Nutes Hardwater

[Nastydroaste]

Hey whats up you all, new to this forum, but already know the basics.. I currently have two 5 sight 18 gallon dwc setups with 8 white widows and 2 skunkxhaze growing in them(once sexed i will trasfer to there own 5 gallon buckets). They are about 3 days old, under a 400w hps and everything looks good. Ok. to the question. I have really hard tap water (650 ppm) (400 ppm is calcium) so I ordered FLora Hardwater micro along with Flora gro and Flora bloom. My question is when should i had my nutes, and what ppm and ratio should I be at with water ppm included. Example: 1st week 800 ppm 3 parts micro 2 parts gro 1 part bloom, 2nd week 1000 ppm ect.... Or however you want to explain . Thanks

 

[Mr Green Man]

Hard one to answer.

It's kind of personal.

This is my first ever grow but it's going okay so far, no diffencys, lock out or over ferting. Tuch wood.
I started low, and have stayed low and i'm doing okay.
You can lern a lot from checking the PPMs everyday and seeing if they are moving up or down.

This is what I have done so far, and I work in EC. And I'm using Canna Aquar, Canna Zym and Liquid Silica.

Tap Water EC0.4
Rooted cuttings,
these are the starting ECs, they have always driffted down.
5 days EC0.6
7 days EC0.9
8 days EC1.1
Flowering
2 Day Flush, Plain Water
7 Days EC1.3 <---- I found this to be slitly too high
7 Days EC1.1 <---- And this was slitly too low Next time I will do it the other way around!

Thats as far as I have got
I plan to
14 Days EC1.2 + Canna PK13/14 = EC1.4 Next Rez change and let it driffed down over a two weeks. But I will have to see how it goes.

I aways top up with plain water.

With Tap water that hard, with so much calcum in it, Be very carfull of Magnisum Lock out, coursed by the exses Calcum, it might be addvisable to do rez changes often to stop a build up of calcum in your tank.

 

[Mr Green Man]

Thats as far as I have got
I plan to
14 Days EC1.2 + Canna PK13/14 = EC1.4 Next Rez change and let it driffed down over a two weeks. But I will have to see how it goes.
quote]

Done some reasearch on that And now I think I am being a bit premerture.
This rez change I will raise the EC to 1.3 but not add any PK13/14

Here is the plan for now
Week 3 EC1.3
Week 4 EC1.3
Week 5 EC1.3 + Canna PK13/14
Week 6 Let it Run on and drop
Week 8 Flush

Now this is very early stuff, I will be doing lots more reasearch regarding nute useage at this stage.
Including the thing I probably should have done at the start and making up some soultion as per the Canna Indtructions and seeing how it reads.

Good luck keep us posted.

 

[patjack]

I was doing research for my bubble buckets on this site and someone linked to this thread. It is about 31 pages long but the info in it is great, and right along the lines of your questions. It is the ask lucas column
hope this helps

Ask Lucas - Cannabis-World

 

[Nastydroaste]

thanks for the input guys, anyone grow white widow in a dwc setup? I heard that it doesnt like to much nutes. But with hard water like mine do i have to use less nutes than someone with say 30 ppm or does it not matter?

 

[Mr Green Man]

Can you do something about your water. Its really not good. I tihnk you are going to have dirrculties.

My water is half the PPMs of yours, I don't know how much is Calcum but I am already starting to see some Magnesum lock out by the exses of Calcum in the water.

Buy a RO filter or collect Rainwater? I'm hoping to start using Rainwater soon, plenty of it.

By the way,
I just did a rez change, I was aiming for 13 but ended up at 14, I made a misstake with the PH down and had to add a load of Liquid Silica to bring the PH back up, it also brougt the EC up. Will be keeping a close eye on them tonight to make sure they are alright.

 

[Earl]

You are going to have problems with that water.

You will easily grow back your moneys worth, with an RO machine.
$100-200 on ebay.

 

[Nastydroaste]

Well.... That is why i ordered flora hard water micro, It is supposed to be used if you are using tap water that is hard or over 300 ppm so you dont burn your plants. It has accounts for the calcium already in regular tap or high ppm water. I did have a practice bag seed grow with water well over 700 ppm in a dwc, and it grew just fine and healthy for about a month until i cut it down about 2 days ago(got pics). I live by the ocean so i guess that is the reason for my water being so hard, but from my experience with my bag seed, and using the regular micro, i would think I would be ok.

