Coco: Tips, techniques, and the facts you will need

Silky Shagsalot

Silky Shagsalot

Well-Known Member
saw this thread and thought i'd throw my 2 cents in. i've been in coco for over ten years now, and will never go back to dirt, lol. i always use a good 10-15% perlite. good for air to roots. i feed full strength (usually around 800-1000 ppm.) every day once they're established in veg. always allow a good 15-20% run-off. run-off is key. if you feel you're having build-up issues, increase run-off amounts. i've read in g. low's "integral hydroponics, and asked him about it," that coco prefers several small feedings per day, rather than one or two big ones. i'm almost ready to put together an auto feed drip rez system. i never flush, until the end. although some feel it's not necessary. i use house and garden coco specific nutes, and some of their supps. real happy with the h&g line. and as someone said, their roots excelurator is great stuff, it is "very," pricey! i use fulvic and humic acids. i use pro-tekt for ph up, and a 9% phosphoric acid solution for ph down. i like the bagged coco, the bricks are too much work, lol. i do flush it with r/o water, and don't bother with ph'ing that water. i use r/o water to feed, and never use just plain water. it seems that coco doesn't require the high ppm's that soil growers use, but i see some use this method. i never check my run-off ph, unless there's an issue, and in all these years, there hasn't been any. i feel that chasing ph is a mistake. i mean, who cares what the run-off ph is, if your plants aren't displaying any issues? i re-use my coco 3 times. i use hygrozyme to help clean it up. i'm a bit high, so if this makes no sense, sorry, lol.... leaving tap water out to get rid of chlorine may not be helpful in all areas. some cities are using chloramine now, and that won't work.. never had to use cal-mag either. i wonder why some need to??
 
JohnnySocko

JohnnySocko

Active Member
^^^^ +Rep just for the avatar that somehow both disturbing but funny as hell (not sure if its "pro life" or "pro choice" or "multiple choice".... ha ha ha)...I'm having a hard time typing :lol:
 
A

AltDog

New Member
djwimbo said:
When I was running errands this weekend, I talked to the guys at a local (bigger name locally) gardening center. I had a brick of coco in my hand, employee asks if I need help, so I ask where the airpots/Superoots pots are. "Oh, we don't carry those." .. "Why?" .. "Too many holes, bug problems, and soil issues." I still bought what I went there for, but the second person to help me was much more helpful.
Click to expand...
HAHAH for real? He/whoever complained to him, must have been planting airpots in the garden ROFL
 
burgertime2010

burgertime2010

Well-Known Member
Silky Shagsalot said:
saw this thread and thought i'd throw my 2 cents in. i've been in coco for over ten years now, and will never go back to dirt, lol. i always use a good 10-15% perlite. good for air to roots. i feed full strength (usually around 800-1000 ppm.) every day once they're established in veg. always allow a good 15-20% run-off. run-off is key. if you feel you're having build-up issues, increase run-off amounts. i've read in g. low's "integral hydroponics, and asked him about it," that coco prefers several small feedings per day, rather than one or two big ones. i'm almost ready to put together an auto feed drip rez system. i never flush, until the end. although some feel it's not necessary. i use house and garden coco specific nutes, and some of their supps. real happy with the h&g line. and as someone said, their roots excelurator is great stuff, it is "very," pricey! i use fulvic and humic acids. i use pro-tekt for ph up, and a 9% phosphoric acid solution for ph down. i like the bagged coco, the bricks are too much work, lol. i do flush it with r/o water, and don't bother with ph'ing that water. i use r/o water to feed, and never use just plain water. it seems that coco doesn't require the high ppm's that soil growers use, but i see some use this method. i never check my run-off ph, unless there's an issue, and in all these years, there hasn't been any. i feel that chasing ph is a mistake. i mean, who cares what the run-off ph is, if your plants aren't displaying any issues? i re-use my coco 3 times. i use hygrozyme to help clean it up. i'm a bit high, so if this makes no sense, sorry, lol.... leaving tap water out to get rid of chlorine may not be helpful in all areas. some cities are using chloramine now, and that won't work.. never had to use cal-mag either. i wonder why some need to??
Click to expand...
H&G makes great Roots Accel, Shooting Powder is phenominal, and enzymatic therapy make good sense and I say that because 2-4 feedings a day can get heavy for roots that can't breathe because there is decay. I water from the bottom so Zone(chloramine) keeps them looking good and drinking feverishly.
 
burgertime2010

burgertime2010

Well-Known Member
"I want to write a book" all about Coco Techniques and the science behind it. Problem is.....I need co-authors with experiential overlap. Know anybody??
 
