I've been down this road once ... I would STRONGLY suggest to the OP to transplant into some organic soil mix that he can build from local resources. You don't need everything that we use here for our organic soil but the basics will be enough to get the ladies to the end with a decent result. The way this grow is going it wont be long and more issues with begin to show. The soil has WAY too much fertilizer in it. Flushing is for toilets and for the plant feeders, has no place in an organic garden. There's no such thing as "Kinda organic"; it IS or IS NOT, there is no KINDA. It's "kind a" poisonous...for you me and the plants. I've transplanted ladies at 4 weeks into flower with no issues - they will be a lot happier and less stressed than leaving them in that soil. Add to that, at the end IF there are any buds to smoke they were grown in that "who knows what" soil mix with chems - not good for me not good for you. Transplant.. get some decent organic soil - get some peat moss without any additives (chemical ferts) at HD or Lowes and add in some hummus and some sort of limestone or crab meal and transplant. You will be a lot happier and then we can help you build some decent organic soil to grow in properly.
I actually sent and searched out an answer to why you don't flush. This is from Microbeman: " » Sat Jul 18, 2015 12:11 pm If someone has too much N in their soil, first assuming that this has been established through some form of testing, second assuming that they believe they have applied this nitrogen in some sort of soluble form, we might conclude/surmise that this has occurred accidentally, perhaps by overdoing an alfalfa tea or something like this. Otherwise we might surmise they are not using organic/natural best practices growing techniques and have applied some sort of available nitrogen (ammonium nitrate, etc) If one is applying solid best practice for natural/organic growing the nitrogen used by the plant comes from N which is sequestered in organic matter and bound to 'soil' (the growing media). The N is made available to the plant through processes where the nutrient is released by organic acids excreted by roots as well as various microorganisms, converting it to ionic form and depositing it into the soil solution. [I should mention that N also comes from the atmosphere but that is not what we are discussing here] This system is further enhanced/accelerated by microbial predation. Because this N is sequestered and bound up, it cannot be easily flushed out. There may be some minimal nitrogen in the soil solution which could be leached out but this is insignificant. Evidence of this sequestered nitrogen is made apparent when a harvest has been taken and there remains sufficient N in the same soil to support the growth of new transplants. Now going back to the individual who 'accidentally' applied N, if their volume of growing media is small enough she/he may be able to flush some out with plain water in a one shot exercise. The downside to this is ruining your soil and plant by overwatering. Better to just wait it out."
Solid and true information provided by Tim here. This basic nutrient cycling/mineralization process. But this is all premised upon solid organic practices. Did you tell him that we were dealing with an amended Fox Farm bagged soil? Tim's info' is why I posted what I did in Post #10. Did you read the information? Imbalanced C:N ratios (too much unavailable C to go with available N) in composts/soils interfere with the nitrification process, leaving excess amounts of ammonia in the soil to be lost to the air (more common in compost piles), or left to be easily converted into ammonium through the process of hydrolysis. Fox Farm soils are built to be used as "soil less" mediums, to be used with their chemical products. Moving on to a new post before this one times out/gets erased/whatever was happening before. I'll be back later...
F*ck this. Another post with a lot of relevant information lost trying to explain why you're wrong. I doubt that this will help, being that you are unable to understand the information presented to you. Soluble forms of nitrogen can in fact be "flushed" from soil. I alluded to this in post #3. In agriculture speak, it's called leaching. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leaching_(agriculture) And in post #18, I explained why waterlogged agricultural soils are not analogous to properly aerated container soils. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waterlogging_(agriculture) Have fun, parrot. I'm done...
You didn't deserve that. I had a really bad day, was in a really bad mood, and am really REALLY sick of the issues we're having with this new forum design. My most humble apologies...
its okay waktoo. I really just wanted to know why people always say not to. I know I can be frustrating and maybe a little slow to grasp some stuff. I've never been good at science stuff; especially chemistry. I really like to read your posts and don't mind too much when you correct me. I know we agree on much more than we disagree I'm sure. I've been talking a little bit about it on my thread. I didn't want to post my response because it didn't seem like it would go anywhere positive at the time. maybe now we can talk about it?
So much of what I addressed that was lost in various postsis covered in these two. I'm still kindof guessing as to what needs to be addressed here because you haven't actually asked a question, but I think I knowwhere you're coming from now… This says a lot… "The'excess' is bound up for slow release via food web cycling as mentioned above.If the plants don't pick up released ions the substrate should. It's the “organic†soil. And more importantly how it's constructed. The soil base in this scenario is nothinglike what we build. The soil base usedby the OP is a mixture of two Fox Farm soils. The ingredients are listed in this link… http://islandseed.com/potting-soil/ WHAT exactly is composted forest humus? That's the main ingredient in these two soilmixes, and we don't know in what ratios it's being used. I'm thinking it's mostly woodchips andleaves, leftover “waste†from the forestry industry. Both of these things are high in “unavaliableâ€forms of carbon (lignin and cellulose). These compounds take an extreemly long time to break down and becomeavailable through microbial degradation. Considering the volume of these products that FoxFarm produces on aregular and consistant basis, do think they are taking the time to develop atrue soil like we do? A soil base builtaround REAL thermophilic compost/VC that comes with an appreciable CEC that isable to adsorb excess soluble nutrient ions from the soil solution? Now without a soil test, the rest of what I have to say onthis subject is nothing more than conjecture based on deductive reasoning. So take it for what it's worth… OP used a poorly built soil with a high C:N ratio and a lowCEC. This low CEC is already “prechargedâ€to some extent from the amendments added by FoxFarm. Probably not fully charged, but mostcertainly fully charged after OP addedall his amendments and cycled for amonth. There is very little, if any, available space on the soilcolloid to adsorb excess available nitrogen. So the NH4+ builds up in the soil solution (no room on the colloid,right?) because the C:N ratio is too high and it doesn't get microbiallysequestered and eventually converted to NO3-. At some point, the levels build high enough that the plant is not longerable to “choose†what nutrients it wants when it wants them. Voila! Nitrogen toxicity… I agree with the last paragraph in the second post100%. I was not suggesting that OP flushhis soil repeatedly. That most certainlywill end up in anaerobic conditions. Andto be clear, we're not talking about sequestered nitrogen (which wouldn't causea toxicity problem to begin with), we're talking about excess nitrogen in theform of ammonium which has become concentrated in the soil solution, and can beflushed or leached away by passing enough water through the soil column. Not all of it, but a lot of it. I rememer reading in one of the agriculture PDF'sI have that something like 80% of the nutrients in solution can be removed fromthe rhizospere by moving a particular amount of water through the soil. I haven't figured out how the measure mightcorrelate to “flushing†containers plants, but I do think the 2-3X volume thebottled growers use is probably a bit excessive.