the Hand Watering coco thread

[Guest]

Don't really have any tips that havn't already been stated. I do use the PBP coco specific nutes. I use exactly the dosage on the container and have had no problems at all. I do supplement with cal-mag but havn't this last grow and really can't see the diff.

 

[bonecarver_OG]

wellcome in Mo!

Wamen - hows it going with the outdoor

peace

 

[Guest]

hey bonecarver

I'm going to be using hand water'd coco pots on my next grow and i had a few questions about watering. I'll be watering once a day, with run off. Do you know roughly how much I'd need to water each plant in a 2 gallon container of 70/30 canna coco/perlite to arrive at around 10-15% run off? I'm just looking for some kind of rough estimate so I can figure out what size of container I am going to need for my nutrient mixing. I'll have (16) 2 gallon pots to water on a daily basis. I currently only have 3 gallon pails for mixing my nutrients in and it's not great as I wind up mixing 2-3 pails each time I feed, but at least I only do this every 4-5 days or so. With daily watering I have a feeling I am going to have to invest in some kind of res to mix in and hold nutrients but I have no idea what size it would need to be. I was going to pick up some 5 gallon pails, but if I wind up mixing 15+ gallons a day, I'd rather get a heavy weight garbage can to do it all at once. THanks for any help you can give, cya

 

[gaiusmarius]

get a big garbage can, once the plants get a certain size they can easy take 1/2 gallon per watering. like you said mixing nutes every day is bull shit.

 

[WhiteWolfman]

I am using coco for the first time and hand watering! DO you let the pots dry totally out like soil before you water? Or do you keep em a little moister & feed em more frequntly? Currently feeding/watering every 2-3days.

Using the house & garden organic coco nutes, anyone have experience with these products?

 

[pray4pistils]

dried = fried

dried = fried

Definitely don't let the coco dry out completely between watering. The fine little hairs on the roots will die and it'll take forever to get them to regenerate. In my set up, I use a moisture meter to keep the wetness between "slightly wet" and "slightly dry". So, I keep it in the moist range always. Two of my plants were originally grown in soil which is still packed around the root balls. I shook out as much as I could and then plopped them in the new containers full of coco coir. It seems that I never have to water the soil portion at all because it wicks moisure out of the fiber area.

 

[bonecarver_OG]

a rez for the water is definetly a must. the plastic garbage cans work really well. also big plastic containers for storage etc.

coco should never be dried up inbetween watering unless there is some really serious reason for it.

the run of is really not so messy - i try to keep the coco steadily at a equal humidity level more or less - that means when i water a big part of the water i put in flushes out - if it doesnt i just keep ading more glas by glas. i pretty much water untill i start getting run of and then the remaing water draining thru will replace and flush the coco in every watering.

peace

 

[purcellville]

I started playing with Coco about 2-3 months ago. I am hand feeding and watering currently, and plan to continue with my veg area. Check out my veg/mom tray in 3x3 pots of pure coco.

I just put a few pots to flower and will probably continue by hand water for now. I have everything to do a comprehensive dripper setup, but I am concentrating on trying to have a perpetual garden of variety. This is making me think about bigger pots, I have some 5x5.

Anyhow check out the few young girls in flower.

Here is a Sensi Star, from clone @ 7 Days in a 3x3 Coco pot sitting on top of a waterfarm.

Here is Rez's Killer Apollo, from clone @ 7 Days in a 3x3 Coco pot sitting on top of a Waterfarm.

I will be adding Rez's Ice and some ECSD today.

Now on to nutes.... I have been using the PBP line, because that is what I still have a lot of sitting around. Surprisingly all looks well to me using this stuff. Now I have some of the Canna A+B, PK13/14, and Rhizotonic (sp?) on the way so i will see how much better it can get.

I will admit the PBP line is cumbersome to use. But with LK, Sweet, and bit of Budswell the results are spectacular.

Sweet smoking to all.

 

[the cult]

Handwatered, on coco with some hydroton as well. I water every day or at least every 2nd. For future I am considering automated run-to-waste as its hard to keep up with watering with RL too.

Sour Jack, day 33:

AK-47, day 33 (indica pheno):

Coco is the best really.

 

[Guest]

the cult,

what size square container are you using and how much water are you giving every day / two days?

Peace

 

[bonecarver_OG]

nice pics all!

 

[the cult]

the cult,

what size square container are you using and how much water are you giving every day / two days?

