soil grow.. "To Ph runoff or not to Ph runoff.. And Go!! lol

seems to me as a "newbie" the forums contain a lot of contradicting information.. and due to this ive decided that hydro is by far the "easiest" way to start growing.. seemed daunting at first but after dealing with the soil aspect of growing I think it would be easier.. obviously the "ph testing probes" you buy are pieces of shit and cannot give you a real idea of your "growing mediums" ph... which seems to be the determining factor in whether your plants absorbs the nutrients it needs.. to me logically speaking I would think the roots absorb water not soil therefore the ph of the water you are using is much more important than the ph of your "growing medium"... but still I see thread after thread stating one should test the "runoff" water from their planters... then I see comment after comment about how it doesn't mean jack shit.. and the second seems logical to me but the amount of information about people gathering runoff for ph testing is abundant... so as I said in my title... "To Ph Runoff or not to Ph Runoff"??

The ph of the soil is as important as the ph of the water. After feeding with nutrients the plant will only take what it needs it can actualy take only the water in a nutrient mix if it wants,, leaving behind salts, witch can play with ph ,The average ph of tap water is fine with cannabis but soil ph can vary greatly.. If you buy cheap weady soil you have mor chances of having problems

It's something I'm looking in to in more detail now too.

https://www.rollitup.org/t/ph-of-runoff-in-soil-grow.544387/

http://www.growweedeasy.com/ph

http://www.kindgreenbuds.com/marijuana-grow-guide/measuring-the-ph-of-soil-soilless-runoff/

https://www.420magazine.com/forums/frequently-asked-questions/184554-measure-ph-directly-soil-run-off-water.html

It's widely debated. My view atm is that it's beneficial to test run off and adjust pH to prevent any lockouts. A plant might not show deficiency's but that doesn't mean it couldn't do better if the pH was in the correct range. Still learning though so it's something I've yet to experience. I'll be buying a pH kit for the next grow or the one after. I want to get a fairly good one so need to save some money.

Easiest way to grow? Take a 5 gallon bucket put in a air stone and a netpot , add floranova and light.

Ph'ing runoff isn't really necessary Put good water in and dont over use the snake oils

I haven't Ph'd with soil in years.

superbak3d said:

I haven't Ph'd with soil in years.

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Do you change soils and nutrients or have you been using the same ones and just got it all dialled in so you don't have to?

pHing your runoff tells you nothing, however measuring the ppms of the runoff can be useful when trying to diagnose issues

easy answer
Mobile and immobile nutrients
some can come out in the wash, some can't. so it tells you nothing really.

TopDogTHC said:

Do you change soils and nutrients or have you been using the same ones and just got it all dialled in so you don't have to?

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No. I stay with the same stuff every round. I like consistency. I have a (i think) a pretty good system. I try to use as little fertilizer as possible and try to treat the soil with organics.

But even when I did ph, I often found (maybe just luck?) I never needed to make any adjustments. My ph was always in the optimal ranges so I just stopped checking it.

Nah just build a good soil blend and PH the water going into the planters. We buffer our soil so we don't have to check run off.

Run off ph Is mostly useless,unless you are running a full inert media like perlite. Even then it doesnt always tell the full story,Ive never bothered to check runoff ph.Run off ec is another matter and can be used is some circumstances to to check total nutrient load,however in soil its still pretty ~

I always check ph BEFORE I feed just because,when I was growing in soil.As I prefered not to stress the buffers in my soil.But thats just me.