I've been looking into different growing methods for a long time, I've always heard mixed things about hydro. Some people love it and some people hate it, I've smoked hydroponic bud that was absolute shit but I'm almost 99% percent certain it was the grower. Looking up bubble buckets, & other DWC methods they all look pretty simple to build, and it would save me some money on soil if I can just grow them in water lol. I would love it if some people with experience in DWC might tell me how its done?
I've heard other people say that as well, everything seems easy except for one thing, I keep seeing people talk about "ppm" I assume it means parts per million. How do I work with that?
You get a TDS meter for dirt cheap off ebay. It will tell your what your PPM's are. the more of anything other than pure water you add the higher your PPM's will be.
What he said as well And some pH up and pH down. With these tools it takes ALL the guesswork out of growing as you are never trying to figure runoff etc... You will know exact levels of everything. Heck get these tools and a good camera and the blades on this site will practically grow it for ya! People say soil is easier... eh I disagree. Easier to fuck up imo. Rootbound/transplant issues. Bugs/fungus in soil more than hydro. Hard to know exactly what the levels of your soil are (compared to hydro). Can't be dilluted, has to be flushed if you add too much nute, and if you flush too much you get rot...goes on and on. There is as much knowledge needed and used for soil (if not more) than with water. All soils are different, All RO is pretty much the same (<10ppms) My advice (if you want simplest grow method out there). Hempy! That's it damnit! Going to start another 'simple' thread about hempy. But it is hydro that is watered and treated similar to soil. It is the single easiest way to grow even easier than soil.
This is a guide to hempy and he said same thing (simplest way to grow hydro) great guide: Hempy Bucket:how to - Cannabis Culture Forums
I would suggest a RDWC setup. When the plants get big and all tangled and buds heavy in late flowering, its much easier to change the water. And if you only use buckets, and have a 600w plus HPS, mine drink 2 1\2 gallons per day in late flowering, so you would change the water every other day or every 3rd day at most. Plan a good fill and drain setup with ball valves, and cover the tops of your buckets as no light can reach the water.
I've always grown with soil but this time I tried DWC. It's fucking unbelievable! Transplanted clones into buckets last week and even due to my over feeding the plants are still moving along with much haste! They say your ppm for cuttings/seedlings should not be over 200, so 100-200 max. I put too much of my base fertizlier in the buckets so my PPM is reading 365. So I poored some water out and added fresh, 0ppm RO water, making my ppm for these cuttings 140. With a simple 3-part liquid fertilizer, a decent lighting system, ph/ppm meter, ph up / down solution it's almost idiot proof! I mean come on it's not rocket science.. plants (not to mention cannabis is considered a "weed") need a few key elements and they rest is just a waiting game! good luck, dont buy cheap shit. spend the extra few bucks on good nutrients and good gear and the results will be 10fold down the road
DWC has it's problems too, wait until you experence root rot for the first time and it destroys your whole grow because you don't know what to do, and by the time you figure it out, it's to late. Let me offer you a piece of knowledge I learned the hard way. Read the whole threads, maybe even print it for future reference. The cost is around 25 bucks and will last many many grows. It's called Heisenburg Tea, plus the 25 bucks you spent, you will save because with the beneficial bacteria you are breeding and adding to the plants root ball will cause the nute uptake to increase, which will increase growth rates and you use less nutes. At the height of Veg, the transition to flowering, I'm around 600 PPM, and slowly ramping up the PPM's to around a max of 900'ish. This is on a .5 conversion meter. Here is the URL: --->DWC Root Slime Cure aka How to Breed Beneficial Microbes Another thread here in GC: -->http://forum.grasscity.com/hydropon...asy-beneficial-bacteria-cure-root-issues.html I would suggest go ahead and order or pickup at ur local hydro store the components and brew small batches as a preventive measure. The roots will get much more hairy looking with the tea. I'll never grow without it again.
Oh, one more thing, check PH daily and PPM's, if you notice some change, inspect roots etc... Let no foreign material fall into the buckets to induce rot when inspecting. White spots, check under the leaves with magnifier for TSSM's, they will fuck you hard if they start to make webs before you notice em'. As you add water back, only add PH adjusted water, when you have added 1\2 to 3\4 of the total water in the res or bucket, flush and change the water. I change in veg every 7 -- 10 days, in late flowering when they drink 2 - 3 gallons per day, it's about every 4 - 5 days for a water change. One more link for you to bookmark. Sick plant pic guide. ---> Diagnose Your Sick Marijuana Plants | Marijuana Nutrient Problems & Symptoms by Picture | Grow Weed Easy When you get to be an experienced grower, pay this forward to the new blades here at GC.
