Soil pH is too low

[Msgator1981]

Brand new here and new grower...please help!

I am in week 4 of an autoflower grow in soil. I have been feeding once a week and water every other or every third day. I have been giving 1/2 tsp per gallon of each of the GH grow, veg, bloom. We give the nutes and water at between 6 and 6.5 pH. My runoff is in the low to mid 7 pH range. One of my plants has a pretty good phosphorus deficiency because of it.

I don't know if we should lower the pH of the water and nutrients we give to 5.5 or sow to counterbalance or if we need more nutrients. Any suggestions?

I am brand new and don't know if I am disallowed from sharing photos or maybe I just can't figure it out, but I am certain the deficiency is phosphorus.

 

[Dwight Monk]

Photo Gallery Guide - How to Resize, Upload & Post Photos

That walks you thru how to upload and post pics here. That will help folks help you and give you more accurate advice. Unless it is real hot there you may be overwatering too as I seem to water every 4-5 days except when hot (which it has been lately here so it is 2-3 days currently). I try and stay in the 5.5-6 PH range for my water, but I don't worry about or care what the PH is coming out personally (I'm also in soil).

 

[Scientific]

Photos would help. Don't be too quick to pronounce that you have a deficiency in X because of Y. It's usually more complicated and subtle than that.

Why are you dosing at that level? Do you have a GH chart that tells you to do so?

 

[NaturalSpirit]

I dont get above 2. I am seriously concidering If my device works because the plants look good...

Subbed

 

[Steveolevi]

Photo Gallery Guide - How to Resize, Upload & Post Photos

That walks you thru how to upload and post pics here. That will help folks help you and give you more accurate advice. Unless it is real hot there you may be overwatering too as I seem to water every 4-5 days except when hot (which it has been lately here so it is 2-3 days currently). I try and stay in the 5.5-6 PH range for my water, but I don't worry about or care what the PH is coming out personally (I'm also in soil).

Seems to me that it is important to pH your runoff so that you will know what EC/ppm of the next feeding should be. Eg. If you read 500 ppm you would know that your next batch of nutrient laden water should be at 500 ppm if your nutrient goal is 1000 ppm. Otherwise, how would you know how much nutrients you plant requires at that time? I always check pH in and out when growing in soil. Could someone please post why some say don't pH in soi I don't understand where you are coming from. Thanks

 

[SmokingWings]

Seems to me that it is important to pH your runoff so that you will know what EC/ppm of the next feeding should be. Eg. If you read 500 ppm you would know that your next batch of nutrient laden water should be at 500 ppm if your nutrient goal is 1000 ppm. Otherwise, how would you know how much nutrients you plant requires at that time?

Checking the EC and ppm and constant checking and adjusting of the water's pH is extremely important with a hydroponic type of growing system. Hydroponics is an artificial growing method where the gardener does the work. They adjust the water pH and make sure that the necessary nutrients are available. Much less work to do when a natural soil is used for the grow medium that the roots will be in.

With soil it is important to have an idea of the pH of the water that will be used to water or the "pH of the water going in" as it is sometimes called. As long as the pH is close to 6.3 then the soil does the rest without the grower having to constantly check every little detail in and out.

The water, once it starts to work its way through the soil, allows the minerals and nutrients already there to become available. At the same time the soil starts to adjust the pH up a little bit at a time and this lets more nutrients become available.

Find a copy of one of the several different nutrient charts which shows a nutrient's peak availability at specific pH levels and it starts to sort itself out. But, it is the soil that adjusts the pH as needed once it is poured on as long as it is close to 6.3 pH. With hydro styles of growing there is no soil to help adjust so it is up to the grower to handle the details. If a hydro watering is not very, very close to 5.7 pH then it limits the plant's ability to take in the necessary nutrients even though they were there and available.

Most of the people that participated in the thread have left the group a couple of years ago. Maybe some of the new soil growers will be able to help explain it in more detail.

 

[Phytoplankton]

EC or PPM is much less important in soil than in hydro or coco type grows. The soil has buffering capability, plus, you normally don't feed every time you water, it's feed, water, feed, water etc. Now, if your water is horrible, like mine, you do have to watch closely for lockouts/deficiencies, which will occur more often with high EC/PPM base water, but that's what flushing (when using synthetic nutes) is for. PH the water after calmag/nutes to around 6.2, this will allow for immediate absorption of most nutes, and as the soil raises the PH the nutes that are absorbed at the higher PH range become available. If using a "living soil" PH'ing isn't really necessary.