Machine feeds

[Douglas.Curtis]

One of the traits of a 'Dynamic Accumulator' type of plant, like cannabis, is the way they 'look fine' while quietly locking excess molecules and elements to cell walls. What is fixed to the cell walls does not 'flush out.' So IME the smoke ends up a higher temp, starts to taste like burnt stuff within a few hits, and leaves a thicker ash with weight to it. I believe you'll readily see this at the end of this run.

When your errors are underfeeding, the plant generally shows it right away. No silent quality killing going on in the background like overfeeding. I'll cram a bowl super tight with flower, poke a tiny air hole, smoke it, and have a super lightweight ash fall out with a light puff or tap. The last exhale of the bowl should be tasty, and have almost zero "burnt plant/stuff" taste to it. Cool temp, soft feeling, resin rich flavors and aromas till the last hit.

The full pH swing is what allows this at 1.5EC and lower. Each element has a different pH range where it is readily absorbed by the plant. Providing this full pH cycle means the plant can easily absorb what it wants at each stage. With roots-in hydros, like DWC and NFT, the pH swing should happen in approximately 7 days at the beginning of a run, and this can be adjusted through nutrient solution volume. Roots-out hydros, basically any set up where the roots are not constantly in contact with the nute solution, have this same pH swing in the rez, and also a smaller pH swing which happens between irrigation cycles.

I use nutrient dosing for top and bottom end pH control, and let the plants do the main work for me.
This Only Works Perfectly with R/O or similar water (0-12ppm)
Fill rez, add nutes to starting EC, pH up with a calcium carbonate product to lowest healthy pH.
Top off to same level every day with pure r/o and take your readings.
As the plants use the nutes the pH rises.
When pH hits top end of healthy range, add nutes back to starting EC. pH will automagically be back where it was when you started the rez.

Lather, rinse, repeat till physical flower bulking quits, then I use lowered EC to maintain high transpiration through oil production til harvest. 5 days from harvest my rez is replaced with plain r/o.

 

[Hiddenjems]

I run flood and drain pebbles in containers.

I did a test grow in a 4x4 tent with 450w of LEDs and a cut I had been running under hps for around 2 years. All I did was keep the temps 10* warmer than my hps rooms and it turned out perfect.

I started my feed at 2 ec and upped it gradually to 2.6 at week 6, then back down to 2.0 until finish. I didn’t see and abnormal peaks or drops in ec.

I think you’re right and you’re just maxing out your transpiration.

 

[Douglas.Curtis]

Right, with the transpiration maxxed out the low nutrient level ends up delivering a lot of nutes anyway.

 

[Ca++]

One of the traits of a 'Dynamic Accumulator' type of plant, like cannabis, is the way they 'look fine' while quietly locking excess molecules and elements to cell walls. What is fixed to the cell walls does not 'flush out.' So IME the smoke ends up a higher temp, starts to taste like burnt stuff within a few hits, and leaves a thicker ash with weight to it. I believe you'll readily see this at the end of this run.

When your errors are underfeeding, the plant generally shows it right away. No silent quality killing going on in the background like overfeeding. I'll cram a bowl super tight with flower, poke a tiny air hole, smoke it, and have a super lightweight ash fall out with a light puff or tap. The last exhale of the bowl should be tasty, and have almost zero "burnt plant/stuff" taste to it. Cool temp, soft feeling, resin rich flavors and aromas till the last hit.

The full pH swing is what allows this at 1.5EC and lower. Each element has a different pH range where it is readily absorbed by the plant. Providing this full pH cycle means the plant can easily absorb what it wants at each stage. With roots-in hydros, like DWC and NFT, the pH swing should happen in approximately 7 days at the beginning of a run, and this can be adjusted through nutrient solution volume. Roots-out hydros, basically any set up where the roots are not constantly in contact with the nute solution, have this same pH swing in the rez, and also a smaller pH swing which happens between irrigation cycles.

