help with nutes

I have read quite a few books watched a few movies and had an okay amount of first hand experience but one thing that has eluded me is something that explains n-p-k ratios..... i dont understand exactly what each does how they work with eachother when to use them or anything like that... well i understand how to feel out my teas for the right ratios or follow directions on a bottle but i want to understand the why and how of nutrients. i think of growing as a science not an art and i am really having a tough time figuring this out any help will be greatly appreciated. (p.s im not a noob grower i just prefer trolling lol)

Dont quote me but i know roughly how the ratios work for me at least. its different with all plants.

during veg they need more N than anything barely any K and a little P

this is for building the fan leaves so your plant can establish itself and its roots. its basically like setting up the lungs and skeleton of the plant.

The average ratio i use of npk is 2-1-1

Then as you switch into flowering or after the plants show sex maybe a week prior to flipping to 12/12 you want to bump up the P bump up the K and keep the N the same

The ratio i use is of npk is 2-3-2

I only do this for the first week before flower until 2 weeks into flower. This is because your plant is switching to growing branches to produce buds on.

They use the N and P more in this stage because they are still building small amounts of leaves and alot of the branches. K is kept the same as N because it will be sucking it up shortly.

This is where people who run the Lucas Formula(only micro and bloom nutes) tend to see deficiency in N

Then after the first 2 weeks of flowering you switch to a 1-2-3 or 0-3-3.

At this point your leaves no longer grow much and its all focusing on the buds and the tiny bit of stretching left so make sure to keep the P and K up!

So a rough breakdown. Nitrogen is for growing fan leaves and vertical growth. Phosphorus helps grow the branches for the buds. (K) Potassium helps grow the bud calyx and seeds (if pollinated)

hope this helped!

Your supposed to drop your nitrogen levels completely during flower, or it leaves for small buds :O