simple DTW with osmocote+ and plain tap water

I wanted to share a simple system I cooked up that is working great for my moms and that I'll soon test in my other cab. I don't have a lot of time to spend gardening, so I tend to look for easy,low maintenance solutions. That's what drew me to looking into OC+ and other CRFs. Anyway, here's what I did. I bought a 3Gallon (I think it's 3G, may be 5G)tote with lid. I'm using a tiny 69GPH pump, an air stone, some 1/2 black irrigation tube, some 1/4 black irrigation tube, various plastic bits (right angles and Ts). I made 2 square felt smart pots (roughly 1G). I made a mix that was 1/2 washed Coco, and the other 1/2 was 3:1:1 of perlite, fullers earth, and peat moss. Long story as to how that mix came to be - the short version is that I knew I wanted Coco and peat to help me dial in my PH. My tap is PH 8+. I used some window screen (cheap roll from Wallyword) to make some screen pouches (roughly 5" long by 3" wide, then doubled over to make a pouch). I used a stapler to seal 2 sides, filled it with OC+ (3 or 4 TSP per pouch), then stapled it shut. So, my airstone runs 24/7, the pump kicks on 4 times a day for a few minutes each time. The pump pushes water up the 1/2 line, which has 2 1/4 lines tapped in, which each run to some home-made drip rings which sit on top of the coco/peat medium. Two screen pouches sit under each drip ring (one on either side of the circle), so that the water drips through the screen mesh to release some food into the medium. There are some holes drilled into the top of the lid so that any excess water drains right back into the water res below. I fill it with straight tap about once a week, I never PH, the healthy plants grow like crazy. I hope it all makes sense, I'll try and grab some pics sometime soon. I just wanted to share a system that is stupid easy to maintain. I hope it performs as well for my flowering cabinet as it does for the moms, but I see no reason to not be optimistic about the outcome.

Interesting - i like the DIY screen pots especially.

I've often wondered about slow release fertilisers like osmicote - I have a bunch of different ones around here for house plants. The issue I see if giving the plants a flush - the nutrient source will still be releasing food into your medium. But then if it's a slow release food that's a couple of months and not too high a level it might not be a bad issue all things considered. From an organics perspective I've always been skeptical of the claimed ability of growers to halt soil activity anyway. Interesting!


Definitely perfect for mums - gonna give some a go soon.

i reduced to 1 feeding a day just to slow the growth of the moms. I'm going to use this system for my photoperiod test grows as well using a 3 gallon bucket as the water reservoir.

i use those fabric reusable shopping bags as air pots, but i put them inside of white plastic 4gal buckets that i put 2" holes all over, to help with rigidity/not moving rootball
the pots are on top of an air hockey type table called an air floor, that has the intake sucking under it and pulling air up through the root masses

I've now tested this in flower - only problem I hit was that I needed to supplement for cal/mag in flower. I'm in the process of converting everything I have over to this just-add-water setup.

Very nice DIY. You can make it even easier. I've been using CRF's for several yrs now. OC+ is perfect for mothers and long veg periods. It will feed real well for a full 4 months and even longer. Now instead of the pouches, just blend it into the medium. For flowering I use OC 14-14-14, it has a shorter life span and will be consumed in 7 to 8wks.
I look forward to seeing your flowering set-up.

WattSaver said:

Very nice DIY. You can make it even easier. I've been using CRF's for several yrs now. OC+ is perfect for mothers and long veg periods. It will feed real well for a full 4 months and even longer. Now instead of the pouches, just blend it into the medium. For flowering I use OC 14-14-14, it has a shorter life span and will be consumed in 7 to 8wks.
I look forward to seeing your flowering set-up.

Click to expand...

glad to hear from you - your grows and comments on the various boards were significant in my decision to try out OC+. One of the reasons I kept the CRFs in pouches is so I could see how they degrade over time, and add if needed. I've been working toward creating a stupid simple system that just about anyone could use to grow their own medicine. Just-add-water (without ph'ing) was the primary hurdle I've been working to solve. The other thing I've been working toward and testing is using 730nm lighting to try reduced photoperiod cycles in order to speed up flowering. The jury is still out on that one as to how short of a cycle I can make work - 3on/9off didn't work, now testing 4on/11off here.