Runoff amounts: possibly stupid question

[Herb Dean]

Hey legends, this might be a dumb question but hopefully someone can answer it for me.

When you say 15% runoff or 20% runoff... what’s the 15% of? The volume of your pot? The amount fed to the plant?

A friend of mine said volume of your pot but that just seems massive! I’d need to be getting 4L’s or runoff each water for 20% runoff lol surely that’s not right haha. I’ve got my girls in 20L pots and generally get about 500ml of runoff.

Cheers for clearing this up

 

[N420]

When they say 15% run off they mean of the amount you put in. When I water I add it slowly around the outside edge of the pot when I see it start to get some run off I stop. Its not an exact science as long as you get some run off you are good

 

[Herb Dean]

When they say 15% run off they mean of the amount you put in. When I water I add it slowly around the outside edge of the pot when I see it start to get some run off I stop. Its not an exact science as long as you get some run off you are good

Legend thanks mate. Friend of mine definitely had me concerned hahaha! He was so confident that it had to be 20% of the pot size. I better tell him otherwise so he doesn’t drown his girls

 

[N420]

Hey no problem. Checked out your journal you got some happy girls there

 

[Herb Dean]

Hey no problem. Checked out your journal you got some happy girls there

Thanks for checking it out!
The Acapulco has a bunch of her leaf tips pointing down which is what brought me to question my feeding technique.
I’m using canna full nutes and following their schedule which has been giving me good results.. I’m feeding at the moment and have just dialed it back a little. Hopefully it sorts her out.

Because I had an algae issue I changed from a daily coco water to every 2 or 3 days which fixed the algae issue but maybe the nutes hanging around in there for that long is the issue?

Cheers @N420

 

[TorturedSoul]

When they say 15% run off they mean of the amount you put in.

^^This^^. But it's sort of "fuzzy" anyway. If you just dump water in, the water will follow the path of least resistance (as it does) and you'll end up creating channels that allow much more of the water to simply flow through your container and on out of it. If you pour S-L-O-W-L-Y, you can hydrate much more of your medium/substrate and, thus, will tend to have less runoff. And what runoff you do have will probably (tend to) have a higher EC, assuming you have a buildup of nutrient salts in the first place. Whereas, with the first ("just dump it in") method, you might still see a high EC - but it'll probably be because your saucer has just received much of the nutrients that you tried to feed to your plant/soil.

 

[TorturedSoul]

The Acapulco has a bunch of her leaf tips pointing down which is what brought me to question my feeding technique.

A landrace sativa? Many of them tend to be light-feeders, especially (but not always exclusively) where nitrogen is concerned. You'll see that a lot in the strain descriptions of various African landraces, but it can apply more generally as well.

Because I had an algae issue I changed from a daily coco water to every 2 or 3 days which fixed the algae issue

Coco coir is, basically, a hydroponics medium, therefore it should remain hydrated (at least "moist") at all times, IMHO. It can also "capture" certain ions, including but not limited to Calcium, and might end up doing that if/when it is allowed to dry out and gets rehydrated, which might lead to issues, IDK.

A little algae on the surface isn't a problem other than being slightly unsightly if one is even aware of such things (lol). If it's down farther, try supplementing with H₂O₂, assuming that you aren't trying to nurture a "microherd" of microbial life in your containers.

I never worried overmuch about a little green algae anyway. It's the brown slime stuff that you really don't want in your root zone. I'd almost rather have the clap .

 

[Herb Dean]

^^This^^. But it's sort of "fuzzy" anyway. If you just dump water in, the water will follow the path of least resistance (as it does) and you'll end up creating channels that allow much more of the water to simply flow through your container and on out of it. If you pour S-L-O-W-L-Y, you can hydrate much more of your medium/substrate and, thus, will tend to have less runoff. And what runoff you do have will probably (tend to) have a higher EC, assuming you have a buildup of nutrient salts in the first place. Whereas, with the first ("just dump it in") method, you might still see a high EC - but it'll probably be because your saucer has just received much of the nutrients that you tried to feed to your plant/soil.

Thanks for confirming!

I do water quite slowly as I read a watering article on here by Emily I think from memory and she’d mentioned the importance of watering in short intervals to allow time for the oxygen to be pulled through the medium.

Appreciate the info!

 

[Herb Dean]

A landrace sativa? Many of them tend to be light-feeders, especially (but not always exclusively) where nitrogen is concerned. You'll see that a lot in the strain descriptions of various African landraces, but it can apply more generally as well.



Coco coir is, basically, a hydroponics medium, therefore it should remain hydrated (at least "moist") at all times, IMHO. It can also "capture" certain ions, including but not limited to Calcium, and might end up doing that if/when it is allowed to dry out and gets rehydrated, which might lead to issues, IDK.

A little algae on the surface isn't a problem other than being slightly unsightly if one is even aware of such things (lol). If it's down farther, try supplementing with H₂O₂, assuming that you aren't trying to nurture a "microherd" of microbial life in your containers.

I never worried overmuch about a little green algae anyway. It's the brown slime stuff that you really don't want in your root zone. I'd almost rather have the clap .

Lmao thank you!
The algae has recently disappeared and as they’re going into flower I’m about to up my feeding schedule again to see how they like it