plant keeps snapping small branches

i just started putting my plant in its scrog net but i have noticed the branches brake easily when i am trying to tuck them under the net
i have broken 3 small tops off already. all 3 are now clones so no waste

what do i add to my plants to stop this happening. i read silica is that correct ?? and if so how do i use it in dwc

callies said:

i just started putting my plant in its scrog net but i have noticed the branches brake easily when i am trying to tuck them under the net
i have broken 3 small tops off already. all 3 are now clones so no waste

what do i add to my plants to stop this happening. i read silica is that correct ?? and if so how do i use it in dwc

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yes silica should help i am not sure how to use it iin DWC but from what i've read in soil application is you MUST always add the silica to your water first then add your other nutrients because silica is supposed to raise your PH and thus it can basically lock out your nutrients. idk if this is true or what but i just do it to be safe. silica is nice i tried it for the first time on my current grow i have a pretty leggy plant and it just spread out completely due to no support during flowering. surprised nothing broke off. the kolas were literally touching the ground

Silica is supposed to increase turgidity, that is strengthen your stems.

Try to do training after watering your plants, they may be more bendy.


Lethidox is correct, always add Silica FIRST.

Hi Callie,
Try using supercropping type technique. Pinch and roll the branch a bit to "soften" it. I'm just learning manifold training and with some plants I have to do that .

And I'm not so sure silica will help. I thought it would make stronger stems which may translate into stiffer.
JD

Joint Monster said:

Silica is supposed to increase turgidity, that is strengthen your stems.

Try to do training after watering your plants, they may be more bendy.


Lethidox is correct, always add Silica FIRST.

Click to expand...

umm dwc

JohnDee said:

Hi Callie,
Try using supercropping type technique. Pinch and roll the branch a bit to "soften" it. I'm just learning manifold training and with some plants I have to do that .

And I'm not so sure silica will help. I thought it would make stronger stems which may translate into stiffer.
JD

Click to expand...

Lethidox said:

yes silica should help i am not sure how to use it iin DWC but from what i've read in soil application is you MUST always add the silica to your water first then add your other nutrients because silica is supposed to raise your PH and thus it can basically lock out your nutrients. idk if this is true or what but i just do it to be safe. silica is nice i tried it for the first time on my current grow i have a pretty leggy plant and it just spread out completely due to no support during flowering. surprised nothing broke off. the kolas were literally touching the ground

Click to expand...

yes its like calmag add it 1st to your rez apparently but i have no idea how using it in dwc works

callies said:

yes its like calmag add it 1st to your rez apparently but i have no idea how using it in dwc works

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you mean like measurement wise? or just mixing nute wise? nute wise i'd probably go silica, cal mag, rest. measurement wise can't help you there not familiar with DWC. you could always try googling how to run silica in DWC for some more information idk if this forum has a DWC specific forum i would assume so probably under hydroponics

JohnDee said:

Hi Callie,
Try using supercropping type technique. Pinch and roll the branch a bit to "soften" it. I'm just learning manifold training and with some plants I have to do that .

And I'm not so sure silica will help. I thought it would make stronger stems which may translate into stiffer.
JD

Click to expand...

i hate cropping my plants. i also hate lst although both are ok training technique and i normally do them in the past but i wont go back to doing that now. now i am trying a 2 stage scrog net
stiffer stems might relate to more braking but my last grow i had to use pliers to crop my stems due to them being to big and hard

Lethidox said:

you mean like measurement wise? or just mixing nute wise? nute wise i'd probably go silica, cal mag, rest. measurement wise can't help you there not familiar with DWC. you could always try googling how to run silica in DWC for some more information idk if this forum has a DWC specific forum i would assume so probably under hydroponics

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ill give that link a read kind of too much irrelevant information to read though though. all i really needed to know was does it increase your tds and do i use it the entire grow even in flower. hopefully ill find that information in the link

callies said:

ill give that link a read kind of too much irrelevant information to read though though. all i really needed to know was does it increase your tds and do i use it the entire grow even in flower. hopefully ill find that information in the link