 

[Nastydroaste]

forgot to mention, I cant really use the sink or bring in alot of water from jugs, I have to be discrete and use a water hose from outside that conveniently reaches my setup of 2 18 gallon reservoirs.

 

[Nastydroaste]

Here is my practice grow with a small cfl, probly not even 500 lumens and 700 ppm water at about 31 days or so of veg ( 12 gallon reservoir). The reason it is so small is because the light of course, but it was only to get a feel for the dwc. I didnt use a ppm meter for nutes I just used tsp measurements with regular micro along with gro and bloom of course.

 

[Mr Green Man]

cool.

I didn't start having rpoblems untill the 3rd week of flowing though, when the plants really started using high nute levels. But maybe you will be okay with your hard water formular.

Good luck

 

[Earl]

You can put a waterhose connection on your RO unit
and hook it up when you need to run some.

I keep a seperate 50gl rez just for RO.

Your hard water nutes will work OK
until the 5th week of flower
and then you will get a lot of Mg lock indication on the fan leaves.

The plant will live until you harvest it,
but bud yield will be reduced.

RO makes things easy for the hydro grower.

Of-course if you switch to RO,
then you will need regular hydro nutes,
or you will experience Ca deficiency.

I grew with 300ppm water for a couple of years,
but I'll never go back.

You'll do OK with it, I did.
But I went nuke-u-ler with RO.

The best reason to go RO is the money you save on pH down.

With RO, you can get the pH stabilized,

With tapwater, when you get the pH stable,
it is time to change it out.*

With RO you use drops of pH down,
with tapwater you use milliliters.

All that pH down, has a bad effect on the plant also.

You will eventually switch to RO,
once you decide to become a serious hydro grower.

* see the pH rule.
CC Hydro 101 by Earl - Cannabis Culture Forums

Good luck.
.

 

[Nastydroaste]

I was actually thinking about leaving the 10 plants in my dwc setup until i can tell sex, then transfer them to their own 5 gallon buckets. I would hopefully end up with around 4 or 5 females. Then i could use the ro water as it would be alot easier to get a couple 5 gallon jugs of water than 36 gallons I currently have. I do have regular micro too, so wont have to buy that. I wanted to get an ro filter but I have kinda gone over budget allready. Ive spent about 500 bones on the stuff i have right now, and i still want to buy another 400 hps. So for now i hope i will be ok.

 

[Nastydroaste]

Or....... Should i buy an ro filter, or the 400 hps? What do you think

 

[Mr Green Man]

hmm, probably the RO,

Sounds like you will get more smoke per plant, that means things are running more efficent that means you will save/make more money and get into less truoble if, god forbid, some one bad finds you crop.

My 2 cent.

AS for starting Ten in a DWC system, and then transfering to indervidule pots, be carfule the roots don't get all tangled up.

 

[Nastydroaste]

hmm, probably the RO,

Sounds like you will get more smoke per plant, that means things are running more efficent that means you will save/make more money and get into less truoble if, god forbid, some one bad finds you crop.

My 2 cent.

AS for starting Ten in a DWC system, and then transfering to indervidule pots, be carfule the roots don't get all tangled up.

Does having two 400w lights get you in more trouble than one or does it make it more suspicious? Yea i am stuck now between the two. I was thinking that another 400w light would double my yield when i start to flower but if you all think its not worth it maybe i should just by the osmosis filter. Thanks for your opinion, anybody feel free to tell me what you think. Any experience?

 

[Earl]

Get the RO, and grow under the single light, until next time,
then add more light.

.

 

[Nastydroaste]

well you all convinced me, i will get the ro filter. There is one on ebay for under 100 dollars that hooks up to a hose, ill probly get it next week or so.

 

[Nastydroaste]

Just bought it!! lol

 

[Earl]

Now you need to make a RO rez, with a float valve.

This tub has about 35gl of RO.
It takes about 10 hours to fill.

This animal through float valve was kind of expensive,
but comes with a water hose connector.

These type of valves are cheaper.

But then you will need an adapter to hook up the water hose,
and that will raise the price.


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