MID TOWN'S COCO Q's

[MID TOWN]

Hey coco experts.

This is my first run with coco and I'm having some problems.



I've got 15 girls in 3 gallon pots of BCUZZ coco with a recirc drip system and I'm using the H&G nute line up with RO water.



My problem is that no mater what I put through them the run off comes out at 6.8 PH.


I've tried just runnin a bunch of 5.8ph solution through, that didn't work. I've even tried running solution through em that was ph'd at 4 and the run off still comes out at 6.8.


My girls are really suffering so if you guy's have any tips on how to correct this that would AWESOME!!!



Thanks, MID

 

[Guest]

Did ya prep the coco in anyway?

Isn't the bcuzz supposed to be ready to use right outta the bag?

6.8 is absolutely ridiculous midtown... A few months back when we wanted to start importing coco for plant nurseries, we ordered samples from companies all around the globe (srilanka, india, brazil, mexico...) and not a single sample came in with a pH of over 6.4. I really don't know what else to tell ya except you might have gotten a bad batch...

 

[rabid]

Hey Indica
Please elaborate a bit if you will...regarding the samples. Especially about the SE Asian samples. Did you have any coco from Thailand?

 

[Guest]

I had a long explanation of what I'd to but I hit post and the damned site froze on me.

Anyway.

Here's what I'd do.

Get your res where you want it with regards to pH and ppm. Use it to flush and not small quantities. If you start seeing return after 2 minutes water for 6. Let everything sit for an hour and recheck everything. Readjust the tank and do it again. Repeat this 6 or 7 times or until you feel better about it.

If you need to change the res water out in the process, go ahead. Take the kink out of your main water feed line and hang it out the window. Always adjust pH after nutes have been added. This all may be stuff you know but maybe it'll help somebody.

I had an ec rise the first few times I watered but other than that, B'Cuzz is ready to go if you bought the 50L bag. Their other stuff should be ok too.

Check you meter. How long has it been since you recalibrated it? I had to recalibrate during my current grow. The meter was telling me everything was ok but the plants were telling me it wasn't. Turns out, I was right in the upper edge of a lockout.

Are you using any tap water that might have water softener chemicals in it that might continue to raise the pH? Be sure to use ro and tap water at a 1:1 ratio. You'll need the trace elements and nutrients the tap water provides. If you use pure ro, you'll pick up a calcium deficiency relatively early in the grow. The addition of tap to the mix cures that most times. If you want to continue to use pure ro, you'll have to add these minerals and whatnot as supplements such as Cal-Mag+ - which I don't like, hehe.

Hope this helps. Don't worry, it'll be ok. Nothing is ever wrong with coco that it can't be fixed. hehehehehe. We just need to figure out what you're doing.

Peace

 

[jekyllandhyde]

i would check the meeter even if its new midtown....those fockers can take a shit on you at anytime...peace

 

[Neptune]

mid town, you really need to push a LOT of water through them over a 2 hour period. it's just a matter of lowering your nute solution's PH down to 5.0 and flooding them over 2 hours.

don't do this more than once a week though, the plants will not be happy with the flood.

 

[MID TOWN]

Thanks for the reply's everyone. My meter is brand new and I just calibrated it so that's not the problem.


I don't know if I actually fixed the problem but I did get my PH down to 6.1 last night.

I just let my drippers run for about 3 hours. Constantly lowering my PH to 4.0 leting it run through for 20 minutes and when it stabilized it was at 6.7. Every time I did this my Ph stabilized .1 lower. So what ever was in my coco was actually raising the PH of my entire res. Anyways I kept lowering it to 4.0 and finally got it to stabilize at 6.1.


I'm kinda worried that this wasn't good for the girls but I didn't know what else to do. The coco itself was like ph up. Run 25 gallons of 5.8ph solution through and it all came out at 6.8.

 

[jekyllandhyde]

didnt you have some mysterious algae? how did you clean your system? with what?

 

[Sauron The Blue]

i tested this out, 20 gallons of water to a 2 gallon coco pot with canna coco in it, starting ph was 5.8 and mine came out around 6.8 after the first gallon, 6.6 after 5 gallons and 6.4 after 20 gallons. Im going to soak a pot in ph 5.5 water and see what the ph is after a few hours. Ill let ya know then!

-stb

 

[MID TOWN]

OK this is getting really stupid.

I checked the run off today and it's back up at 6.4. I've pumped about 100 gallons of tap water through them ph'd at 5.0 to try and compesate and my runoff is still 6.3.

WTF could be causing this.