Got4m2e0

Got4m2e0

Well-Known Member
Came across this thread figured I would put in my two cents worth of experience.

i used
canna A/B
Roots excel
Cannazyme
top shooter
bloombastic. (Amazing finisher for color and taste!)
Orca
drip clean
koolbloom
general hydroponics ph down
and fish tank ph down with is sulfuric acid ( switching over the GH ph down)
and for cal mag I have
general organics CA+Mg
calmag plus
and calimagic

i found that with canna, the N levels are so high that I get overly green leaves with the claw showing every time I use calmag plus, not so much with calimagic. My tap water is EC of 231 so I use 2 MLs of cal mag to bring it to 400 like canna suggested on their web site. So I use it in veg which saves me from the claw that could happen in flower. I start using GO CA+MG which has no N in it IF I see a deficiency in CA or mg. with that being said I will move on

i use troph blumats which do have a little run off from time to time so I check runoff ec every now and then to make sure I have no build up. I won't allow the runoff ec to be more the 300 EC over the nutrient solution in the res.

I tend to run 1200 EC in ms so 1.2 at peak of flowering with means I add 6mls per gallon of A+B, .5ml drip clean, and 2 ml of kook koolbloom as needed depending on what my girls are telling me.

imoe I found that with CoCo you need to be able to read your plants. All the Runoff EC tells you is how much salts are built up in the medium. It doesn't tell you which ones are needed by the plant and which ones are left to build up. So if you want to get good at Coco learn to read your plants, so you know what they are asking you for.

I normally use Bloombastic for the last three weeks, because I found it stops growth and make the buds Super dense and adds a ton of sweetness and brings out the fall colors like crazy. My flush is only three days with 2MLs of A+B and 2MLs of cannazyme and or course .5mls of drip clean. They come out looking purple and when dried they look lime green with hues of purple and magenta and the smell is something else. I don't get that without bloombastic in my setup. On wards...

I don't use blu mats until flowering, I also don't throw them in flowering unless I can water till runoff and they are dry by mid day. Cause after the stretch, they don't make roots anymore and during the stretch I found they don't make really seem to grow as much roots as they do during VEG. Which a strong root system they LOVE blumats keeping them moist and go crazy from that point.

To grow roots, I water deeply and infrequently, and even let the tops get a little dry and they grow roots like crazy trying to get water and nutrients. I used to use rhizotonic but at 5-10 ml a gallon I rather use roots excell at 1ML a gallon and save a tone of money since an 80 dollar bottle make 250 gallons vs just shy of 200 using half strength rhizo they both work really good at suggested rates so root excel is a no brainer.

I use orca in the beginning, only because the fungi spore won't sprout in a high PK solution and I feel light when I start them off. I also don't pre wash the coco. Canna does that and since it states that is is ph buffered to 5.5 to 6.1 and the 6.1 ph is better for P and K uptake. Which is good for the starting of roots on clones. It only makes sense to leave it be and I have yet to have a problem and been doing it that way for years. This my own experience, not saying it would hurt to ph buffer it Down to 5.8 and certain strains my want that, but I like to keep things simple.

I'm trying out the top shooter and so far all is well, it is delaying the fall color like it states on H&Gs website, so I'm hoping the bloombastic will still preform using it for one week instead of three.

good luck to everyone and happy growing.
 
JohnnySocko

JohnnySocko

Active Member
I'm just trying coco for the 1st time and loving it....
I was having issues with the Canna nutes and my tap so I switched to a regime using H3ads formula and GH nutes; don't know what exactly what corrected the situation but my plants look better....
I'm using drip clean and watering 4x daily with no runoff in 6.5L pots...I see plenty roots already through the holes so I must be feeding/watering right

right now I'm not trying to figure out any additives beyond basic nutes
 
burgertime2010

burgertime2010

Well-Known Member
Update: Ebb and flow works better the more I cycle it in coco. I tried just 1 flood and soak per day and figured it would be close enough. Food is better used in shorter floods more often.
 
burgertime2010

burgertime2010

Well-Known Member
Just rounding the first reservoir change in a few days. I bought humic acid powder online (cheap) and put 5 oz of it in. Now, growth was excellent prior but the vitality was lacking...looking wind burned or a bit tired. I decided to run it after some very convincing reading and statistics. They have been officially juiced and according to the package only need it every 4-6 weeks. It does make the tray and res kind of dirty. My point is that it is cheap, used gingerly, and causes all systems to go.
 
