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Florida Growers Thread; Reloaded

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Copperfield

Copperfield

Member
Asslover said:
The two systems I've tried are "Waterfarms" and ebb/flow buckets.
Hydroton, GH 3 part. Hit/miss with the 'farms and complete failure, multiple times, with the ebb/flow thing.
Plants start out great then root die off and...
If I'm not mistaken, Gsizzle grows in ebb/flow buckets full of rockwool croutons. We all see his successes:biggrin:
Too me, soil & coco are idiot proof. Hydroponics is Alchemy i suppose :blowbubbles:
I've got nothing but respect for guys that master the water. If i could master the water the way i whip coco I would be a millionaire by now.:joint:
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The new system I'm running now seems to really doing well..... In living the dwc..... The growth I've had so far has been explosive it seems. I am still running the cocoa, but I have yet to to kill it like you or old gray hair..... I'm still trying to finds better way to get more w less numbers...... I'm hoping this method w b a keeper for me...... Im only a couple weeks into bloom.... Theguy who taught me this style of dwc gets 1/2 elbows a plant...... Seeing is believing tho..... I'm using different nutrients tho. I think that I've just been over feeding all along..... Yea, taking ppm and ph sucks, but if u pay attention to those things.... U can track how much your plants are eating and then know if u can feed them more or less and reap a better harvest. The one thing that gets me is that I'm running different strains on one res...... Some ear more than others..... I grew em big this round so I guess well see how it goes
 
Dawn Patrol

Dawn Patrol

Well this is some bullshit right here.....
Veteran
Catatafish said:
This is true.....if you dont break the soil down after each run and get rid of root balls. If you are then your in back breaking territory again
biggrin.gif
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P-NUT said:
Yeah mixing the soil is hard work
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bucketswithsoil said:
i can see what ya mean about the back breaking,mixing up soil,compost and whatever else,ya throwing in there..
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I've done it a number of ways - mixed new soil for each pot, replanted with a top dress (no till), broke up the root balls and recycled that soil into the compost pile.

Best thing I ever did was buy a cement mixer on Craigslist. Can't mix as much as I used to by hand, but layer your components (for me A) compost B) Peat C) perlite and let that thing run for 30 minutes. Add your selected amendments and run it another 15 minutes then dump to a wheelbarrow and then shovel to pots.

Lather, rinse, repeat as necessary.

Then I take the pots and add AACT and let them sit for about two weeks and then the mix is ready for anything other than seedlings.

Asslover said:
Well, for me it's set/forget. 55 Gal rez, mix up once, set PH and don't come back for a week until the rez's are empty.
Those who know me on these board know that I've gone 3 weeks to Europe with everything on auto pilot and have come back to perfect bloom rooms every time.way
Theirs no right or wrong method, it's all preference and lifestyle...:tiphat:
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Now that I'm also running a cab, I either need to figure out a simple hydro setup or at least Blumats as I already have them.

It would be nice to only have to check the cab once a week like I used to do with the outdoor girls......
 
B

blue_tick

unreg

now those are straight up totem poles. nice looking cross you have there.

peace
 
dansbuds

dansbuds

Retired from the workforce Bullshit
ICMag Donor
Veteran
RockinRobot said:
I would think it would take more time and effort hand watering everything than topping off a res and adjusting Ph every couple days. But then I come from the Marine Aquarium hobby, which makes only having to watch Ph and PPM a snap compared to the testing and balancing on a marine tank.

For myself, having a bad back, The back-breaking work of mixing soil and amendments combined with the pain of having to keep a schedule to hand water, is much more work than Hydro. With Hydro I move water with a hose. No lifting needed. I use an always on meter that monitors Ph, PPM/EC and Temp. I can see at a glance when res shifts. Ph drift is slow only have to adjust when topping off res, usually every other day for me. I have found the more you let it drift the better the plants do.

Also I prefer automation. All feeding is on a timer. Set it and forget it. Don't have to worry about not getting home before lights go off to water. Some days I'm so bored from lack of maintenance I go in just to watch them grow for a while.


