Fox Farms OF + cal/mag problems?

What can I add (organic) to a bag of Fox Farms OF to help with Cal/Mag probs without jacking the pH of the soil all up? Week 3 of flowering + is brutal on me...

Well, dolomitic limestone will contribute calcium and magnesium, but it will raise the pH also of course. Typically this isn't a big deal at all, it just means you probably wont have to worry about pH at all for quite a while. Even around 7 or slightly higher is still an appropriate pH- you'd really have to over do it with the dolomite to cause any problems. Bone meal contains significant amounts of calcium, as does gypsum (calcium sulfate) and earthworm castings contain some calcium and magnesium. Epsom salts is magnesium sulfate and a number of growers use it in their soils and for foliar applications.

OF does not have the nutes to support a plant in flower. At 6" into veg. I assume all the nutes have been used.

what can be added and in what ratios/per bag to give OF the nutes to support a plant in flower I guess is the question then? without throwing off the pH. OF is already balanced w/added lime and I have tried adding bone meal/greensand to OF in the past with no noticeable difference. It just seems the same thing happens every time. Lush and green through veg... come week 2-3 of flowering and all bloody hell breaks loose. I do not feed with nutes just water plain water and occasionally w/added molasses ~ Maxicrop liquid kelp ~ Neptunes harvest. Feeding with something like Fox Farms Tiger Bloom is not organic and added salts etc. are anti-micro life so? Is it possible to get through a just add water grow without chemical ferts or not?? I tried the Super Soil Mix and the ratios are for such a large quantity at once mixing up a 1 bag batch was next to impossible based on the recipe from High Times... any help would be much appreciated rollitup and thanx!

Are you counting on the lime (actually oyster shell flour), that was in the OF, or, did you add some?

The problem is, they don't add enough, it gets consumed, and when the plants really start sucking up the Cal/Mag in flower, it's not there. Seems to last ~6 weeks or so before it's consumed/depleted.

Get some dolomite lime and top dress with it to solve the problem. It won't screw up your pH. It has a pH of 7 and will not go above that. If you check now, I would bet your pH has dropped a good bit since the liming agent has been depleted.

Wet

wetdog thank you for the wisdom. I do not add any lime. I have been afraid of adding to much thinking it was balanced in the mix already. When mixing at the start how much would you add say per/gal of container size and would you add epsom salts to it as well? What I do is go with Light Warrior for seedlings in solo cups till 3rd node transplant to 3gals w/OF and as I like to LST they are in those pots for another few weeks tops. What you are saying is right on as a few weeks veg LST'ed and then transition ~ 2 weeks flowering puts me right there in the 6 week and depleted sitch. Transplanting during flowering is super sketchy but if you kept the stress down as much as possible would a week 3 flowering transplant be better in the long run to carry through the last month of flowering or will it do more harm than good?

IDK what to tell you about xplanting in flowering, I've never done it. Usually, I'll transplant to the final home about 2 weeks before the flip.

For the lime, I use 2tbl/gallon of mix, or 1cup/cf of mix. Top dress and regular watering will work it in. If you can 'scratch' it in the surface without disturbing roots, even better. Next time, add it to your mix before use.

One application should do the trick and give it a week or so to do its thing.

For the epsom salts, you can either lightly top dress, or add ~1tsp/gallon of water when you do a watering. I add it about every two weeks to once/month.

HTH

Wet

You can transplant in flower just to do it NOW and be gentle. If you know your container is too small your best bet is to just transplant; it isn't such a big deal, it just isn't ideal. If possible try to get some Espoma Bio-Tone Starter Plus (widely available a HD & Lowes) and/or an accompanying mycorrhizal product(e.g. Rooter's Mycorrhizae). It also doesn't hurt to use some liquid seaweed (Maxicrop) or similar in the water applied immediately after the transplant.

If you're using fresh OF I agree it would be prudent to add in some more lime for the final transplant. Oyster shell flour is calcium carbonate, with some trace minerals I would imagine, but no magnesium. Eggshell is calcium carbonate and some garden limes are primarily calcium carbonate. Dolomite lime is preferable since it contains magnesium (6% or more). There are also considerations for particle size as finer or micronized varieties of lime are faster acting and break down quicker in the soil whereas pulverized or pellets break down over time. That'd be something to thing about if you had a long flowering sativa or something otherwise what Wetdog recommended will generally be sufficient.

What wet says. Keep adding the kelp adds during watering and top dress dolo lime every two weeks, starting two weeks before flowering.

hey Batshitcrazy hows plant going now? getting better or same result ?

batshitcrazy said:

What can I add (organic) to a bag of Fox Farms OF to help with Cal/Mag probs without jacking the pH of the soil all up? Week 3 of flowering + is brutal on me...

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Mix in equal amount of Sulfur pellets(Espoma makes a great slow release) with Domalite lime
or mix 1/8th tsp of epsom salt in 1 gal water and feed or pre mix 1tbsp per gal of soil.
What are you putting in your FoxFarm OS soil?