The Original Old Farts Club

[user 60570]

I hope to be as smart as you some day LOL

sh-it , no one has very far to go in order to accomplish that goal

 

[RosterMan]

A solution will only hold so many particles in suspension before it becomes super saturated and can not absorb anymore.
So it does depend.

 

[user 60570]

GH's 3 part flora series.
-3 part directions suggests adding the bottle labeled "micro nutrients" first to the water, when preparing a nutrient solution.
The way I was taught, and it works so I stuck with it.

exactly

 

[RosterMan]

that is what I understood when mixing Micro and Bloom , always add the micro first and then the bloom….otherwise it will not turn onto a solution

OK I agree with that, those big words and long sentences got me confused LOL

 

[RosterMan]

You testing me again?

 

[Tattered Old Graywolf]

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Date: February 11, 2019Author: Marijuana Growing Educators
Coco coir is a popular root zone media choice for growing marijuana. It can be easy to use, and some growers use it for more than one crop, which saves money. But it often causes problems for your marijuana plants—harming growth rate, potency, yield and your bank account—until you master these important coco coir facts…

Marijuana Coco Coir Fact #1: Coco Coir Manufacturing Standards​

As with manufacturers of gardening soil, soilless mix, and rockwool, there are multiple coco coir manufacturers—and very few make quality substrates.
Coco coir comes from coconut husks. The quality of coco coir depends a lot on where and how the husks are sourced. The quality and age of the husks are also important. Some coconut husks are loaded with sodium and toxic contaminants from ocean water or storage ponds. Other husks are too green and immature to be processed into quality horticultural material.
When coconut husks aren’t processed properly by washing them with fresh water at the right temperatures and for long enough, and by carefully treating and drying the material after washing, the resultant coco coir can cause nutrients problems that harm or kill your plants.
What’s more, coconut husks have to be expertly processed so they break down into “coco peat” fibers with the right water-holding, aeration, internal consistency, and durability for marijuana plants. The processing must be done using professional facilities, methods, and materials. If not, you see inferior coir that tends to become waterlogged or break down quickly, leading to drowning marijuana roots.

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During horticultural coco coir media manufacturing, husks and fibers must be washed and treated correctly or the finished product causes severe feed program problems involving nitrogen, calcium, iron, magnesium, potassium, sodium, and chlorine.
And coco coir must also be graded, packaged, shipped and stored correctly so it works well for your marijuana garden.
You’re probably wondering what’s the best coco coir brand. I’ve tested all major brands and many off-label brands, and have experienced intermittent or pervasive problems with all of them, including Canna and Botanicare.
It doesn’t help that there are significant variations in coco coir quality batch to batch, even from the same manufacturer.
Ask your hydroponics store what brands of coco coir they most recommend. But no matter what they recommend, take a look at this next fact…

Marijuana Coco Coir Fact #2: Wash & Test Coco Coir​

No matter what a hydroponics store or coco coir manufacturer tells you about the quality, pre-washing, processing, and usefulness of their coco coir product, it’s best to wash and test it yourself before you use it. What I do is buy the smallest amounts possible of the top two coco coir brands recommended by my hydroponics store. Then I test the products using the following method:

• Put the coco coir in a two-gallon bucket that has holes in the bottom, and place that bucket inside a five-gallon bucket.
• Using reverse osmosis water, pour 2.5 gallons of water at pH 5.7-5.9 through the coco coir, collecting the runoff water in the five-gallon bucket.
• Test the parts per million and pH of the runoff water.
• If the parts per million reading is higher than 450 ppm, and/or the pH is wildly out of range, repeat the experiment to see if you can get runoff water that’s less than 450 ppm and within pH range.
• If you rinse your coco coir more than three times and it’s still showing 450 or more ppm, and/or the pH is out of range, don’t use that coco coir.
• This rinsing and monitoring process take times and you may go through several brands of coco coir before you find a quality product. When I rinse coco coir and the runoff pH is within range and the runoff parts per million is below 300, I feel I can trust that coco coir.