Peace

Various, but mostly 11 or 15 Litres. In this case the Sour Jack is in a 11L but the indica pheno of AK-47 is just in a 6.5L bucket. Water is hard to say, but about 0.5 litre for the 6.5 buckets, and I suppose about 1 litre for the 11L buckets. EC of 1.4 and PH of 5.8.
What is ALWAYS most important is that you have maximum space for the roots to expand in during first weeks of flowering, if you aint got space then you aint getting much buds. I veg in 1L buckets and transplant in 6.5, and the results are just tremendous, especially in coco where the roots grow at an unearthly (lol) speed.

 

[JackKerouac]

NOICE. I dig the coco pics, all.

Using the house & garden organic coco nutes, anyone have experience with these products?

This is another one to look out for. I think Texas Hydro carries their line.

 

[-VT-]

a rez for the water is definetly a must. the plastic garbage cans work really well. also big plastic containers for storage etc.

That's a great idea! I am gonna get on that project soon!....thanks fellas....
I am gonna start watering my plants less....I been getting too much runoff and it's costing me money. I am gonna try for 10%....or less...I been gettin' out of hand lately...and now that I am watching my budget it's more glaring to me
I added a layer of perlite to the top of my bags like a lot of folks and I think it's helping me battle gnats and keeping the surface moist....

Although with no EC meter I wonder if I'll burn the plants maintaining "mix reservoirs"....I need a EC meter lol

peace 'handwaterers'

 

[bonecarver_OG]

whenthe plants are really small the run of can be very litlle too - as long as the nutes are weak

i use trays with coco in cups for my seedlings. the cupsa have holes to suck up the water i put on the trays. no run off at all at this stage. and the risk for salt build upp wont be high until much later - and then im flushing them out well anyway.

i start the handwatering from the second transplant of veg phase.

 

[-VT-]

hey Bones....lemme ask ya something...
The way I understand this and from my mistakes...is it safe to say that with more runoff and frequent waterings we can run higher PPM's? And if taking a "water as needed" soil approach run lighter on the nutes?
Watering less sounds like salt buildup....
More watering with good runoff flushes the medium preventing buildup....
Can't turn the thinker off when high on Sativas

Thanks for the help bro

 

[Guest]

hey Bones....lemme ask ya something...
The way I understand this and from my mistakes...is it safe to say that with more runoff and frequent waterings we can run higher PPM's? And if taking a "water as needed" soil approach run lighter on the nutes?
Watering less sounds like salt buildup....
More watering with good runoff flushes the medium preventing buildup....

Excellent question -VT-

My question is... how would you go about properly watering a pot that holds 5 gallons or more? Obviously, it would take a lot of water to allow for any runoff, so would you have to run nutes at atleast 1/3 dosage to avoid any kind of salt build up?

 

[bonecarver_OG]

VT - interesting questions

salt build up will really only become a problem if the coco gets time to get dry, (the water evaporate etc) - and the salt thats disolved in the water gets concentrated. if u use strong nutes and frequent waterings u can still get high salt level in the water just because of the nute levels. some plants can definetly get damaged from that.

frequent waterings and balanced nutricion programs are the most eficient.

u can allways try bumping the nutes a bit every now and then to see how the plants are reacting to it. sometimes some plant can handle in veg a few strong doses of nutes and just grow like crazy while others dont want nutes at all

but U are right. more or less.

when it comes to strength - i dont normally pump the nutes up untill the plants are asking for it. less is more

Indica sativa - thats a common missconception - the truth is a BIG plant in a big pot does use a lot of water - but the trick is to keep the coco loaded with water (not completelly soaked - just steadily wet) - it means:

water the coco bit by bit untill u get a deacent run off - then just frequently keep giving it small amounts of water for example with a pint glass.

- for example a 25 liter - 5 gallon pot can be completelly OK with getting about 2 liters of water a day. the run off wont be too big - - 10% of 2 liters is 2 dl... not that much waste really. still id say its better to try to get some flushing going on.. atleast as often as u can try to water a slight bit more.

peace all

 

[Guest]

I was treating the coco like soil... although I was still giving my plants a small amount of nutrients each watering, I was not giving them enough to allow for any runoff.. I guess even with a small amount of nutrients, not keeping the coco properly wet caused some type of toxicity anyways. Thank you for your input amigo =]

 

[bonecarver_OG]

we are all here to learn from each other