufacturers full strength feed can be way too strong)

I suggest starting at 1/4 of what they tell you to feed per each item they tell you to feed. Then simply check the runoff.

At that point this applies again.

If your runoff is less than 1000ppm you simply feed more

If your runoff is higher then 1000ppm you simple feed less

7

Thank you for your help. I just watered them until I had runoff. I sucked up some in a syringe from one plant and filled a shot glass.
PH 5.4
PPM 1412
EC 3004
That’s different than when I put it in. I used all 2 gallons among the three from what I made yesterday. I got the formula from a YouTube when I grew the autos. They grew good so I figured I’d use same formula. I think it’s a weak mixture. I wonder what’s causing those yellow leafs.
They are in 5 gallon pots.
Here are some pictures from today:

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8

Try this next time you water. Use the same formula (ml per gallon) that you have been using.

This time use 1-1/2 gallons of feed per plant (this will give you the sufficient runoff you need for your 5 gallon pots)

Note
It’s more important to get sufficient runoff that washes out the old and puts in the new. Not getting sufficient runoff as I said before will lead to accumulation of salt build up that leads to bigger problems with your plant in many different aspects.

Doing this, I personally 100% guarantee your plants will grow much healthier with little to no issues as long as you’re feeding correct nutrients with sufficient runoff

Remember you want to keep your runoff numbers as close to 1,000 PPM and 6.5 pH as you possibly can

You’ll be just fine. Good luck to you

9

I was wrong about pot size. They are 7 gallon pots. Does this change how much I put into each pot. Also I use one of those Vivosun moisture meters. So I know if I put that quantity in each pot, the moisture meter will peg. Do I then wait for the moisture meter to get down to below half way before I water again?

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Dry time for the soil is incredibly important as the roots can only uptake oxygen when the plant is dry.

Moisture meters are okay but can be misleading due to inaccuracy in the reading.

I like to go by weight. 7 gallon pot is very light when dry and very heavy when wet. It’s important not to water the plants when the soil still wet.

In 7 gallon pot when you do water I would water/feed at 2 gal per girl to get the sufficient runoff.

11

@Growdoc
EC 3000 or PPM 1500, is my question?
@Lostgirl .. the new PH and TDS meters have arrived, calibrated, and work well.

12

Thats one of the things i dont like about adding scrog net, unable to lift and feel weight these were flipped December 7th, using promix hp with mycorrhizae, 5 gallon fabric pots, 5 gallons of jacks 321 every other day

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I feed by EC, I feel it more accurate on nute strength. Ppm is just another way of measuring it. TDS can be high due to solids that have no nutrients, EC measures salt concentration .

14

So just toss the run off when done? I hate wasting it. Probably still full of nutrients. I guess I’ll throw it out on the daffodil patch. Some are already sprouting. Thanks for the tips. To paraphrase. Water each girl with two gallons and measure the runoff PH etc. Don’t water again until the pot is lighter. Shoot for 1000 ppm and 6-5 ph of the runoff.

15

The runoff is excellent for garden and plants. I used to feed it to my tomatoes all the time

16

tds just taking ec and multiplying by whichever factor tds your using. (usually 0.5)

17

EC x2 will give you PPMs, TDS can vary due to solids in the water that are not conducive, so TDS will measure them but they have no EC.