Organic Nutrients & PPM

Hey guys, I am running FOOP by FOOP Organic Biosciences. I ordered this stuff mid-June and it sat for 3-4 weeks before I started using it, stored in a cool dark place. I just started feeding for veg a little over 2 weeks ago, so about a month after ordering. Anyway, I have been putting in the recommended ml/gal of nutes, but my ppm is always low, like almost half of what it should be. I am going by the week 2 veg recommendations which is 26 ml of Veg A and Veg B per gallon, and should check out to be 700ppm. After mixing it's only 400ppm. This happened last time as well but I didn't want to add more just in case my meter was off. I just calibrated the meter before this last batch and still showing up like 50% of the ppm... I only ordered the starter kit to run on these 6 plants, which should have been plenty, but now I don't know if I am going to have enough of the veg nutes to make it until I flip... Anyone seen anything like this before? and if anyone else out there is using FOOP, it would be great to get some first-hand comparisons. I messaged them today asking what's up, haven't heard back yet. Thanks!

For reference: https://thefoop.com/products/foop-starter-pack

So just heard back from them on IG.



I don't know much because I'm still a noob to both cannabis and farming/cultivation in general, but does this sound legit? Are there cases where ppm is irrelevant? Now that I'm thinking, this grean bicycles tea doesnt say anything about ppm, just mix x amount per gal, aerate, and then feed.

So, after a bunch more research and pondering, I guess organic nutes dont work like synthetic nutes. Measuring ppm in liquid form is irrelevant, because there are parts of the formula that dont become activated until they're in the soil. Even testing the soil can be misinterpreting because it would depend on how long they've been in the soil, if they've become activated, and if the plant has absorbed them, etc. Essentially it seems pointless to measure ppm unless the nutrient manufacturer gives you a number for testing that refers to the ppm in liquid form, but why bother as that number would be insignificant anyway... and if you follow ml/gal chart, then essentially you would know that what your adding is the desired amount. So with that being said, measuring ppm in organic nutrient formulas is pointless, because that number is going to change over the course of its availability in the soil. Interesting.

Just bumping this, hoping for a little feedback and to get a conversation going

with the organic stuff.. usually you just follow the recommended amount per gallon. They are right, just said it in a way that was very generalized..
Follow the directions..

Theghosty said:

with the organic stuff.. usually you just follow the recommended amount per gallon. They are right, just said it in a way that was very generalized..
Follow the directions..

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The more that you know. lol. I just assumed that I was to measure after adding nutes to confirm the ppm. There is nothing on the bottle that really clarifies. Glad they're going to take it off so another dumbass like myself doesn't make assumptions.

you did the right thing..

The ppm's could be lower with this because its chalked full of mycorrhizaes and microbes. All that buffer in your root zone uptakes the nutrients more efficiently. So you can get away with feeding lighter.

Doomboy15 said:

The ppm's could be lower with this because its chalked full of mycorrhizaes and microbes. All that buffer in your root zone uptakes the nutrients more efficiently. So you can get away with feeding lighter.

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PPMs are irrelevant in organic gardening. Seems like the OP figured this out some time last year.

This may be irrelevant but I’d like to put some fuel to the fire of confusion over ppms in Foop nutes. I’ve been using them for almost a year now and there was a point where I had to remove a couple of plants due to them being herms. I might add that I re-use the coco I grow in, having said that in the grow after that my plants seem to struggle a lot in the early stages of veg. I ended up finding out the ppms of the water coming out of my pots were over 4K where as my foop mixture going in was in the 800 range. Ended up flushing the coco ALOT till ppms were closer to what was going in and my plants exploded. Now I’m not absolutely sure why I had a huge built up in my coco but it essentially nute locked my medium and after I flushed my plants I haven’t had any problem since.