Haystack

Haystack

Member
Help with coco pot size and automated dtw
Hello everyone and thanks in advance for the input and advice. I'm finishing up my first coco run in a new room. I'm running 4 plants per 1000 watt in 7 gallon smart pots. It's working right now, but what a pain in the ass hand watering and draining the saucers is. Anyways for the next round I'm going to build DTW tables and set up drip lines. I like the idea of watering twice a day so was thinking 3 gallon smart pots. You guys think 3 gal pots will provide enough root space as well as providing a sturdy enough base to hold half elbow plants with out trellis'? Also how's everyone's experiences with 2 gpd drip lines? That seems to be the norm at the hydro shop, but I was looking at the contractor landscape place and found sprayers that can adjust from 5-20 gph. I was thinking these would clog much less.
Thanks for the input!
 
Squidbilly

Squidbilly

Well-Known Member
I need an automated DTW guru to chime in...

I'm having trouble figuring out how to judge how much I'm watering. Currently I have a rez with an air stone and circulation pump(which runs on a cycle timer to mix the nutes every once in a while).

When the pump runs to water the plants I've been testing different lengths of time with a stop watch and measuring how much run off I'm getting. Problem is I can't get a measurement of how much I actually watered them.

So
-5 minutes gave me a little less then 5 gallons of run off, which seams like alot for 9, 3gal pots.
-3 minutes gave me more like 2 gallons.
-1 minute gave me less then a gallon.

I have a 30 gallon res. So if I watered once a day to 5 gallons run-off that's 6 days(more like 4-5, I change it when It get's low instead of top it off).

Is that TOO MUCH run off, or is more better? Obviously i'd like to eliminate as much WASTE as possible from my DTWaste set-up.
 
hellraizer30

hellraizer30

Rebel From The North
Squidbilly said:
I need an automated DTW guru to chime in...

I'm having trouble figuring out how to judge how much I'm watering. Currently I have a rez with an air stone and circulation pump(which runs on a cycle timer to mix the nutes every once in a while).

When the pump runs to water the plants I've been testing different lengths of time with a stop watch and measuring how much run off I'm getting. Problem is I can't get a measurement of how much I actually watered them.

So
-5 minutes gave me a little less then 5 gallons of run off, which seams like alot for 9, 3gal pots.
-3 minutes gave me more like 2 gallons.
-1 minute gave me less then a gallon.

I have a 30 gallon res. So if I watered once a day to 5 gallons run-off that's 6 days(more like 4-5, I change it when It get's low instead of top it off).

Is that TOO MUCH run off, or is more better? Obviously i'd like to eliminate as much WASTE as possible from my DTWaste set-up.
Click to expand...

If your not going to use drip clean then 10% of what you put
In needs to come out to slow salt build up
 
Squidbilly

Squidbilly

Well-Known Member
I get that part, I'm trying to figure out how long to run my pump to get 10%+ run-off.

Does GPH/60=GPM? Or is that not an accurate way to judge how much you're watering per minute?
 
Silky Shagsalot

Silky Shagsalot

Well-Known Member
JohnnySocko said:
^^^^ +Rep just for the avatar that somehow both disturbing but funny as hell (not sure if its "pro life" or "pro choice" or "multiple choice".... ha ha ha)...I'm having a hard time typing :lol:
Click to expand...
lol, ya, i like the pic too. it's an album cover from long ago, "King Crimson."
 
reddiamond

reddiamond

Well-Known Member
Squidbilly said:
I need an automated DTW guru to chime in...

I'm having trouble figuring out how to judge how much I'm watering. Currently I have a rez with an air stone and circulation pump(which runs on a cycle timer to mix the nutes every once in a while).

When the pump runs to water the plants I've been testing different lengths of time with a stop watch and measuring how much run off I'm getting. Problem is I can't get a measurement of how much I actually watered them.

So
-5 minutes gave me a little less then 5 gallons of run off, which seams like alot for 9, 3gal pots.
-3 minutes gave me more like 2 gallons.
-1 minute gave me less then a gallon.

I have a 30 gallon res. So if I watered once a day to 5 gallons run-off that's 6 days(more like 4-5, I change it when It get's low instead of top it off).

Is that TOO MUCH run off, or is more better? Obviously i'd like to eliminate as much WASTE as possible from my DTWaste set-up.
Click to expand...
Why not put all your drippers/pipes into an empty tub and run your timer for 1 minute, that will tell you how much nutes you put in then you can work out the 10% from there and adjust your timer to give you the correct runoff.
 
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