I use nutrient dosing for top and bottom end pH control, and let the plants do the main work for me.
This Only Works Perfectly with R/O or similar water (0-12ppm)
Fill rez, add nutes to starting EC, pH up with a calcium carbonate product to lowest healthy pH.
Top off to same level every day with pure r/o and take your readings.
As the plants use the nutes the pH rises.
When pH hits top end of healthy range, add nutes back to starting EC. pH will automagically be back where it was when you started the rez.

Lather, rinse, repeat till physical flower bulking quits, then I use lowered EC to maintain high transpiration through oil production til harvest. 5 days from harvest my rez is replaced with plain r/o.

My P is staying under 60ppm. This is less than half of what biobizz bloom gives in the final weeks, and they expect you to also add boosters. Further increasing the P. I use biobizz as an example, as it's to hand. It's by no means the highest.
P gives the chemical factory taste, and hard black ash. I'm not going heavy on it. Contrary to what you were saying, high temps give a more complete burn. The higher the temp, the more stuff will burn. It's logical really. Leading to a cleaner ash. I'm heavy on the K, which increases burn temps. It's the basis of gunpowder, as it helps things doped with it, to combust faster. The tobacco industry can offer advice here. They add various things to get that burn temp high enough for the white ash we expect.
It is of course difficult to say much, without actual lab tests being available to me. It's the amount the bottle says though, so the best place to start. The only deficiency seen has been K. Now fixed, but I will reduce that extra K mid bloom. I have been using their coco feeds of late, and needed to go 50% over bottle advice, so it didn't seem wise to try a lower dose of the hydro feed, than advised. Though I have in the past, before LED.


I get a pH swing, but not by design. The only official verdict I have seen, is that a constant pH is better. We work in a range where everything is available. Our feeds formulated, so that anything a little harder to get, is more abundant. The big stuff that can be relocated, can be taken in a few hours, to last a couple of days. So swings are not a problem. It just stores them while it can, then moves them about internally. The small stuff that can't be relocated, is where problems may occur. A low pH can increase the abundance of some to toxic levels, and these can't later be moved around, so as the pH becomes unfavourable to them, the new growth goes from high supply, to low supply. As they are not mobile. The more plastics we use in our systems, the more likely a toxicity is. As an example, healthy looking plants have shown 10x more Mo in tissue sampling, than was added to the tank. The Mo having come from plastics. Mn Cu Zn, they all leach from plastics, and give the plants more than we did. This isn't bad plastics, it's the right stuff. These metals are needed to keep the plastic more homologous. They are emulsifiers. A guy hand feeding soil in pots, has a lot less exposure than a recirc guy with floppy tanks and hoses. Who might see real problems as low as pH5.5
I'm not sure what you are reading, with these 7 day long pH swings. To me, it just sounds like days of low expose to elements that can't be relocated. Then days of excessive exposure. Individual leaf tissue analysis would be interesting. It can't be done though.

I might get the RO filter out again at some point. My build has been done with the pipes in place. It's great to just top up, and everything is back where it was, uneffected. Though in need of N and K to rebalance there higher depletion, if you want to get really close to where you were.
I was just reading of a study group making there tank at 1.5mM K, then using 4.5mM K as the top up. To average 0.5mM K. Yes, 3x more K in the top up. Toms, not Canna, but it's interesting. Other studies are talking of the top-up EC commonly falling to 25% of the tanks target EC. Which is perhaps where I'm heading. You will be lower, with your wue.

I do have an idea what is going on, but I'm happy you feel your green is the best, and I must be doing something wrong. It's a pitty we are unlikely to ever put it to the test, but every grow is certainly different, and the further we stray from the path, the more new info we can learn. I don't think I will be reducing my wue efficiency so drastically though, as them terps are water soluble. I imagine your room smells nice.