It's like my coco isn't coco at alll. It's just a solid form of ph up.




JEKYL- I set up a whole new system cause I couldn't get rid of it.

 

[Guest]

Get the botanicare bales next time bro, just add food and water and it's ready to go, same thing with canna coco

i tested this out, 20 gallons of water to a 2 gallon coco pot with canna coco in it, starting ph was 5.8 and mine came out around 6.8 after the first gallon, 6.6 after 5 gallons and 6.4 after 20 gallons. Im going to soak a pot in ph 5.5 water and see what the ph is after a few hours. Ill let ya know then!

-stb

That doesn't make one bit of sense, did you happen to get a cheap chinese ripoff of canna coco or what?

 

[MedResearcher]

Some CoCo takes a long time to stabilize/lower to the correct PH.

I use cheap CoCO, not bail but bags. I always flush it really good then just use it. At first I was always checking the PH of therun off and it was high like you said and it was driving me crazy. No matter how much I flushed, it wouldnt budge. Anyways eventually maybe a month into the grow it finally stabilized down where I wanted it.

I think as long as your reservior is PHd correctly before you feed them everytime, you should be ok and the PH eventually will come down and stabilize it might take a while though.

 

[MID TOWN]

Some CoCo takes a long time to stabilize/lower to the correct PH.

I use cheap CoCO, not bail but bags. I always flush it really good then just use it. At first I was always checking the PH of therun off and it was high like you said and it was driving me crazy. No matter how much I flushed, it wouldnt budge. Anyways eventually maybe a month into the grow it finally stabilized down where I wanted it.

I think as long as your reservior is PHd correctly before you feed them everytime, you should be ok and the PH eventually will come down and stabilize it might take a while though.

Thanks for the reply man. I hope your right!

 

[Sauron The Blue]

just checked my pot that I soaked in a 5gallon of 5.5 ph water. the water in the 5 gallon was still 5.5 when I checked it, after i pulled the pot and let it drain, i poured about a gallon from the 5 gallon bucket back through the pot and measured the run off, it was around 5.9 when it came out..left the meter in the sample cup for a minute and it got up to 6 when i checked last.

This is weird to me, because in my recirc systems the ph of the res is always stable at 5.8 and I let them drain out the pot for about a minute and feed 4 times a light cycle.

 

[Guest]

Mid Town.........I never considered Coco Coir until I read a thread of a close bro from my `ol krusty bucket days about using "Run to Waste"........It seems that if coco`s recirculated or even ebbed and flowed that what happens is salt buildup along with ph rise.........My bro uses run to waste once a day with 15-20% runoff to keep rootzone from sitting in stagnant solution...........He then flushes every week to remove any buildup and has had no probs with ph or ppm`s since........I`ve been usin the cheap shit for couple months now with great success following the run to waste and flush weekly method on plants to pick moms from and take clones........Good luck and hope you figure out yer probs.......I did wash the shit outta my bales in a 55 gal. drum repeatedly till ppm`s and ph leveled off though before using and to date have had no rise or fluctuations due to the run to waste method.........Peace.....DHF......

 

[Guest]

Run to waste - recirc - no matter. Water every day, at least once until you get at least a 15% runoff. The coco never dries and the residual salts are held in suspension til the next watering when they are then kept within tolerance by the runoff.

If you use a recirculation reservoir, which I do, I avoid any problems with ec buildup in the pots by watering for 6 minutes. I start getting return at 2 minutes with at least 6 holes per drip ring and a 360 gpm pump watering 7 plants in a 3X6 tray. I hang the drip hose to my dehumidifier in the tray to catch its water and my tank stays very stable.

My reservoir is held at 5.8 pH and a nutrient ec of 1.0. I have absolutely no - zero! - problems with buildup. The more you water, the more the plants like it. But never let the coco dry out between waterings.

I know this is repeat info for a lot of people but we seem to just have to keep on saying it. Coco is a hydro medium. Hydro methods work very well with it.

DEDHEDFRED, your bro is watering correctly for run to waste. He's also watering correctly for recycle. He is just simply incorrect about the buildup problem in recirc IF the evaporated water from the whole grow is compensated for in some manner and put back into the reservoir. You can either do that by adding pH'd water to the res or letting the reclaimed water from you dehumidifier do it for you.

Too many successful recirculating coco growers out there for it not to work.

Plus, when you water and get a 200% runoff like I do, you don't need to flush once a week because you do it every time you water. The plant's roots just love it.

Peace

 

[Guest]

Thanks mojo........Midtown.....I hope everything`ll work out for yas......DHF........