COCO DTW Multi-Feed White Widow GH Maxi CFL

BluePhoric

BluePhoric

Well-Known Member
Hey all, sorry I've been inactive so long.
This is my third grow... First one in Coco, or DTW, or multi-feed, or GH nutes.

Coco style : Botanicare CocoGro 8" compressed brick. No perlite, no pebbles, etc.
Nutes : General Hydroponics Maxi series (MaxiGrow / MaxiBloom).
Supplement : Technaflora MagiCal
Pot style : Fabric, 2 Gallons.
Lights : 23W CFLs, Daylight 6500K.
Circulating pump : 320 GPH
Watering ring : home made, 1/2 inch tubing.
 
Short notes about the first 44 days of the grow :

- Coco was prepared with PH'ed water only because it was already rinced/buffered, etc. by Botanicare.
- Germinated in Jiffy, like usual, then in solo-cup for 2 weeks.
- WW wanted to grow thin and long. Light schedule was initially 20/4; She stretched too much. Went to 22/2, and still she
stretched like a b!tc#. Finally, I let the lights on permanently (24/0).
- I hand-watered for the first few weeks. Grow nutes (MaxiGro) only, no CalMag.
- On day 19, Calcium deficiency appeared, so I introduced CalMag and fixed the problem.
- I watered once every few days at first, then every morning, then every 18 hours, gradually increasing.
- I probably lost over a week+ worth of veg growth; I was too lazy to use humidifiers and RH was around 30%... much too low. Growth exploded when I put some humidifiers and got RH to 45-50%.
- Automatic watering started after ~ 30 days. Testing different schedules/settings along the way.
- I went up to 4 times/day, then back to 3 times a day as my runoff EC was climbing.
- Watering time is 20-25 seconds (still experimenting), with runoff every time; I give more time/more runoff at first watering in the morning.
- It's been a lot of trial and error dialing the nutes reservoir. Still is.
- After 3-4 days, my Reservoir starts to smell and PH rises continuously. Even if I empty res/clean with H2O2 (Hydrogen peroxyde), still smells after a couple of days. I started putting a small quantity of H2O2 directly into the res every couple of days, and it stabilises the PH and kills any bacteria. Also added an air pump with airstone that I tun 10 minutes every 3 hours (but my timer broke and I need to replace it). I should be able to add new water/nutes to top the reservoir and last a week or more before cleaning and starting over.
 
I'm on day 44 total, 9 days after flipping to 13/11 (I don't do 12/12 and in my previous grows plants flowered even on 14/10).

WW looks great. A bit tall for my taste. 20 inches from coco; Surprising for 24/7 light schedule.

WW_Day_44-a.JPG


Didn't do much training at all. Only thing I did was :
- Topped the plant on day 23, took the cutting and started a clone for a friend.
- A week before flipping to flowering I topped the 6 biggest/highest tops.
- Along the way, I pruned every little stem that was not one of the main 6. I want less-but-bigger-colas this time.

I'm slowly transitioning from grow nutes to bloom nutes.
week 1 : 2/3 grow, 1/3 Bloom
week 2 : 1/2 grow, 1/2 Bloom
week 3 : 100% bloom, maybe, if flowering aggressively... maybe another week 1/2-1/2

I havent seen much stretch yet. IME, the strech comes mostly on weeks 2 and 3. Week 1, the plant is growing new leaves at the nodes and adjusting her hormones ;-)
 
About the setup...

This photo shows the watering ring I made. About 5 holes on each of the 4 sides.
I put a pencil to show scale.

WW_Day_44-c.JPG


This is how I collect runoff...

WW_Day_44-d.JPG


This is my nutes reservoir...
There is an horizontal piece of tubing, with two holes in it, to reduce the water pressure going up to the plant. It also helps in aerating/mixing the Res.

WW_Day_44-e.JPG


Here's the fabric pot I'm using; A brand I did not know and had never seen on Amazon. The Hydro-shop had those (along with the expensive Soft-Pots). The 2 Gal pots were only like 3$ CA.

WW_Day_44-f.JPG
 
:ciao: Hellooo and welcome to 420 Blue!

WW is looking great so far and I like your watering system! I’ll pull up a seat and hang out !
 
MotaFina said:
Looking good Blue....she looks super healthy! Are you seeing any pistils yet?
Click to expand...

A few pistils here and there. I'm expecting her to change a lot over the next few days, with flower growth appearing.
 
Cal-Mag / salt buildup / slight lockout :

Having had a Calcium deficiency after a few weeks from seed, I started mixing full-strength Cal-Mag doses.

Everything was fine for a while, but now I'm having salt buildup (high runoff PPMs) even if my reservoir has relatively low PPMs and I give generous runoff every watering. In the last 2 days I'm seeing some yellowing/dying leaves at the bottom.

I'm using my tap water + Cal-Mag; It must amount to a too high level of cal+mag witch the plant does not uptake and it stays in the Coco.

I topped my reservoir with a new mix, with no Cal-Mag; That should reduce the Cal-Mag by 50% in my res.
I also did a mini "flush" with demineralised water, just before watering from my res.

I'l monitor my runoff PPMs to see if the issue goes away; I may need to do a real flush.
 
Hey good to see you back at it Blue! If you flush use a reduced nutrient mix, never run pure h2o through the plant when running coco. I normally use a 1/4 strength flush. WW is looking great though!
 
Pennywise said:
Hey good to see you back at it Blue! If you flush use a reduced nutrient mix, never run pure h2o through the plant when running coco. I normally use a 1/4 strength flush. WW is looking great though!
Click to expand...

Yeah I normally do 1/4 strength if doing a real flushing. But this time I just wanted to give a "wetter" watering to get some salt out. I started with only 1/2 Litre pure water followed with normal watering (normal nutes) with plenty of runoff... I'll see on next watering/runoff, in 2 hours, if it did some good.

Thanks,
BP
 
I think the yellowing of lower leaves may be Sulfur deficiency (yellowing from the stem progressing to the tip). It'd be related to high PH and I should keep my PH at 5.5 witch seems to make my plant happiest. My runoff is always at 6.5 PH anyway.

Probably a little nute lockout.
 
PW, I ran PH in the range of 5.8-6.2 at first and the plant didn't like that. Had minor Phosphorous lockout. Runoff was sometimes PH ~6.7 (It's now stable at 6.5 for some time). Rootzone at PH 6.2 is supposed to be the MAX for absorption of P in coco.

I just watered 3 hours before lights-out.

PH in/out = 5.5/6.5
PPM in/out = 540/750 (diff = +210).

I'm happy with +210 for now.

I've been feeding at 540ppm the last 2 days (was at 640 and even more before) but runoff ppm's would not come down, and I still had +300 to +400 ppm differential. I think there was too much CalMag in my mix (I use tap water).

Today I topped the reservoir as to have 50% less CalMag in the res and a bit more nutes, and still be at 540ppms total.
Before watering at 13h00, I gave her 1/2 litre of demineralised water and immediately after proceeded to normal watering with 540ppms. The runoff had a diff of +310ppms (850). It was expected to be high since I tried to leach a bit of salt.

I will see tomorrow after the morning watering if the diff +/- in runoff ppms is still around +200.

Good night,
BP
 

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