Marijuana Coco Coir Fact #3: Buying the Best Form of Coco Coir​

Beyond finding properly-manufactured coco coir that performs well in runoff pH and ppm tests, you want to buy coco coir that has the right consistency and configuration. Coco coir comes in a variety of configurations, including condensed bricks, loose fiber, coco peat blocks, and coco coir fibers mixed with perlite.

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The best way to grade coco coir’s usefulness in your grow op is to wash and measure it, and to physically handle and visually examine it. You’re looking for dark, clean, golden-brown fibers with the consistency of moderately-dry soil. The coco shouldn’t have clumps or fine powder.
Many marijuana coco coir growers use coco in raised grow tables for sea of green marijuana gardening while others use it in individual pots. I don’t pay the extra price for coco coir that comes with perlite, but especially if I’m growing in a grow room that tends towards high humidity, I might cut coco with 10% coarse perlite. Bricked coco is usually cheaper, but harder to work with. I suggest loose fiber.
And again–remember to first buy a small amount, so you can thoroughly inspect the coco before you buy the larger amount you’ll use for your season if you find that the coir is high quality.

Marijuana Coco Coir Growing Fact #4: Watering Coco Coir​

Coco coir retains water well—too well if you’re a marijuana grower who tends to overwater. On top of that, coco coir’s appearance isn’t a reliable way of knowing when it needs more water. Coco coir should be watered when it’s 50-70% dry. But how can you determine the dryness of your coco coir?
One method works only if you’re growing in individual pots:

• Water until about 15-20% of the water runs out the bottom of the pots and the coir appears to be thoroughly wet.
• Weigh the pots and record their weight. If they’re evenly watered, they’ll all weigh about the same.
• When you think 50-70% of the moisture has left the coco coir root zone, weigh the pots again.
• The difference between the initial wet weight and the current weight is used in a percentage calculation to determine how dry the coco has become.

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Two other things to know: Coco coir is particularly sensitive to salts and contaminants, because it has chemical and physical properties that interact with water and whatever’s in it in ways that no other marijuana root zone media does, so always use reverse osmosis water.
Be careful not to overwater. Too many coco coir users drown their cannabis roots, which is especially bad for tender seedlings and clones that don’t yet have fully-formed root systems.

Marijuana Coco Coir Growing Fact #5:​

Some Nutrients Suck​

If you use regular hydroponics nutrients or organic nutrients with coco coir, you’ll almost certainly see crop problems. I used to hate coco coir, until someone explained to me that it was the fertilizers I was using, not just the coir, that caused the problems.
So the first step in ensuring you can properly feed your cannabis plants in coco coir is to get the highest quality coco coir substrate. We’ve been testing coco coir for years, and have been greatly disappointed by all the major brands. Most of them haven’t been processed, washed, or buffered properly. Using these inferior brands, you’re forced to use nutrients made specifically for coco coir, which means they can’t be used in other substrates.

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Problem is, most of the nutrients brands that claim to work well in coco don’t. Growers are forced to use cal-mag supplements that created more problems than they solve. Growers harm their marijuana plants with repeated flushing, trying different nutrients parts per million concentrations, underwatering, and overwatering.

• Coco coir holds water well, so you water less, and less frequently.
• Coco coir is an ideal host for beneficial, root-enhancing microbes.
• Coco coir can be recycled for use in multiple crop cycles.
• Coco coir’s favorable oxygen/water ratios provide more oxygen to roots and prevent waterlogging (as long as watering is done properly) which increases growth rate and harvest weight.
• Coco coir is a mostly-inert medium that works well with hydroponics and organic nutrients.

We grew some huge plants in 25 gallon smart pots, with a mixture of coco coir and Fox Farm Ocean Forest and used Alaskan fish fertilizer for nutrients.

Hope your back eases up some today GW.

Thanks SG! The heat got rid of the snively and whiney part, leaving only the bone-on-bone groaner!

 

[user 60570]

A solution will only hold so many particles in suspension before it becomes super saturated and can not absorb anymore.
So it does depend.

that is why i follow the directions , like 8 ml Micro , 16 ml Bloom

easiest method of growing i ever did and the most weight…GH nutes and 100% perlite

 

[user 60570]

You testing me again?

how am i doing?

