BigDannel
Well-Known Member
OK so like the title says, I realized today that I made a massive mistake on my current grow. Instead of being embarrassed and hiding it from the world, I'm going to shame myself in hopes that others learn from this.
I'm 2.5 months into veg, two plants in Fox Farms Ocean Forest soil in 5 gallon air pots. I've been using the Fox Farms line of nutrients, which at this point calls for Big Bloom and Grow Big. Things have been going great, no major problems except a slight mag deficiency on one plant. I've been following the Fox Farms schedule exactly as printed........ or so I thought.
I got my CalMag today and was reading the instructions to measure it out. It listed in both tsp and in ml. When I bought my Fox Farm trio bundle it came with a handy measuring dropper that had measurements in ml. That's what I've been using so far to measure out all my nutrients in this grow. I realized that a tsp seemed pretty large compared to the dropper/syringe so I checked them against each other. Yup, I'm an idiot.
What I thought was 30 ml is 3.0 ml. The plastic on the dropper is really worn, and I'm just plain ignorant of what 30 ml would look like vs 3.0 ml. Lesson learned for sure.... I was home alone when I realized this and honestly just laughed at myself for a solid 20 minutes. I've been under-feeding my plants big-time! Like 1/10th of what it calls for! Yet the plants are great, so I can laugh.
This does show me some valuable learning points:
1.) FFOF soil has a lot of nutrients in it to start and will easily carry your grow into at least 2 months veg with very light additional nutrient use.
2.) I always heavily advocate to follow the feeding schedule exactly as printed, but now I'm hesitant to say so (edit - based on personal experience. I still think follow the schedule) until I can do another grow and compare. I think that the schedule should be followed, however, FFOF may indeed be "hot" if combined with the nutrients according to the schedule. If anyone has feedback on this please add it. Next grow I'll be able to report if this is the case.
3.) Make sure you aren't an idiot like me and double-check, then triple-check your measurements. Fortunately I am in soil and it is far more forgiving than other mediums, but this could have been a disaster in hydro. Or a disaster if I had severely over-fed the plants.
4.) Make sure you can laugh at yourself and move on. It helps greatly with stress levels.
I'm 2.5 months into veg, two plants in Fox Farms Ocean Forest soil in 5 gallon air pots. I've been using the Fox Farms line of nutrients, which at this point calls for Big Bloom and Grow Big. Things have been going great, no major problems except a slight mag deficiency on one plant. I've been following the Fox Farms schedule exactly as printed........ or so I thought.
I got my CalMag today and was reading the instructions to measure it out. It listed in both tsp and in ml. When I bought my Fox Farm trio bundle it came with a handy measuring dropper that had measurements in ml. That's what I've been using so far to measure out all my nutrients in this grow. I realized that a tsp seemed pretty large compared to the dropper/syringe so I checked them against each other. Yup, I'm an idiot.
What I thought was 30 ml is 3.0 ml. The plastic on the dropper is really worn, and I'm just plain ignorant of what 30 ml would look like vs 3.0 ml. Lesson learned for sure.... I was home alone when I realized this and honestly just laughed at myself for a solid 20 minutes. I've been under-feeding my plants big-time! Like 1/10th of what it calls for! Yet the plants are great, so I can laugh.
This does show me some valuable learning points:
1.) FFOF soil has a lot of nutrients in it to start and will easily carry your grow into at least 2 months veg with very light additional nutrient use.
2.) I always heavily advocate to follow the feeding schedule exactly as printed, but now I'm hesitant to say so (edit - based on personal experience. I still think follow the schedule) until I can do another grow and compare. I think that the schedule should be followed, however, FFOF may indeed be "hot" if combined with the nutrients according to the schedule. If anyone has feedback on this please add it. Next grow I'll be able to report if this is the case.
3.) Make sure you aren't an idiot like me and double-check, then triple-check your measurements. Fortunately I am in soil and it is far more forgiving than other mediums, but this could have been a disaster in hydro. Or a disaster if I had severely over-fed the plants.
4.) Make sure you can laugh at yourself and move on. It helps greatly with stress levels.