Ebb and Gro ?'S

[dogstick]

Ist off thanks for taking the time on this. I was just wondering a few things 1 being what is the general number of plants used with a 55 gallon drum for 2gallon and 5 gallon pots? The other is do you guys mostly rocks clones in the 2 gallon pots so then seeds would be better to upgrade to 5 gallon. The 2 gallon pots just seem small. thanks for any input

 

[DrDan]

Hya Dog, I use 2.5 gal buckets in my ebb and gro and at harvest of 8 weeks I have a major root ball but not root bound. I have had very good yields with these but am also tempted to see what 4 or 5 gal buckets would do. "Roots are everything, everything else is byproduct" If that holds true, should see a marked increase in yield especially with longer flowering types. CAP company states you can use 48 of thier buckets with one 55 gal tank. Bull pucky! You will be toping off after nearly every feed and chasing ph like Liz Taylor chased men. My experience is 30 is about tops and of course, less if you go to the 5 gal buckets, after all, you only have 55 gal res to work with. My guess would be eight 5 gal buckets per 55 gal res would be about right. I like to keep a ratio of 2.5 to 3 times the vol in the res than is needed during flood. I have less ph wandering and can go a couple days without need for topping off with H2O as well as making those spendy AN nutes changes less frequent. I hope my ramblings have been of help. Here are a couple pics of my system.

Oh, and I prefer Hydroton for my grow medium. I clean it with flush and Hygrozyme after harvest and presoak it in No Shock just before reusing it on the next crop. The other medium that is well suited to this system is the gro-tech's inserts. I forget the name of them at this moment but it isnt a reusable medium to my understanding. Rockwool and Coco Coir retain too much water for this system though I have read of some success with a mixture of Coco Coir and perlite.

 

[dogstick]

DrDan, Nice thanks for the info. Yea your girls look great in those 2.5 gallon buckets. I wonder if the 2 gallon buckets would get root bound but you say yours didnt with the 2.5 so maybe they would work. Makes sense with your numbers, 30 in a 55 gallon drum leaves under 2 gallons per plant. So you shouldn't have to chase to much. I would go with hydroton or those inserts things. Still working out the kinks but want to get a new setup sometime soon. Either this or the aeroflo but want to grow from seeds so that really wont work.
Yea I just harvested some outdoor and 2 were in 5 gallons and the other in 7 gallon. The 7 gallon doubled what the 5 did in yield but the 5 finished earlier than the 7. well thanks for your input..
J