I decided to flush my ladies today. I flush with city water & use my garden hose. At this point in the grow I've stopped using distilled water on them anyway. I took some photos before the flush so they aren't droopy.
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It's funny I didn't realize how fast they have grown until I looked back over my journal. I hate the wait. I haven't had truly killer pot in some time.
I've noticed the leaves are starting to develop a few trichs. I'm hope I don't have to spray them again but I will if the gnats become a big problem. I've only been spraying the ones on the sand in the flower room & have avoided the plants. There seems to be fewer everyday. I hope before I harvest these ladies the problem is cured.
Sand on top is not a great idea. I just wonder how much if any it filters out my nutes from the water. If I still have a gnat problem in a few weeks I'll pick up some small rocks to spread out on top of my plants in the veg room.
I threw out what I had left of my soil mix. I cleaned my tub & sprayed it down with a pyrethrin mix. I let it dry out for a few days. This time I mix the soil my self instead of buying some organic potting mix.
60 lbs top soil
40 lbs mushroom compost
30 lbs soil conditioner
16 liters perlite
8 liters vermiculite
I didn't measure the peat moss, I probably put about 3/4 cf
I got the basic soil consistency the way I wanted before I added the good stuff.
1 1/4 cups blood meal
1 1/4 cups blood meal
1 1/2 cup dolomite lime
1 1/2 cup of aluminum sulphate
1 TBS muriate of potash
1 TBS copperas
I let everything sit over night then I pH ed. It was 7 so I added a little more aluminum sulphate to bring it down to 6.7. I like to hit 6.8 but I used all my aluminum sulphate so I didn't want to go over.
The list above is the final mix I started out with less of of a few things but added more to get the everything right, or at least I hope better than the last soil.