starting hydropnic nutrients

Hello fellow growers I am getting ready to germinate my Big bud seeds. I am going to use a drip system in 1 1/2" rock wool cubes? my question is do I water the plants with nutes from the start or do I only use water for the start. If so how long? any help will be much appreciated.

About to start a bubbler grow and from my research you should:

1st Week: Use water only
2nd Week: 250 ppm
3rd Week: 350-400 ppm
4th Week: 500+ ppm

This is what I've researched and will be implementing into my bubbler system once I recieve some Jock Horror seeds. Strongly reccomend ph & ec testers.

Hope this helps you. Have fun growing!

Thanks for the info man. I got both of those 2day in the mail so im set to go there. Are you starting with distilled water? I did the ph and ppm for my tap and it was 450ppm and 9.3. Makes me wonder if this shit is good to drink
I'm going to start with dutch master gold with Cal mag and distilled water. what about you?

any one else with some advice?

I'm going to use distilled water also. I got some technaflora nutrients from the hydro shop that came in a kit.

this is what i have heard

you can use half strength for the first 2-3 weeks after that its full strength nutes

happy to help

Thanks for the help what water would you say is the best to use.

pigpen said:

Thanks for the help what water would you say is the best to use.

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Ro is the best water to use

really I heard distilled is where it is at? Can you educate me on why RO is better BK? I will go with what ever one is better for my plants? any one that can help with this please feel free

RO is cheaper. perhaps not the initial outlay for a filter but buying gallons of distilled water, especially for a hydro system, will add up very fast.

your water is terrible - you should take it to your municipality for testing since i think that is pushing (or already exceeds) the upper limit of allowable TDS.

Keep in mind you have to include the water's PPM without nutes - so you couldn't add nutrients to you water until the plants were ready to exceed 450+ PPM! yikes!

Yeah thats a scary thought man no way in hell I am going to go with my tap water. Is there any way I can get RO water without getting the filter. I heard a rumor that walmart carries it so you can bring your own bucket and fill it up. Can any one confirm this with me?

pigpen said:

Yeah thats a scary thought man no way in hell I am going to go with my tap water. Is there any way I can get RO water without getting the filter. I heard a rumor that walmart carries it so you can bring your own bucket and fill it up. Can any one confirm this with me?

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You can go to a supermarket and get drinking water i guess - i think that is what you're describing. Go get a gallon and pH/PPM it and see.

Give it a try.

RO is a great investment - especially with hydro. How many gallons is your reservoir? Figure you have to change it at least once every two weeks throughout the grow (or use the equivalent). Figure 4 weeks veg, 8-10 weeks flower and a week for a flush - that's 13-15 weeks. That's about 6 or 7 reservoir changes. If you have a 10 gallon reservoir - that's 70 gallons of water. And if you have a 20 gallon res and change it out every week (like me) then you're looking at significantly more.

You can do the math and figure if it is worth saving up for.

Never thought of it like that man I am going to use a 20 gal res to. Is it needed to change every week or is every other week?

pigpen said:

Never thought of it like that man I am going to use a 20 gal res to. Is it needed to change every week or is every other week?

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your system instructions should make recommendations for that. I end up changing mine - on average over the course of a grow - probably once a week. But not every week - like when they are seedlings - i probably won't change out the res - just add to it for a few weeks. But when they get bigger and start drinking more - then i'll start changing it out more often.

good to know man thanks for the advice

i personally think that distilled or RO water is best