Never let the soil dry out completely?

Heil Tweetler said:

Bro,

I asked you a simple question, no need for melt down or a bumbling, confused and irrelevant rant.

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Well there is nothing bumbling or confused or irrelevant in what I wrote.

It seems you want to prove a point about ph that isn't true and doesn't apply.

I thought what I wrote might help you find the answers you are lookin for.

If not oh well. Your answer proves you don't want to learn anything. Just argue and post unrelated info.

Your question is not a yes or no answer. There is way more involved than the inaccurate ph chart that floats around the internet.

Adjusting ph is really a water culture or neutral soiless technique as the roots are always uptaking and certain elements lock each other out without a buffer like soil.

Sorry you think trying to explain soil ph is a rant. You are the one who asked the question.

Good luck.

blood from a turnip bro

Budget Buds said:

blood from a turnip bro

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Yeah. Usually is. But maybe someone will read it and benefit.

potheads are cra cra

Budget Buds said:

Letting the soil dry out makes the roots grow to search for water , It will give you a better root system, Lots of times I will wait until they start to barely wilt before watering them , Never had an issue doing so but I only have vegging plants in soil , Anything that is flowering is in a hydro system .

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How are you taking the plant in veg to flower and switching to hydro? I could probably find out by reading but I'm an instant gratification kind of guy lol. Just curious how your doing it.

I'm not really about the science of all this but letting my plants dry out to the point of wilting is not my ideal of a happy plant and have found it does set them back a bit even though yes they do bounce back quick. I grow in soil only outdoors and keeping the water moist but not dry is my preferred method. Keeping the soil loose and not letting it compact is a good thing . Last year was a bitch for watering and yup my plants suffered for it and I went through 150+ gallons a week for 15 plants. I've got 2 water tanks this year lol.

Budley Doright said:

How are you taking the plant in veg to flower and switching to hydro? I could probably find out by reading but I'm an instant gratification kind of guy lol. Just curious how your doing it.

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I take them out of soil by breaking the soil gently around the roots, then soak them (roots) in a bucket of water for a bit, then I rinse the remaining soil off of them and place them into a neoprene collar in one of my systems (ebb and flow/ aeroponic). It's not hard to do at all and by doing so cuts my maintenance down by 50% not having to monitor or service more hydro systems BB

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Budget Buds said:

I take them out of soil by breaking the soil gently around the roots, then soak them (roots) in a bucket of water for a bit, then I rinse the remaining soil off of them and place them into a neoprene collar in one of my systems (ebb and flow/ aeroponic). It's not hard to do at all and by doing so cuts my maintenance down by 50% not having to monitor or service more hydro systems BB

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Seems like more work actually but hey what ever works .

At the first seedling stage I water once every week or until dry after bout 3 weeks once I have a root system I water every 4-5 days keeping the soil damp no wet but damp I'll continue this for another 3 weeks once in flower I'll water once every 2-3 days as I have more roots then soil

I generally let the soil dry out as much as possible without letting the plant wilt. My understanding is that the roots need air to be healthiest, and as others have said, will grow more vigorously searching for water. That's why you want lose, non-compacted soil (with plenty of perlite). In the wild, cannabis prefers sandy soil, that's why we use lots of perlite. It's too difficult to get the good drainage with sand - much easier to get it right with perlite.

Watering is trickier when the plant is smallest (because there's less margin for error), especially in big pots. When I initially transplant my seedling into 5gal buckets, I will not saturate water, because they will need to be rewatered before the bottom soil is anywhere near ready. I just water near the seedling. I use a combination of poking my finger in the soil, and lifting the pot checking for weight. I check my plants every day, sometimes several times.

In my experience, a regular schedule for watering is a horrible idea. There are just too many variables. For inexperienced growers, err on the 'too little' side until your thumb turns green, for both watering and fertilizing. Generally, do not let them wilt, but it may be worth it to really delay watering once as an experiment. When you think you need to water - don't. Just eyeball them for a few hours or day or two, watching for wilt. This will give you a conformation that your estimates are correct.

Perimeter watering is of no use. You want an even distribution without disturbing the top soil too much. Flood until just before water will seep out the bottom, which takes some trial and error, too. I usually put a layer of perlite or gravel on the bottom of the pot to prevent over saturation of soil at the bottom (before the roots get down there). It's not really necessary, but increases the error margin somewhat.

I grew Red Diesel once and then crossed with a Blue Dream. I must say Red Diesel and the offspring all required the soil to dry out a bit. They hated wet feet. Grew some Maui once and it was the opposite. Make sense when you trace back the gene pool.

I will add to this thread to anyone who views it for knowledge gain, as I did originally.
The idea of having too little oxygen is mitigated quite well when one uses the typical light and airy soil mixes that are common in the cannabis community. These soil builds by their very nature are nearly impossible to over water, unless your drenching them daily which is only ever needed in hot climates in the middle of summer or when the plant is too big for its pot. Heck most mixes now have either coco or peat moss in them along with perlite and/or pumice to keep things from compacting much at all.

In the opinions of most members on growing sites like this one and the farmer, I "over watered" my first run of cannabis being I only let the top go dry, maybe 1/2" deep, but my root growth never slowed for a moment and each time I would repot, every plant was nearly root bound even though try to not let that happen and do a fairly good job usually.. they just filled out their pots faster than hell. And turns out they were searching hard and fast for nutrients as I went light on my dosage the first time around (organic growing).

cannabis is a very fast growing plant, it doesn't take long at all to fill out even a 10 gal pot. Heck some organic growers use 30gal pots just so they can stretch the veg cycle properly to more closely mimic an outdoor grow.
As I'm sure anyone here knows, outdoor grows get absolutely huge compared to indoor of the same strain. Certainly more than 3-4 times the size of typical indoor grows,veven though that's the difference in time we are talking about.

Any good gardener should know how saturated a soil should be/feel after watering. It's not hard to see if the soil is breathing well or not. Heck, I literally hear bubbles popping and crackling when I water my plants and that's the sound of oxygen exchanging throughout the medium. It's a lovely sound I must say...