Anyone growing in perlite? Results?

[.Smoke]

Which calmag brand are you using? I can tell you if you link me to it.

I'm thinking of increasing bloom nutes as K helps to decrease availability / lock out N. Maybe that will help me lower my N. I'm going to try add some bloom booster and increase ph a bit.

Cal-Mag UltraPure | Plus Micros

Plant and blossom power. Bloom City’s Cal-Mag UltraPure formulation contains calcium, magnesium, and a wide array of micro-nutrients to grow healthier plants. Use Cal-Mag to prevent blossom end rot in tomatoes and peppers. Bloom City Cal-Mag works better because it contains more micronutrients...

www.bloom.city

 

[Porky101]

Ref

View attachment 4612899

1-3-2 is a common bloom NPK ratio. Jacks 10-30-20 for example.

What is your NPK ratio?

Veg is 10-5-9
Flower is 7-5-10

I must admit I'm not having great results with either.

Wierd because at a stage I had very good results but lately I'm struggling a bit.

I'm feeding my clones an EC of 2.0 they seem to be growing well.

In the past 1.4ec always worked for me but now I think I fiddled with my mix a bit I'm not sure.

My plants seem to be getting cal mag deficiency. But they have plenty of N so don't want to give cal nitrate. So I'm thinking the right think to do is increase my kp a bit.

 

[Porky101]

Ref

View attachment 4612899
Bloom city 2-0-0 per ml
N 5.3
Ca 5.3
Mg 1.6


1-3-2 is a common bloom NPK ratio. Jacks 10-30-20 for example.

What is your NPK ratio?

I have done load of research and usually K is higher than P.

What do you suggest? I'm feeling slightly baffled. But I believe adding mkp will solve the issue

 

[TintEastwood]

I started doing this breakdown bs to understand wtf is actually in my mix. Lol


With MC in coco it's super easy to od on K. Been dere.

 

[Porky101]

View attachment 4612912

I started doing this breakdown bs to understand wtf is actually in my mix. Lol

View attachment 4612927
With MC in coco it's super easy to od on K. Been dere.

What is MC?

 

[Porky101]

View attachment 4612912

I started doing this breakdown bs to understand wtf is actually in my mix. Lol

View attachment 4612927
With MC in coco it's super easy to od on K. Been dere.

Your growing in coco right?

If I'm in perlite then surely I could use your mix and then lower N, CA and MG by 20 percent?

 

[TintEastwood]

Your growing in coco right?

If I'm in perlite then surely I could use your mix and then lower N, CA and MG by 20 percent?

My bad, MC = Mega Crop.

Do you have Jacks or other nutes on hand?
Let me know what you are thinking and I'll work up a mix.

The mix above includes magphos, not commonly available.

 

[Porky101]

My bad, MC = Mega Crop.

Do you have Jacks or other nutes on hand?
Let me know what you are thinking and I'll work up a mix.

The mix above includes magphos, not commonly available.

No Where I live there is non of that. I need to mix my own.

My mix I have listed on page 1. My NPK is 110 - 50 - 100 in PPMs. That is @ 1.2EC. I have decided to feed like this:

Base nutes 1.0EC
Cal mag 0.4EC

Total added EC 1.4


This will most likely change my feed to :

NPK 155 - 35 - 80 PPM *** This is a guestimate.


Lets see if that works...


Magnesium Phosphate looks cool. But you can OD on P rather easily so be careful with that! That will be really nice week 2-6 flower.

Sure I would love to try your mix and even your EC's. Ill mimic your grow in my room. Will let you know results. I love experimenting!

 

[Buck5050]

I have been using straight perlite for a year or two. I do use it in a "hempy" style container, which works well with the mini-reservoir this style provides. I had some issues with Mg using MC in perlite under LEDs. I did added some Epson salts and it corrected the problem fairly quickly. That being said, it was very specific to the lighting and environment.

With my experiences with perlite only as a medium, without the hempy mini-res, I would without a doubt be watering multiple times in one day. Perlite does have a decent wicking action when sitting in water. It will pull some moisture up and keep itself humid for a little while, but it does dry out faster than most mediums. I have run a side by side with perlite for my own personal conclusions. I used half as much nutrients at a rate of twice as fast and the results were undeniably better when comparing dry weights.

 

[Porky101]

I have been using straight perlite for a year or two. I do use it in a "hempy" style container, which works well with the mini-reservoir this style provides. I had some issues with Mg using MC in perlite under LEDs. I did added some Epson salts and it corrected the problem fairly quickly. That being said, it was very specific to the lighting and environment.