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you can use it the entire grow but i'd start to back off towards the end of flowering where it shouldn't really be needed. i run AN silica which is called Rhino Skin it states to run it only in flowering i believe but from what i've read you can easily run it in veg but i stopped adding the silica towards the middle of flowering and i didn't run it as much as i think i should. i ran it maybe 6-7 times throughout the entire grow which has been almost 7 entire weeks now + veg in January. TDS i don't know

this is what i've found

Sadly, the one place silicon cannot be used to grow cannabis is when it is grown hydroponically. That is the reason that hydro-grown plants are a little weaker. The reason? In order for Silicon to stay soluble, it requires a pH higher than 7. As a result, it cannot be included in a normal hydroponic feed. It would interact negatively with the other elements and lead to nutrient deficiencies. The only kind of silicon you find in such feeds are an additive called Potassium Silicate.

https://www.cannabis.info/en/blog/growing-use-silicon

makes no sense to me tbh because i know the liquid silica's i use all state potassium silicate. unless they are referring to maybe powdered forms i really don't find any other info otherwise relating to TDS and silica use in DWC

found something a little more informational i guess

https://scienceinhydroponics.com/2010/08/silicon-in-hydroponics-what-silicon-is-good-for-and-how-it-should-be-used.html

How big is this plant you are trying to scrog, and why are the stems so big you can't gently bend them down under the screen. SCROGs are supposed to have the plant GROWN into the screen. I hate when I see guys grow a big plant and then smash a scrog screen onto it, or just put up trellising and call it a scrog. Also why would you want a 2 tier'd scrog? The point of the scrog is so the WHOLE screen is covered competely with canopy and budsites. Traditionally nearly all the growth underneath is removed to allow proper air flow.

Thundercat said:

How big is this plant you are trying to scrog, and why are the stems so big you can't gently bend them down under the screen. SCROGs are supposed to have the plant GROWN into the screen. I hate when I see guys grow a big plant and then smash a scrog screen onto it, or just put up trellising and call it a scrog. Also why would you want a 2 tier'd scrog? The point of the scrog is so the WHOLE screen is covered competely with canopy and budsites. Traditionally nearly all the growth underneath is removed to allow proper air flow.

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ive done both and i way i prefer smashing the plant in to the net once the plant is already big and bushy then go right in to flower but with my new setup i cant do that so i am growing the plant in to the net. i am finding it annoying to pull heads down with out snapping them. plant is pretty small doing a cupboard grow this time round over my tent. its a strain ive never grown so maybe its just the genetics are more fragile then im use to although that just sounds retarded to me.
im about to take it out of the net and re do it plus change my rez to a bigger one. im thinking maybe my net its to low but i was planing to put up two nets so i dont have to mess around with lst to space the plant out. im thinking that might not work so ill scrap the 1st net (the current one up) and put a new one a foot higher

I use rhino skin at 2mls per litre. It can throw your ph out aparrently. So add it first before adding other nutes and ph'ing. I use ph perfect so dont have to worry about that side of things. Silica will strengthen cell walls making stems/stalks stronger and only takes a 2 or 3 days to notice the increase in strength from my experience. It also makes your plants more resistant to bugs!! Just dont use silica towards end of flowering. As for the scrog side of things, i put big plants straight under scrog when i flip and train for the next 10 days. No problems doing it that way!!

Heres an example. Plant about to go under scrog in flower room.

This will fill the entire space nicely. In my make do scrog haha.

You guys can grow your plants however you want I'm not trying to say its "wrong", but smashing a plant into a scrog just isn't the most effective use of the scrog method. At that point you have grown a big plant and your mostly using the screen as support. If you grow your plant into the scrog screen then you ONLY veg as much plant as you really need to. You want all your buds at or above the screen so why veg out tons of plant under the screen? I saw pictures of a garden on IG today where the guy had plants woven into a screen 2.5-3 feet above the pots. Nothing but mostly bare stems below the screen.

Well if your growing it in and the plant is small, I really don't know why you are snapping stems. New growth tips should be pretty flexible and you shouldn't be bending more then an inch or 2 at a time really. Gently giving the stem a slight press and twist before you bend might help loosen the cell walls a little and make it smoother.

Real SCROGs aren't just about supporting your branches they are about defined canopy control. I'm sorry Hydro, but that last picture is NOT a scrog. That is you using those ropes to support your branches. Scrogs have screens that the plants are woven and grown into.

Veg time was a little longer on these two but yielded just over 2 pounds under 2 600w hps. Nothin wrong with bending a big plant under a scrog at start of flowering callies!