Hey GC, I've been doing some practicing to learn a thing or two about growing indoors, and I've ran into some problems with my attempts. Now I've never really intended to follow through with a grow from beginning to end, because I've never had even a proper budget setup. But I've had enough to get through at least a few weeks of vegging. In the past two attempts, my plants had gotten locked out, which I've pinned on a pH issue. I've ordered a pH meter and the General Hydroponics pH up and down kit, so I'm excited about that, but I have some questions. The meter I chose was an admittedly cheap one. It's the etekcity ph-009, and it doesn't have a probe for soil. Will this be an issue, or is testing the water and runoff, then adjusting accordingly enough? Also, I currently have a soiless, organic seedling starter mix from walmart. The contents on the bag read as follows: Shpagnum peat moss, horticultural vermiculite, perlite, and an orgainic wetting agent.(it looks as if there are flakes of pyrite in it, so I'm assuming that's the wetting agent,) I've heard with peat moss, you should add dolomite lime as it's pretty acidic. would it be okay to top with lime then water? I've read that lime can take up to months to be effective? Any words of advice or a sharing of experience would be great.
Good soil that is alive buffers ph so you dont need to worry about it. Put them in FFOF soil for 1 month and water when top 2-3 inchs soil is dry. Add your perlite to the FFOF soil to add aeration.
Get Oregon only brand soil or fox farm soil and you'll never worry about pH it self stabilizes pH so u can water str8 from the tap bruddah...
I'll be transplanting to FFOF. I've heard in the past that it's too hot for seedlings though. Can you start in it?
I have 11 plants a couple weeks from harvest that started from seeds in a 60% FFOF / 40% Coco Coir mix. So yeah, you should be able to start in it. No worries.
I started right from seed in FFOF and im about 2-3 weeks shy of harvest and still having no problems. Nor did i when they were seedlings
FFOF is hot but for most strains seedlings have no issues with it. They make a light soil for seedling but is not needed in my op.
Yep i also forgot to mention mine are autoflowers which are nute sensitive and using FFOF and fox farm trio nute's ive still yet to have any nute burn. They aren't kidding when they say auto's aren't very hungry.. Im on day 60 on my 60 day lemon (will be around a 75-85 day lemon lol) and i have needed to fed three time's there entire life. Wasn't even able to work my way up to full strength either.. started at a quarter then half and last feeding was 3/4 and she's about ready to chop soon!
Thanks for the input guys I really appreciate it. I'll also be using Fox Farm's nutes. It'll be a week or so until i can get into soil due to funds however as the closest hydro store is 40mins away, and judging by their website's prices, I'll be better off ordering from amazon. So since it will be a week, I'm still dealing with low pH, but my stuff should be here today. I might just go pick up some lime today to be safe, and look around for anything else I could use. Will I need Cal-Mag if I'll be using the fox farm nutes?
Got my ph up and down kit and meter today, I'll go out and grab some cal-mag tomorrow, then getting the rest on Friday. Subbed into your journal btw. Your girls are looking great.
you will def need it.. next year im going advanced nutrients nutes cuz they are ph perfect and im tired of phing my water all the time lol. it gets annoying! but my plants loved it so it's worth it. and thanks for subbing my man! i havent been out to check on them in about 6 days due to we have had 5 inches of rain in the last week so havent really needed to lol. next time i go out there im taking them from the plot and bringing them home to finish up out in the backyard! they are 60 day lemon kush auto's and today is day 60 exactly and they probably have anywhere from 14-28 days left lol.. crazy how off they were about the 60 days! who know's they could have really swelled up in this last week but i really doubt it. once i get em home ill take some pics and check the trichs to see where they are. if they are 100% clear ill probably feed one last time if they are starting to get cloudy ill probably water from here on out and pull once i start seeing some amber im getting excited! let's hope no chopper decide to fly over and fuck up my harvest lol