Constant Ph battle...

so, this is my first hydro grow. built a little 4 gallon, 2 plant system. it's been up and running a week and a half. i can't seem to get the water to stabilize. every day the ph creeps up. started at 5.7 on day one. day two it was 6.1. lowered it to 5.7. day 3 up to 5.9. lowered it again. day 4 (yesterday) 5.8. left it alone. today, back up to 5.9. is this pretty normal??

ya depending on medium and nutes a small pH change like that is normal. i changed over to COCO in my ebb and flow buckets and have a much more stable PH over 7 days it will change AT MOST .2 up so from 5.8 to 6.0

what kinda food u use? i use advanced and never check my ph.

You don't need a bigger res but you want a bigger res.

First of all, you just want to keep your pH within a range of 5.5-6.5

Don't adjust it unless you go out of that range.

When you mix up the nutes the first time, and they are in range, leave them there until they go out of range. Then adjust down to 5.5-5.8

You are most certainly trying too hard.
Mix up a fresh batch of nutes and manage the pH better.

agree with above but tbh if the plants are happy i dont even test the ph it will only give you a headache.

Fry is assuming your plants can't be MORE happy.

Res is abit small (for me anyways. Thats really not a bad PH swing at all but I would get a bigger res, your plants will thank you.

Use the res you got and just add another tote where it recirculates cuz I had the same problem and added a tote and couple pieces of PVC and another air stone should be under $20...

As others allready correctly pointed out your ph is normal,quit chasing it like you are,the rule of thumb setting of 5.8 is a meaningless number,for some plants its the optimul spot,for other plants a ph value of 5.4 would be optimul,and yet another strain ot plants might prefer a ph value of 6.7,much depends on the plants.

Try & remember that ph values of 5.5 to 6.5 are only an industry guideline,used as a rough starting point,most plants can easily handel ph values of 4.5 up to 7.5 for short periods without any damage,this is like one day or so,all nutrients have different prime absorbtion rates as well,for example one nutrient might be best utilized at a ph of 4.0 while another nutrient is in its optimum absorbtion range at 8.0,common sense tells us we cant let the ph get that far out of range beacuse it will fry the plants,but by letting the ph float around within acceptabel ranges the plants benifit from being able to absorb nutrients more efficiently.

Just let it ride for a few days without any adjustment,as long as it stays within 5.5 to 6.5 dont adjust,after a few days you will see the rate of climb slow down,at that point only pull it back in if it goes out of range & then only just enough to be at acceptable range,dont pull it all the way back down to 5.5.

I allow my gardens ph to go as low as 4.9 & as high as 7.1,as long as the ph is not moving any further in the wrong direction i dont fuck with it at all,after a few days the plants level the ph climb off & settle in where they prefer the ph to be at.

Right now my sour deisel plants want to be at 6.6 & thats where i leave them & their fat n happy,dont chase the ph.

Larger the res the easier it is to maintain temp and ph. Tho 4 gallons will work, it will also take more work to maintain it.

I use a 37.5 gallon res for 9 -12 plants and have few if any ph issues.

If you use tap water - get some rain water and life will be sweet. My tap water is very hard (and high ph) and i only use it to adjust ph up.
Get as big a res you can to make it more stable.

Start up with fresh rain water. Mix in the nutes and let it rest for some hours. Then meassure ph and adjust the water. Do this again if necessary and it will stabilize. When i use tap water i will continue this fight for a long time - with rain water it's stable after 1 day and i only need to put in a bucket of tap water every week or so to keep ph. (and off course add some nutes every now and then) Never change it - just putting new water in and it's all clean and nice. (Remember to add plenty of bubbles to keep water moving and fresh)

How much water they're drinking up will affect things too, there is some rule of thumb for plant size to gallons I've seen.
PANHEAD empty your mailbox already

I had the same issue when I first started in the hydro grows with a waterfarm system.
My tap water has a natural.

PH: 7.0
PPM: 215
EC: 410

I would soak the hydrotron in water with a PH of 5.5 for 2 days and even got so desperate at one point I even boiled the hydrotron in water of a PH of 5.5. But know matter what when I put the water that was from the tap and made the PH 5.5 with GH "PH Down" in the waterfarm without fail within a day it would shoot up to 6.5 - 6.9. So, what I did was get my two 1 gallon milk jugs and put the only thing I use in my hydro grows from start to finish which is GH FloraNova Bloom in to the PPM that is required for the stage of the grow im in at the time. I would then take a reading of the jug after the nutes were in to see PH and PPM levels and adjusted the PH to 5.0 with GH PH Down. "NOT RECOMMENDED" but work nicely for me and still does. When I would pour the water in the waterfarm after the first day the PH would climb up again but would climb to 5.6 - 5.9 and the water stays consistent in that range. I found that the easiest best yeilding and all around great smoke grows are the ones you make the simpliest. Yes, I use only one nute always had great yields and great smoke. KISS "Keep It Simple Stupid" is what my breeder told me. Oh, and when my bean germinates and goes into the waterfarm I NEVER NEVER use anything but tap water. No PH Down No Nutes. I have killed to many plants within the first week using PH Down instead of using my tap water the first week and PH Down and very Very light nutes the second.

PH Levels will make you go down the rabbit hole chasing it and trying everything but as long as your plants like it who cares where you PH level is. As, it was said earlier certian strains like high PH and certain ones like lower PH. Just try to find an easy method that works for you to keep the PH close to range.

If your Ph is going up your food is not strong enough. Don't chase Ph 5.4 to 6.2 is fine. Go to a few manufacture sites and do some reading on what they recommend. Dutch Master, Cana ect.

cephalopod said:

How much water they're drinking up will affect things too, there is some rule of thumb for plant size to gallons I've seen.
PANHEAD empty your mailbox already

Click to expand...

Hey bud,sorry bout the mailbox,i got behind on pm's z bit over the last few weeks,im still trying to catch up,have a wedding today & most likely i will end up getting smoked straight the hell out

Ive got room now in the mailbox but it might still take me a day or two to catch up on all the mail,im also trying to study the new moderator user control functions that all us new mods are supposed to be familiar with but i will get everybody answered this week.

my 2 cents
1) to small of a res
2) water temps are prob up to high breeding bad bactiria and causeing your ph to swing up faster than it should.
3) set your ph at 5.6 and dont touch it till it gets to 6.0
4) 1 1/2 weeks on a res that small hmm I feel you should change it every week.

I'm with hellraizer, sounds like you need to use some H2O2 or something to get rid of the bad stuff in your water.

I use a 2 gallonj tote, sometimes to 3 plants, and I've never had that bad of a fluctuation with ph... the nutes I use keep things in check... it stays stable even if I go some time without changing the res... when they are flowering they drink alot of water though, so I have to off, and adjust daly...

Oh man. I think you might be right. That might be my problem with my res. I stay a high degree of water all the time causing bactieria. Im going thru a bad PH battle right now and my plants suffering. Im going to pick up a bottle tommorrow and see if I could stabilize this damn PH. Thanx bro.