K
Kelly.
,..
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Blumat auto watering
- Thread starter sunnydog
- Start date
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- blumat drippers irrigation watering
stealthnstoned
Member
Not in canada. Only one person selling blumat jr's for the last month. I cant find any blumat tropf's that ship to canada. Cant find any locally and cant find any online stores that ship here
I will get a link for you.Not in canada. Only one person selling blumat jr's for the last month. I cant find any blumat tropf's that ship to canada. Cant find any locally and cant find any online stores that ship here
Can't seem to find it right now.
SD
For purchasing the Blumat product line(s) in Canada - Rambridge owns the whole deal up north.
Big time.
In the USA the main importer/distributor is Tradewinds out of Sacramento, California.
HTH
CC
Big time.
In the USA the main importer/distributor is Tradewinds out of Sacramento, California.
HTH
CC
http://www.sustainablevillage.com/servlet/display/product/detail/41904
Not 100% sure, but when added to the cart, Canada is an option in the dropdown for shipping country.
Props on the thread btw everyone.. Ordered a couple of the box sets myself last week and look forward to getting them setup when they arrive.
Not 100% sure, but when added to the cart, Canada is an option in the dropdown for shipping country.
Props on the thread btw everyone.. Ordered a couple of the box sets myself last week and look forward to getting them setup when they arrive.
stealthnstoned
Member
Thanks! I'm gonna order some of these asap.. Do you guys think these are gonna be useable in 1 gallon round pots or grow bags? Or are those to small ?
Spanishwilly
Member
I think they'll work.
KindSmoker
Member
Ok,the time has come to make a move on the blumats,I just need to get a couple answers on how I should use them. First,how have you guys been feeding while using the blumats? I would prefer to stick with organic nutes but am leery of keeping those in a rez for multiple days and possibly clogging the lines with sludge buildup. Next,I am pretty devoted to using 7 gallon pots with a little longer veg time,the yields are much bigger than I ever got when using 3 or 5 gallon pots,would you guys run 1 or 2 units per pot? I would rather stay away from the extender drippers so I would use only the actual units. Lastly,I would probably run around 30 four foot plants off of a 55 gallon plastic barrel type rez,any estimates of how long this would last before needing to be refilled? Thanks for the help fellas!
Spanishwilly
Member
The organic nutes that I'm familiar with (BioSevia) would be crap in these drippers, I'm pretty sure.
I think two sensors per seven gallon pot would be good. I think just one Tropf Blumat "Maxi" would be good too.
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I am using smaller pots than that! Just dial them to desired moisture level...works great! But I would suggest using Smart Pots or Air Pots. My 2 gal Smart Pots grew some monster plants under a 400 watt HPS. They air prune the roots, so you can grow a much large plant in a much smaller container.
Also, I started using Drip Clean by H&G. This is to keep salts from building up, as I do not drip to run off. Stuff works really good. If you are using Coco, the GH 6/9 formula with some Kool Bloom seems to work very well...do not have to worry about clogging anything either. Good luck
I agree, no organic nutes through Blumats, that's just asking for a clog. Salts only, and preferably run a dead res (DM Zone, peroxide, Florakleen, whatever) and I still use drip clean to prevent buildup.
When a line clogs just pull the house out of the blumat and suck on it, and then spit!
Also, a set of 30 4' plants on a 55g res will take about a week to empty the res, mine drink about 4 inches a day off the barrel in flower.
When a line clogs just pull the house out of the blumat and suck on it, and then spit!
Also, a set of 30 4' plants on a 55g res will take about a week to empty the res, mine drink about 4 inches a day off the barrel in flower.
I grow organic, amendments up-front. Plain water in the reso.
This is the mix I used 2 gal pots, no trans- plant,
under intense light , set it and forget it soil formula that seems to be working awesome :
For approx. 1cu ft. of soil less mix-6 qts pro-mix, 2qts EWC, 2qts perlite
1 tbs.per gal Liquid Karma /for wetting
1 tbs.per gal molassess /for wetting
3/4 cup blood meal
3/4 cup Feather meal
3/4 cup fishbonemeal
3/4 cup Fish and crab meal
3/4 cup bone meal
3/4 cup kelp
3/4cup jersey green sand
3/4 cup alfalfa
3/4 cup Rock phosphate
1/2 cup langbeinite
1/4 cup N bat guano
1/4 cup P bat guano
1 cup dolomite lime
SD
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I put Liquid Karma, Sweet, and PBP Bloom soil formula in my rez with a pond pump keeping everything stirred. I get an occasional gunking in the dripper tube from time to time. To keep that from happening, about once every two weeks I'll go around to each blumat to make sure all is clear. Just a little routine maintenance to keep them running smoothly.
