pineappleman420
Well-Known Member
Glad i found this one. Very interesting stuff
Silica's main problem in use for plants is its low solubility.
Yeah well maybe should have said "I find" it has the above effectsAnd the fact that it's not used for anything.
Gloomy, what kind of medium did you mix it with? Soil or hydro?I just started using silica powder from Kelp4Less. I started using it in week 3 of 9. I just harvested. I will not tell you how well it worked because everyone would call me a liar. This stuff is worth it's weight in gold. I will NEVER GROW WITHOUT IT.
Why didn't Howard Resh mention Si in his formula?60% Coir, 5% sphagnum, 35% #3 perlite. I keep the pH at 5.9 - 6.1 in veg, 6.3 in bloom.
I make my own nutes following the tomato formula in Hydroponic Food Production by Howard M. Resh, Ph.D. This is pretty much the same as Gen Hydro's A + B+ Micros. Making your own costs pennies on the dollar, as in danged near free. Of course, each strain has its own needs, so you to adjust here, tweek there until your girls think they are in heaven. Tip... Bump the MKP and magnesium sulfate by 50% during weeks 3 - 6 and at the same time taper off the calcium nitrate to zero by week six for a 9 week strain. Thoroughly flush at end of week 6 using ro with magnesium sulfate only, 600 ppm. Flush until the waste water is less than 1000 ppm. Then fertigate using the stock solution B and micros only, at 700 ppm. Oh yeah... mycos in the cloning solution and in the veg nutes. Oh yeah, if you use molasses, go half of the recommended amount or you will make a disappointing mess of the entire project. DO NOT use dried molasses.
Mixing the nutes using a stock solution: Start with RO. Dissolve the silica powder before adding the nute stock solution. You will get noticeable results in 10 - 15 days. The plants will "get tough". Get a lot of air movement going 24/7. The plants will require less support. The flowers will be bigger, more dense and therefore heavier.
Get your lighting, temp and atmospheric controls right AND use DE hps. This is all you need to produce top shelf flowers. Don't waste your time on all the silly bs. Keep it simple and grow great weed.
Man... don't be coming on here saying shit like that. "it literally doubled my mates harvest" Come on dude... seriously? It must be magicAHA!! Until customs started seizing it we had a product here called DrJKS BUD HARDENER, the main ingredient was sillica, you would feed it to the plant from day 28 flowering to 38, it literally doubled my mates harvest, havent been able to find anything like it since though locally
You should be getting way more than that, per 1000w DE. No offense, but especially with a strain called "incredible bulk"I can't say for certain why Howard left out Si.
A little background...
The copyright on his first edition is 1978. Maybe all of the benefits of Si were not yet understood. Or maybe he just didn't think the benefits with respect to growing veggies wasn't worth the hassle. It's been decades since I read his book. but as I recall his approach was to supply the 17 essential nutrients and leave it at that.
He never said as much, but I think he was a missionary. He went to some exotic south sea island where the natives were living on a diet of mostly seafood and yams. He set himself to the task of improving their diet. Howard looked around at the resources available and put together a technique that worked there. Here's the good part. He made the medium they used from coconut husks and rice hulls. To the best of my knowledge, the man was a pioneer of using coco coir.
Here's a P.S. on my previous post. I recently upgraded from single end hps to double end. The Sun Systems DE Boss hoods had samples of General Hydro's Si Armour. I was blown away by the performance, in a positive way, and by the cost, in a negative way. After looking around on the 'net I found that Kelp4Less had a couple inexpensive silica powders. I bought the cheap one and it is working just fine. I suspect that it is just fossil shell four. Now here's the good part. The light from the DE hps lamps is so intense, (How intense is it?) It is so intense that in early bloom the plants grow so aggressively that they show signs of being under fed. I kicked the bloom formula tds all the way up to 1450 ppm and they quickly recovered. Back to the subject at hand, Si. The Si is necessary when using DE hps, in my opinion. These two things, Si and DE hps has upped my game beyond my wildest dreams. I think that with the right strain, I might be able to pump out 2 pounds per 1000 watt lamp, 4 lolly popped plants per lamp. I just started growing Incredible Bulk and I got 1.67 lb.s/ lamp, first try. (I told you everyone would think I lie.)
Considering you were using potassium silicate and potassium is an essential element used in abundant quantities, how can you be sure it wasn't the potassium causing noticeable effects?Oh man... I get so distracted by the minutia that I forget the basics. Si is necessary when using DE hps because you have to toughen up the plant to get the most out of the intense light of the DE hps.