With my experiences with perlite only as a medium, without the hempy mini-res, I would without a doubt be watering multiple times in one day. Perlite does have a decent wicking action when sitting in water. It will pull some moisture up and keep itself humid for a little while, but it does dry out faster than most mediums. I have run a side by side with perlite for my own personal conclusions. I used half as much nutrients at a rate of twice as fast and the results were undeniably better when comparing dry weights.

So this is my question:

I believe my diagnosis is correct : Magnesium deficiency.

Next question is why?


I have two possible answers:

Not enough magnesium

OR

Imbalanced nutrients. Too much N.


Which one you think it is?

My N for Veg is a lot more than my K.

But when I research a lot of sources are citing the ideal ratio is N:K 1:1.4

So my feed could have too much N in it and not enough K. Or I just need to add calmag.

For now I have opted to add calmag to my mix.

 

[TintEastwood]

This will most likely change my feed to :

NPK 155 - 35 - 80 PPM *** This is a guestimate.

Lets see if that works...

I fiddled around to get practice calcing NPK ratio.
Approx 2-1-1.25

 

[Porky101]

I fiddled around to get practice calcing NPK ratio.
Approx 2-1-1.25
View attachment 4613598

Thanks for this.

Is this your veg mix? Looks like it. What ec you running?

If I had to add calmag to my current veg mix I will look like your formula makeup.

So you think I should lower feed, add calmag and then I'll be very similar with your feed. That's what I'm doing currently anyways. Results are too early to tell. Feeding EC 1.5

 

[Nizza]

has it crossed your mind that you might be under watering them?

 

[TintEastwood]

Thanks for this.

Is this your veg mix? Looks like it. What ec you running?

If I had to add calmag to my current veg mix I will look like your formula makeup.

So you think I should lower feed, add calmag and then I'll be very similar with your feed. That's what I'm doing currently anyways. Results are too early to tell. Feeding EC 1.5

That was using your planned numbers. I believe that is a good veg NPK ratio. That's where I need to do more research and determine the best ratio for different growth phases. Still a dummy.

"This will most likely change my feed to :
NPK 155 - 35 - 80 PPM *** This is a guestimate."


These are what-if/maybe - untested.
1-3-3 to PPM example...


using TM-7 to mimmick bagged labeled 10-30-20


Not sure about feed EC. I feed lower, more often in coco.

 

[Porky101]

has it crossed your mind that you might be under watering them?

I don't think under watering will cause a magnesium deficiency. But underwatering could cause lockout which would exacerbate the issue....I am not ruling out underwatering as a factor.



So everyone here agrees an npk ratio of say 4-2-3.5 is fine.

 

[Nizza]

I use 3-1-2 for veg and 2-1-3 for bloom as a loose guideline

 

[Porky101]

Apparently my NPK is 1-1.04-1.14 NPK

But that does not make sense, my PPM of N is double to that of P. Wierd wonder why my program is showing me it like this..

Is PPM ratio's the same as NPK ratios?

For example if my N is 10 ppm and my P is 5 ppm and my K is 10 ppm then it should be an NPK of 10-5-10, this correct?

 

[cobshopgrow]

it make sense.
the avaiable P is something different.
"Factor P to P2O5 : P X 2.2915
P2O5 to P: 0.4364
Use the above mentioned factor for converting P to P2O5 and P2O5 to P"

its a bit confusing but thats how it is.
enter the values of f.e maxibloom or megacrop in hydrobuddy and compare yourself, real ppm values to ratios on the bag.

 

[Porky101]

it make sense.
the avaiable P is something different.
"Factor P to P2O5 : P X 2.2915
P2O5 to P: 0.4364
Use the above mentioned factor for converting P to P2O5 and P2O5 to P"

its a bit confusing but thats how it is.
enter the values of f.e maxibloom or megacrop in hydrobuddy and compare yourself, real ppm values to ratios on the bag.

So are my NPK's wrong then???

I listed my formula on page 1. My PPMs look fine but when I do a NPK it is looking less than ideal?

Seems like I may have been confusing things up and that *May* be my issue?

 

[cobshopgrow]

N (NO3-) 115.853 5.3% +/- 0%
K 172.903 -1.2% +/- 0%
P 67.648 4.1% +/- 0%
Mg 50 0% +/- 0%
Ca 120.91 -3.3% +/- 0%
no your npk arent wrong, theyre what hydrobuddy says, your elemental real world P istill need conversion,, as K do too.
calc some common fertilizers and compare the ratio on the bag with what hydrobuddy state as ppm and fertilizer ratio, you will get the picture.
p insnt p2o5
and K isnt k2o