KindSmoker
Member
Thanks for all the info guys,you have been very helpful! Lapides,could you give me a little more detail as to what kind of maintenance you are doing every 2 weeks with your units while running that organic mix through them? Also,does your rez get a rotten smell to it when you leave all that organic fert in there for a week at a time? I have always thought that if you are going to use salt based nutrients in a soil like medium that it kind of defeats the purpose of growing in soil,why not just go full hydro? This is kind of why I am obsessed with finding out if I can run organics through these blumats.
You could use Blumats with Coco or even rockwool, but I wouldnt run organic nutes as the 2mm ID tubing is just too prone to clogs. Since there is very little pressure (just gravity feed) to allow water through, I wouldn't risk it. Even with salt nutes I have to fix a clogged line once a week (out of 100)
I go around to each the blumats, keep an eye on where they are set, then open them up an arrow or two, and flush out the lil soggy LK booger, if there is one.
I'm constantly adding new mix to the rez, so all the old shit goes to the plants and nothing gets stale or rotten or stinky.
It's getting later in the evening and I'm getting progressively more wasted, but I hope that made sense.
I'm constantly adding new mix to the rez, so all the old shit goes to the plants and nothing gets stale or rotten or stinky.
It's getting later in the evening and I'm getting progressively more wasted, but I hope that made sense.
KindSmoker
Member
Thanks again for the great feedback guys. Lapides,when you say you are "constantly" adding new mix to the rez,do you mean on a daily basis or more like every other day? Also do you ever just use plain water in the rez to give the plants a little break from the constant flow of nutrient into the medium? Same question for you Lazyman,do you ever run for a few days with just plain water? I suppose I could just water by hand once a week with a heavy dose of organic nutrient and just run plain water in the blumat rez,just not sure if one heavy organic feeding a week would be enough for my ladies.
Yeah when I do a res change (which is honestly about every 3-4 weeks) I dump the res, close the dump valve and hit the button on the RO system and walk away. A few days later I'll come back and check the girls and assess what they need and start it off low.
I have learned that with RO I can't go over 500ppm TOTAL in the res or I get clawing with most strains. Increase feed schedules slowly and carefully, wait 3-5 days after each nute change to see what the newest growth looks like before you go any further.
The difficulty with flushing properly (which I consider to be handwatering plain water through the top at best) is about the biggest downside I've seen with the Blumats. Though the drippers will drip plain water, yes, it's not the same as saturating the medium and running volumes of water through it. No way to automate it, and with 100 plants it's a pain to do a proper flush by hand. It will be worse when I start up-potting to 5g pots in flower, so I'm hoping Drip Clean is the answer.
This was one of my favorite things about ebb and flood trays, dump the res and leave the system for a few days and all is flushed. Dump the res again and refill, bam you can run fresh nutes right away.
Perhaps Sunnydog has it right (for soil at least.) Amended organic soil and water with plain water. Man I hate mixing lots of soil though, sucks.
Or if you wanted to run coco or RW, have the Blumats on plain water only, but have a separate res for feeding with hand watering. Not too bad for most guys, that's once a week or so to feed?
If you were bucks-up and had a smaller grow I suppose you could run 2 blumats per pot (1 food, 1 water only) off separate manifolds and reservoirs (or 1 straight off the tap with a pressure reducer.) Then you can simply switch them back and forth as needed, wouldn't that be handy?
So many options! I wish I had a warehouse full of em, I'd make a mint sellin em, lol.
I have learned that with RO I can't go over 500ppm TOTAL in the res or I get clawing with most strains. Increase feed schedules slowly and carefully, wait 3-5 days after each nute change to see what the newest growth looks like before you go any further.
The difficulty with flushing properly (which I consider to be handwatering plain water through the top at best) is about the biggest downside I've seen with the Blumats. Though the drippers will drip plain water, yes, it's not the same as saturating the medium and running volumes of water through it. No way to automate it, and with 100 plants it's a pain to do a proper flush by hand. It will be worse when I start up-potting to 5g pots in flower, so I'm hoping Drip Clean is the answer.
This was one of my favorite things about ebb and flood trays, dump the res and leave the system for a few days and all is flushed. Dump the res again and refill, bam you can run fresh nutes right away.
Perhaps Sunnydog has it right (for soil at least.) Amended organic soil and water with plain water. Man I hate mixing lots of soil though, sucks.
Or if you wanted to run coco or RW, have the Blumats on plain water only, but have a separate res for feeding with hand watering. Not too bad for most guys, that's once a week or so to feed?
If you were bucks-up and had a smaller grow I suppose you could run 2 blumats per pot (1 food, 1 water only) off separate manifolds and reservoirs (or 1 straight off the tap with a pressure reducer.) Then you can simply switch them back and forth as needed, wouldn't that be handy?
So many options! I wish I had a warehouse full of em, I'd make a mint sellin em, lol.
i read this entire thread, and im not sure if i recall seeing anytthing about the difference between the regular troph-blumats, and the troph-blumat juniors? anyone know the difference? im wondering if i could buy 200 of these and effectively water my 200 plants?
