New Coco grower - ppm problems.

[dakotamoon]

I had 4 just germinated Crown Royale seeds from CKS, they germinated perfectly .. I acquired my coco - washed it broke it up.. added per-lite (30%)!

I added a very week solution of nutes ... 1/5 strength .. and ph'd the nutes (dutch naturals grow A, B and 1/5 strength calmag) to 5.8 ph. The ppm measurment of the nute solution was around 600 ppm.

The seeds all have died now, so I measured the runoff from the coco .. wow it's like 1700 ppm...

So I'm assuming that is my "problem"!

Going forward: I am flushing the coco with distilled water - when I get the runoff closer to "normal" .. (around 400 - 600 ppm) then I plan to plant mung beans and see if they will survive.

I'd love to post pictures, but all I have is sterile coco with extremely high ppm, and no vegetative growth.

Am I attacking this problem properly?

Thanks

 

[Chris Scorpio]

U either had something in yet Coco mix, or possibly perlite with nutes in it, or yet ppm pen is off or not consistent

As a seedling, before two real sets of leaves, no nutes are needed

Also run calmag at half to full strength when u use it, like additives, they can be run higher than yer base nutes, that should max at half strength

 

[dakotamoon]

Thanks, I am using bricks of coco coir, and I see on other forums where people had to wash the salts out of the bricks - and there is a ton of salt in the bricks. The coco claims to be between 6.5 and 6.8 - but by flushing it with distilled water .. that may not be a valid number now. I have a very nice blue wave ppm meter .. it has always been accurate .. I know I can't use my local tap water as ppm's are almost 800ppm,, - my RO water is around 40 ppm.

 

[Chris Scorpio]

Not sure how u flush fresh Coco but sounds like it needs it BAD

 

[Chris Scorpio]

Salts good on meat...not so much on plants...


Lol

 

[dakotamoon]

Thanks, Chris - that is the only thing that makes sense to me - that these insane ppm's are killing the sprouts.

 

[Chris Scorpio]

Flush or soak the Coco, whatever yer supposed to do, then test it with pH water, see what runnoff is

Should be same in ant out since Coco is supposed to be inert

 

[SamSmith]

If its compressed in a brick it has to be flushed out. I put mine in throw away pillow cases and run water through it until it runs clear and test the same as tap. I do it in a laundry tub because it takes a lot of water. When I out it in the pots I run a ph balanced 5.8 calmag solution through it until runoff. Then in will plant in it. I don't use perilite.

 

[dakotamoon]

Yup, the one pot that still has a plant living in it, I have flushed to the point where the runoff is now only 300ppm.

So, hopefully that plant will survive, I still hope to put mung beans in the other pots .. till I get the salt under control.

That is with a distilled water flush! PH still around 6.5

 

[dakotamoon]

Thanks, Sam ... You are right .. I should probably start over .. take the 3 empty pots.. put all the coco in a pillow case and let the water run till it's clear! The one plant I got down to low salt - but the other 3 need to go back to the drawing board. I have done so much research on Coco - but there is coco and then the bricks - which are a totally different animal.

 

[SamSmith]

Well there is bagged which is pretty much ready to go and then there is the brick form that needs a little work to get it ready. I only use brick Cocotek without perilite. It works great if preped well.

 

[dakotamoon]

Doing a perusal of people with salt issues with Coco bricks, many have given up and just gotten some Canna Coco already broken up. If I can find some in this little town, I may just do that, I have so many salt issues with our water which comes from limestone wells! If I soak and soak and rinse the coco bricks with 800ppm (which is what comes out of my tap) .. then I am just compounding the problem.

 

[SamSmith]

Your tap is 800?? I didn't catch that. I would just get a RO unit at that point. Feeding multiple times a day you will need it. You can still do a preliminary rinse with it and then again with ro water.

 

[dakotamoon]

Yup, our water comes from Limestone wells, it's chock full of fluroide and many other natural salts! No-one in town will drink water from the tap. I do have an RO, it puts out about 20ppm - which will be used for the DTW coco grow. It is a very small RO system, the output isn't high enough to be flushing coco salts with, and distilled water is pricey.

 

[dakotamoon]

Problem solved: My local hydro store has a nice fresh bag on Canna Coco ..so my coco brick will be saved for emergency coco.

 

[dakotamoon]

I bought my Coco Coir brick from a company called: Milleniumsoils Coir. I have written them to tell them how disgusted I am with their product, I followed the instructions implicitly that came with the brick .. and still ended up with 1700 ppm in the runoff. I have asked "Milleniumsoils" to do something about the $50 in seeds that their COCO destroyed! They are a local Canadian company .. and I assumed buying form them would work. It hasn't .. looking forward to their response.