 

[RosterMan]

Sorry man dealing with some Life lately
A Slap in the face so to say.

 

[RosterMan]

that is why i follow the directions , like 8 ml Micro , 16 ml Bloom

easiest method of growing i ever did and the most weight…GH nutes and 100% perlite

But you start out less when 1st feeding start correct?

 

[RosterMan]

how am i doing?

I would have like to sat down and had a few beers with you
You are an interesting person.

 

[ness]

I'll stick to soil a lot less complicated for me. Morning all.

 

[user 60570]

But you start out less when 1st feeding start correct?

exactly…….i will do 1-2 or 2-4 when babies and gradually titrate upward to max at 8-16 and some cal mag

 

[user 60570]

I'll stick to soil a lot less complicated for me. Morning all.

like Miracle Grow , just add water eh

 

[RosterMan]

As Foochi once said Its all in the Science

 

[user 60570]

As Foochi once said Its all in the Science

that bonehead needs two terms….one for 40 years and the other execution

 

[ness]

like Miracle Grow , just add water eh

Nope tried Miracle Grow don't like it.

 

[user 60570]

Nope tried Miracle Grow don't like it.

i use it n my flower beds

i also like Osmocote time release ferts and Jacks

 

[ness]

Morning Ness. Have a fun day

Morning late for yesterday. I must have got carried away somehow. And a late start for today afternoon is in order. I hear a thunderstorm coming in from the east. 69 degrees and Cloudy. Sure, am enjoy this spring weather we have been having.
Enjoy pass left

 

[Unca Walt]

I write novels in a peculiar way; I just begin writing and seeing where it goes. Here is an vignette from a work that is not yet complete. I append it here, because some Long Islanders my get a memory kick out of it.

From: The Twelfth Magic Summer <-- For alla youse younguns, we are talking 1952.

We had gone fishing in Cold Spring Harbor on a schoolday. He had said to me, “Slug, which would you rather do... go fishing with me, or go to school today?”

My God, there are kids, old folks, and in-betweens that would never have the temerity to even dream of having the opportunity to answer such a question. Dad had just purchased a Sears-Roebuck Sea King 4 1/2 horsepower outboard motor, and he wanted to try it out. As it turned out, I got nailed by my fourth-grade teacher (an ugly old harridan, and a ***** to boot) for truancy. It has always been worth it. Perhaps even more than if Dad and I had gotten away with it clean. No big thing, but Dad had to write a letter.

We went to Cold Spring Harbor, rented a boat, put the outboard on, and zoomed out into the great beyond. Of course, I got to steer, while Dad set up the spreaders and sinkers on our poles. I was ten feet tall. Also, I had never caught a fish in my life up to that point.

We anchored near a buoy and dropped the lines overboard. In less than a second, I had a bite. The fish came into the boat a second later, and I can still see it today, fins spread, tail flicking. It was an inedible something called a bergall. We threw it overboard after I had played with it for a few minutes. I felt like I had spent the morning in a secret fort, or like I had been inducted into a secret society. I had caught a fish!

Dad put heavier sinkers on the lines so they’d go to the bottom faster.

Bam! A bite. I reeled in the line, and there were two flounders on the spreader. This went on for quite a while -- we fished and fished; using progressively smaller pieces of worm (Dad had only bought a dozen, since they cost a nickel apiece) until we had no more. Then we used Dad’s pocketknife to scrape dried worms off the rowboat thwarts. After they were gone, we went to shore and dug some more worms, climbed back into the boat and caught some more flounders. Suddenly, there were six inches and more of fish in the bottom of the boat, and we had to stand on them.

Finally, Dad said, “OK, Slug, we’ve got to knock off now.”

When I asked why, since they were still biting, and we had a couple of pieces of worm left, he pointed at the waterline on the rowboat, which was right up near the oarlock.

“If we put any more in the boat, we’ll sink.”

{Super careful ride back with panicky bailing every now and then}

What a day. And he cleaned and filleted them all. Beats the hell out of school.

If folks would like some other vignettes, I will post them. They all still have notes for expansion, etc. (as in there is a bailing-in-panic story for on the way in -- this was before life preservers came with rented rowboats.)

Just lemme know.