Tea Bag your DWC

[Papageno]

I try to hold back but some problems this is the best answer. It takes diligence and cash to run indefinitely sterile. Until recently I sent people to this thread because it adds credence. I splained it all a few months before this post came out and I know some on her splained it before I did. I haven't read this in a long time but none of it is news. I just really like the way this was put together. Plus it got old asking somone to get to page 6 on a messed up thread to find where I splained it. Once this came out I latched on.

Most of the people who are running that version I posted got it from here. A few I have told them directly and there is an updated version in my journal.

I literally just made this and made it too strong for week 3 and the Chitosan forced early flowering of a male from a regular seed under 24 hour lighting. So that was cool for getting that out of the grow tent at week 3.5

 

[Winkster1]

VillageIdiot I have been following your Tea now for a while and finally got off my ass to make a 1.5 gallon try. What would be your guesamat at a starting dosage in a 4 gallon container starting when and finishing when. I am very interested in what the chitosan will do to my grows. Thank you Winkster

 

[Papageno]

Short answer....every 2 weeks, 4 cups per plant through the basket through the medium.

Long answer:

So I have found it is strain dependent as far as going overboard. Some strains freak so with chitosan tread lightly if at all before bloom. It is great stuff but like I posted a few times it can cause premature flowering and if done too much too deep into bloom it can cause it to hermi. The whole point is the plant is trying to supper reproduce to battle the faux infestation. So depending on how bad it takes the abuse it may be a bit too much. But don't worry it is fine. If it does hermi from this you back off and it stops. It isn't a big dealio and you can dial it in.


So standard is 4-6 cups per plant every 2 weeks in my soil grows. Nothing more just unfiltered untreated tap water once a week as the bacteria fix everything. Using this recipe I use no bottled nutes and have great plants. I can of course do better with some help from the bottles but no need.

In Hydro I introduce through the medium 2-4 cups per basket. But I run large res. Not less than 5 gallons per plant.

I done a shit ton more then that and it works great but you really don't need it. I dumped 5 gallons into a 27 gallon res once. Did a "top off" of 5 gallons of tea right into the res to see what it would do. Just made happy plants. The second time I did that a few weeks later they said fuck you and went hermi. That was a mess around run so I just canned em. I wanted to see how far I could push it. I was ramping it up every 2 weeks. Ran my PPMs needs through the roof. Clean roots have lots of surface area.

The bacteria will last 5 days maybe more if there is good enough "food" for them. That is why both Advanced Nutrients and myself recommend introducing it every 2 weeks. Give it a week to build up and then let them go to town. The whole cycle of life thing.

Best of luck!



Here are some clones... 3 gallon pots, 1 week veg and right into bloom and nothing but tea and untreated water. Didn't veg them long enough to even get new branches just the ones they came with. And I ran no Chitosan near the end. Tea is the shit!

 

[seeya]

Great thread! My question is can I skip brewing the tea separately and instead add a sachet of worm castings directly in my res on a 5 gallon bubble bucket, let brew for 48 hours and then remove the sachet . I was considering doing this at the start before adding my sprout in rockwool to the hydroton with a top drip system or at the end of the first week and whenever required?

 

[Papageno]

I aint online much anymore but for this thread I will will pop by again.


I wouldn't just start dumping the raw ingredients in a res. There are a few reasons.

But the most important is the whole point of the tea is to 2 things, get it all out of the medium and to bring it to a vigorous reproductive level.

At the end of a good brew the medium that is left over has nothing left of value really. That medium, where all the goodness came from, will just gunk up the works. Even with decent filtering it stays fairly thick. None of it is valuable after you leach out the good stuff. It can cause numerous issues but is unlikely to. It is good overkill to filter out all of the original medium and keep it out of the res. To put it directly in will reduce the life of your pumps.

And (and this is why you use an air pump)

Putting in worm castings alone is not enough to get what you want. What you want is a multifaceted gem. There are many ways this works and is good for the plant. The issue is to get the basics right and you can go hog wild adding stuff.

You need some worm castings and preferably also some Bat guano. That plus Sugars and air and the microbes start breeding and you get real strong brew. On top of that you can add all sorts of things for various reasons that the microbes break down naturally into stuff the plants love. But none of that works if you can't keep the pH at 7.0 +-1.0 and the sugar ratio right to get as shown below.

You can't do this easily or continuously in your res.
You don't want to.

You want the res at cool temps and the the microbs brew better warmer. There are a bunch of reasons not to do this. It will be more work cleaning up the mess.

Just brew it strong and flood the system and all your problems will go away and the plants will stand up and salute and everything will be great. I put a 5 gallon bucket into a 25 gallon res.

 

[WFJackson73]

Brewing Beneficial Tea for your DWC

Why?
Root enhancement and biological control of various conditions that can slime a good grow. A hands on tutorial sort of on how to manage and maintain the system.

Most DWC or bucket bubblers tend to be hard to control temps of the res. This no longer becomes a major issue for the home DIY grower. Use this Tea Bag method in a large multi bucket system or a single. Just as effective.

I thought this would be a great topic for conversation as well as a refresh of what we know and have learned. As well as share with others.

Slime!
Most of us have seen it. or know someone that had it, or has been devastated by it, or learned to manage it. Herein is a method to take care of business at minimal cost, but yet just as effective as commercial solutions like Great White. Maybe even better, for darn sure pennies per application in comparison.

If you are familiar with this concept you know that we are talking about growing and distributing beneficial bacteria and fungi to our root zone and water supply.

Choice in managing a DWC or any hydroponic grow is either run a sterile system of a beneficial system. This thread will address the Beneficial side of this issue. This method will help you recover from a slime attack as well as prevent. It can also be applied to your cloning process as well. I would recommend if you run it in a NFT or drip system that you strain the tea before applying.

Who's on board?

What type of tea bag do you recommend for 5 gallon dwc buckets not connected

 

[Rexer]

What type of tea bag do you recommend for 5 gallon dwc buckets not connected

Thread has been inactive for a long while, but I think @NuttyProfessor might be able to answer....