A lot of the problems you mentioned above are not restrained to DWC and can happen in soils, coco coir, aero, inside, outside etc..... I personally think pests are easier to attract and breed in soil as with properly maintained water temp and no light then insects will not be able to breed. I never flush and never have issues but different folks different strokes. I talk a lot about flushing in my 'Simple DWC' thread in my sig fwiw.
I would have to agree, pests and bugs love moist dirt more than anything, and once you get mould or fungus in soil it's very hard to deal with. I'm thinking I'll get a Ppm meter, a ph meter, and start off with a single bubble bucket as an experiment. I have enough space to segregate it from my other plants, ill grow one hydroponically(DWC) and compare it to my soil plants. I want to see if the differences in one strain from two growing methods are significant. Only thing I need to workout is feeding them. I feed my soil plants a half gallon of clean water, and a half gallon of nute mixed water once a week, pretty simple, measurements are easy enough. I just dont know how to mix it for DWC. I use 3 part Flora nutes for my plants(Micro-Gro-Bloom) and I usually do these amounts in a gallon of water. 5ml of each for veg, switching to agressive veg mix once they are a little older 10ml Micro 15ml Gro 5ml Bloom And then transition nutes for first week of flower 10ml of each And finally bloom mix til the end 10ml Micro 5ml\tGro 15ml Bloom As well as adding in B-52,Voodoo Juice, Big Bud, CaliMagic, & Overdrive at specific points in their growth. Any ideas as to converting this to DWC?
I have limited hydroponic experience, I haven't flowered out cannabis hydroponically, but I have used it for mothers and clones. The results were great, and I found it really no more challenging than what I already did (I grow in coco coir), I already used a PH meter and had a TDS meter for the PPM. Hydroponic growth is good if you have access to a quality water supply. I'd grow hydroponically instead of soil less medium if I had an R/O filter, because my tap water is horrible(380+ PPM out of the tap ). If you have some experience growing cannabis beforehand, you shouldn't have any real big issues I would imagine. The biggest difference between soil and hydroponic growth is the time it takes for your plants to react to a change is nearly instant with hydroponics. That is why I think a lot of beginners have trouble, because if you make a mistake with hydro it will go downhill quickly if you don't fix it.
Well I don't have acess to a R/O filter system, nor do I have the funds for one lol. I'm thinking whatever the ppm is out of the tap ill just add into my resivoir bucket and change the ppm myself before I dump it in the DWC, as long as its not obscenely high.
Man you don't need all that shit. You can grow with only the Lucas formula unless you have shitty tap water. Lucas is 0, 8, 16 on the GH line with a 1000 watt light, lighten the load of nutes if you have say a 400, you could do 0, 5, 10. That Grow, Micro, and Bloom. Or floranova it's the same thing just pre-mixed and cost more. I use to use that formula and have hit my personal best of .8+ GPW in like 92 days I think. I now use the GH 3 part, because they have fucked with my water with the clorimines and bubbling it for a few days and adding the green Grow stops the brown spots on the leaves. Go figure???? At the last 4 weeks of flowering I use the powered Koolbloom and it does make a noticible difference in the thickness and heaveyness of the buds. The last week before cut, flush and run a PPM of 300ish. My PPM scale I kinda stick to, pure tap water for clones, or cracking beans. As the roots start coming out the bottom of the net pots, I go to around 300ish, next week to 10 days, i do a water change, and increase to 500 PPM's, the next week to 10 days, I change water, and start flowering, and increase to 600, slowly ramping up to 900 -- 1000 PPM's on a .5 conversion meter. This is important, on a single bucket, when you add back half to 3\4 of plain PH adjusted water, change the water. With a single bucket late in flowering, you may have to change the water every 3 days, which is why most of us use a RDWC. Drain valves and shit setup for quick drains and fills. PH at 5.8 is your target, adjust when it gets to 5.5 or 6.2. Thats it in a nutshell, when you inspect your roots, let no plant matter fall into the bucket as rot could form. I would suggest for anyone growing any kind of DWC setup to read this thread. ---> DWC Root Slime Cure aka How to Breed Beneficial Microbes Buy the stuff now, don't wait till you have to start the battle, only around 25 bucks.
Thanks for all the info, the PPM scale should give me a good guideline to follow with my water. I will probably need to get some money for the TDS meter and PH supplies, but once I have a bit of money I think I'll get my DWC growing started. Unsure if i should buy a bucket or just build one myself, I saw a few online for sale but nothing with any real drains, could be a pain in the arse. and damn, 0.8G per Watt? I have a 400watt HPS meaning thats....320 Grams...from one plant...damn you must have some monsters at harvest time.
As far as PH supplies, Lemon juice and baking soda if you are in a pinch. Little bit goes a long way. It would be useless to attemp to grow DWC without a PH meter and PPM meter of some sorts. You will get problems and have not a clue as how to fix it.