 

[Absorber]

EC3 is very high for me. I'm back to hydro for the first time in years, and was surprised to see the bottle dosing come out so high. Triple checked though, and not with the same calibration solution. Decades ago it was lower, and through my own observations, I was running at 1.6. However, that pushed up past 2.4 the moment I went LED. It's all a bit sketchy looking back, hence doing a run with bottle dose this time. I need to set a benchmark. They do look fine though, except some low K, which I have resolved with this Pot-nit. So the 3.0 probably isn't really high.
It's interesting to hear you top-off with RO, and presume that's not with feed. A sign feed use is dropping a lot through bloom.
My wue is very different, yes. I'm using perhaps 6L per meter, and don't expect a 4x4 would pass 3G a day. Though I have seen 10L a meter before. At 3G beside your 5G, I should be at a higher EC to provide as much food as you do. It is a difficult comparison though, as you say

I found when my ppm went up ( from 1200ppm) plants were taking up more water so i lowered my ppm to 600 during flower and plants started taking up water and nutrients again, dropping level of resevoir but the ppm stayed same . And grew huge cola's at that nutrient strength.
I now run at 500-550ppm in veg and 600-650ppm in flower .
I use Cyco 2 part veg 2 part flower nutrients

 

[Ca++]

Got me checking the bottle. It says the dose I'm using, but gives an expectation of 1.5 - 2.2 (add more if needed)
Hmm. Odd.
The coco and soil say about the same, but the hydro does have about 50% more NPK listed. It doesn't add up.

I suspect I have got this wrong. I have a pair of meters, giving different results. One must be broken. Then I have a tank computer, which I have never calibrated, but does agree with one of the normal meters. This is a 2 onto 1 argument. It might be the 1, who is right. However, both normal meters have been back in the calibration solution, and it sure looks like the 1 meter is broke. Maybe the solution is? It's mixed powder, kept a few weeks in the fridge. I must consider the least likely answer, could be right.
I do have fresh bottled fluid EC calibration solutions, but had decided not to cal the computer. Not for EC or pH. The numbers are not usually something I share anyway. They are just for me to replicate. Also, the computer is Chinese, so I can't work it anyway lol

 

[Orange's Greenhouse]

hard black ash. I'm not going heavy on it. Contrary to what you were saying, high temps give a more complete burn. The higher the temp, the more stuff will burn. It's logical really. Leading to a cleaner ash. I'm heavy on the K, which increases burn temps. It's the basis of gunpowder, as it helps things doped with it, to combust faster. The tobacco industry can offer advice here.

Hard black ash means that carbon is left. Increasing temperature leads to complete combustion thus white, soft ash.

Potassium does not increase the temp. It is just additional weight that absorbs heat. The potassium in gun powder is potassium nitrate (the fertilizer) and the nitrate component is an oxidizer that increases the burn temperature. But there is no significant amount of nitrate in plants so that doesn't do anything.
The most (only) important factors leading to white ash is water content. The more water in the flower, the lower the temperature. Heating and evaporating water is a heat sink.

Something else that can be done is add white salts (eg lime) post harvest. That doesn't influence the taste and can't be overdone (heatsinking) but increases ash volume

Fertility during growth is not important.

 

[Douglas.Curtis]

Uhh... high temps are definitely not necessary for a white and lightweight ash. Most people have a difficult time 'feeling' they actually took a hit, the smoke is so cool and soft. Literally surprised at the huge volume of smoke they exhale, even though they could not feel it in their lungs.

Terps and cannabinoids are greatly assisted in their formation by enzymes. Enzymes create different molecules depending on hydration, temps and pH. So steady pH, steady hydration levels and steady temps make for significantly less complex terps/cannabinoids.

7 days at the beginning of flower. As flowering progresses this swing shortens. My ash is proof to me there isn't anything getting loaded up in my plants.

 

[Orange's Greenhouse]

Terps and cannabinoids are greatly assisted in their formation by enzymes. Enzymes create different molecules depending on hydration, temps and pH. So steady pH, steady hydration levels and steady temps make for significantly less complex terps/cannabinoids.

Please pick up a molecular biology textbook before you spread more of this nonsense.