As a side note. I use fairly cheap Tri-Meters for monitoring rez. Some on here (not this thread) have given me shit for using them but I have 2 of them. They are much easier than pens. I only calibrate at the start of each grow and even after a full grow they rarely drift much as long as you don't let the probes dry out. You can see all readings at a glance, Ph, Temp and EC/PPM. Can even watch Ph change as you adjust instead of having to keep dipping the pen. Granted these won't work well for straight DWC unless you have 1 for each bucket but for anything with a rez they're great.

Can see the meter in this pic.

View Image
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that was me :biggrin: & i still can't believe you got them things to work ! i bought 2 & neither one worked right outa the pkg :wallbash:
i went with the bluelabs at 280 a piece :yoinks: but they work great !!!

but the rest of your post i agree with completely !!! :tiphat:
automation is a time savor fer sure !!! i can go camping for a week at a clip & not have to worry about my garden !


them Darlins are looking fantastic robot !!!!

wish you were alot closer robot , i have 3 18 gallon totes of hydroton sitting here unused from my failed attempt at hydro ......
 
R

RockinRobot

Active member
dansbuds said:
that was me :biggrin: & i still can't believe you got them things to work ! i bought 2 & neither one worked right outa the pkg :wallbash:
i went with the bluelabs at 280 a piece :yoinks: but they work great !!!

but the rest of your post i agree with completely !!! :tiphat:
automation is a time savor fer sure !!! i can go camping for a week at a clip & not have to worry about my garden !


them Darlins are looking fantastic robot !!!!

wish you were alot closer robot , i have 3 18 gallon totes of hydroton sitting here unused from my failed attempt at hydro ......
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FYI on the Tri-Meters. They seem to be VERY susceptible to RF interference from HID lights when actually plugged into AC power. Because of this I always calibrate and take actual readings with the electricity disconnected and the unit running on internal battery. I disconnect power and give the meter about 10 minutes to stabilize when adjusting rez or calibrating meter. The meters WILL go nuts and give strange readings around RFI. Biggest problem I have had with them is the probes are cheap. I have had to Re-solder the BNC connector on them and make sure they were not shorting out. Fixed the issue with the 1 meter that was having issues when I first got it. May be what was causing your issues when you tried as well.

Also if you have the money to spend Hanna makes an always on meter also but I just never saw the need to spend the extra money.
 
dansbuds

dansbuds

Retired from the workforce Bullshit
ICMag Donor
Veteran
well , that RF interference might be why , my meters were literally less than a foot away from my ballasts .......
oh well , i may mess with them again someday , just so i have a backup tri meter handy .
 
R

RockinRobot

Active member
dansbuds said:
well , that RF interference might be why , my meters were literally less than a foot away from my ballasts .......
oh well , i may mess with them again someday , just so i have a backup tri meter handy .
Click to expand...

If you still have them try running a side by side test with your pen for a bit and see what happens. I know after a full run I can pull the probes out of 1 res and put in the other and the 2 meters will still read within 0.2 Ph of each other. More than accurate enough for our purposes. Especially since I allow PH to drift from 5.5 to 6.1 before readjusting. Same with the PPM Probe. I allow PPM to drift 200PPM@700 before adjusting so meter plenty accurate for both purposes.
 
U

unregistered190

Senior
Veteran
Copperfield said:
Wow unreg....... What a beautiful plant bro!!! Attaboy
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thanks....if one or more turns out good, they will make their way around with the folks in this thread....cata, hugh, and g/o are on top of list since each has contributed to my garden in one way or another :tiphat:

if the smoke is good these gals will go in a tent with the dmt male used in darlin's net. (wifi6xgg4)xDMT
 
Catatafish

Catatafish

Active member
Veteran
Unreg did you top them at? Im guessing you just let em grow el naturel the first run?

I could see wfa6 bean poling untopped. She has tendancies to stretch an arm or two longer than the rest if you let her.
 
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