I'm a couple of weeks away from starting on my first grow with coco, and while I'm about to start the puzzle, I'm still missing the most important piece: Nutrients. I've researched coco growing daily for more than a month, and I can honestly say that the more I research, the more confused that I get. When I try to cross reference things I see here against my local hydro stores, the confusion deepens since they offer 50+ different nutes/supplements. Is there a general "starting point" that a coco newbie should use? My plann is a closet grow with CFL's and 75% coco/25% perlite mix. Any tips would be greatly appreciated.
go with botanicare they make a coco specific nute I think its" cns17 for coco and soil". I use botanicare's " pureblend pro grow and bloom". with cal mag for cal def prevention,big bud and molassas during flowering for flav and mass. the cns17 I think adds more cal then the pure blend to make up for coco's tendenacy to bind with cal making it harder for the plant to uptake cal. with pure blend you feed every watering. I love the stuff, hard to burn ur girls. thats where I would start.
Yeah the CNS17 is some good stuff. I using in my current grown now. along with cal-mag SuperThrive Sweet I think the most important thing you will need by far is the Cal-Mag. You will need it. Hope this helps.
how much cal mag you using? and whats the diff between pureblend and cns17 if you still got to add cal mag? I use between 5 and 7 ml per gal.do you notice a benefit to adding the superthrive? I have it but only use it for clones or sick plants.
Botanicare is a great place to start. The Pure blend pro veg and bloom nutes are easy to use and work great. I use pure blend pro, liquid karma, sweet, and cal mag. I would start with these basic nutes because they will give your plants a well rounded diet and they are easy to use. A great additive is Great White Shark. Its basically beneficial bacteria that helps your plants develop insane roots! MORE ROOTS MORE FRUITS!!! Something to think about that is just as important as your nutes is a reliable pH meter. Do not sell yourself short on a cheap one!!! Invest $100 or so into a good pH meter.
the sauchboss is right about the ph meter be careful the $70 one I bought last year just shit the bed. got new combo on the way can't wait
I have cal mag but have not used it. What are the signs of a cal mag defficency? I have noticed some signs of a nute defficency. Since we are on the topic of cal mag. Thanks -Bug
I am using the Canna line for my first grow Is the botanicare line cheaper? I kno that cal-mag ain't cheap :| just made a thread about my results: http://forum.grasscity.com/coco-coir/737065-how-am-i-doing-*pics*.html
I am a total noob, but I have tried one soil grow and two DWC grow which ended prematurely due to unexplained death and root rot (total I killed 9 plants). Now I am on coco, I have REAL shitty hands for plants, so I have encountered many problems too when I first started with coco. THEN someone very nice on this forum referred my to this link: https://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread....highlight=kiss and miraculously my life was saved. Everything are growing like it should be now and I am very happy. Even my wife could notice the quantum leap difference compared to my previous attempt. It couldn't get any easier and forgiving than KISS method I am extremely pleased now. Here is how I do my mine: - 60-40 coco - perlite. Should've use 75-25 that now I realize I have to water often with 60-40 and that's no fun. - Use GH rapid rooter to start the seed, REALLY ROCKS!! Drop your RR to water and squeeze lightly so you don't drown your seeds, then put in warm dark place with humidity dome. 100% sucess rate and cotyledon ALWAYS break ground after 24hrs. I soak my seed in warm water for 24 hrs, then drop taproot down to GH RR and cover the seeds with some very fine RR crumble. - Use well aerated tap water for extra calcium and magnesium, depending on your tap water you might or might not need calmag. Tap water give better result on coco than RO water. RO pH drift too easily, too damn sensitive to pH up/down so I always overshoot when adjusting pH on RO and no extra minerals on RO, so calmag is a must. If your tap water is more than 150 PPM (Hanna) you might consider mixing with RO water to get ideal 90-150 ppm. I completely stopped using RO water, expensive, sensitive to pH drift and no real benefit on coco. - GH Maxibloom ONLY for the entire grow.. NOTHING ELSE ALWAYS pH the solution to 5.8...VERY IMPORTANT!!! - Water every 3-4 days for seedling, then every two days alt water and nutes after 3rd set of leaves, then everyday with nutes after 4th true leaves. - RH35-40% Temp 72-79F - 400W MH even for seedling, humidity dome for seedling take off slowly over the period of 4-5 days after first set of true serated leaf (make hole on dome and make it bigger till eventually completely off, I simply use PE plastic bag for the dome). I found out if I take the dome off without adjusting the seedling to drier air slowly, my seedling would shrink and wilt. - I use diluted Nitric acid for pH Down to add a bit of extra nitrate boost and now potassium silicate for pH up to give cheap silica boost for strong stem. Not too diluted tho, I founf out the hard way that if you have a solution that is too diluted, it would add too many PPM to your water before you manage to get the pH you wanted. If the solution is strong you don't add too many ppm when adjusting. - DON'T FORGET.. Shake or stir all of your mix REALLY WELL!! you'll notice the difference.. - Buy HANNA HI 98129 combo pH, EC, TDS, TEMP. Same stuff that MrED use. It is a rock solid performer. Here is my feeding schedule: - Plain water pH to 5.8 for the first week seedling, then 150 PPM nutrient and water solution after first true leaf (my tap ppm is at 75ppm) alternating with plain water (feed - water - water -feed - water- water) I do flood to waste method. - 300 ppm after I see third true serated leaves, then water with nute everyday. - Bump up slowly after next set of leaves and adjust accordingly, see your plant reaction, never bump more than 50 ppm each time. My plants are doing super now, and I don't see any sign of calcium or magnesium deficiency sign. I don't even use calmag, but I think I might need it during flowering... Note that I have some grow before and never had any success ever before I switched to my current KISS method. It is toooo easy and tooo forgiving... Once again I am a total noob, I haven't even flower yet, but judging from my MANY previous failure and my amazing success with this method, I am very confident that I'd be able to finish this grow with nice result. Stay Green!!
I feel my method so far is the easiest and creates the best results. Nutes I use: Genhydro micro and bloom Cal-mag Humic Acid for uptake (not required tho) 6ml micro, 10ml bloom, 5ml cal-mag, 10-20ml humic acid. Very easy, feed daily with 10-20% runoff. Amazingly easy to manage, pretty much full proof.
Thanks to everyone for your replies. I see people posting a list of nutes in this and other threads, but the vast majority of people simply list them like a shopping list without details as to when they use them, and confusion is compounded with the addition of suppliments..... I've grown in soil before, using 2 different ferts and water.......Veg stage fert with a NPK of something like 6-2-4, and a flowering stage fert with NPK of 5-15-10. The problem with the "shopping list" of nutes is that they don't list at what levels, but more importantly, when to use the specific things (like during veg and/or flower). I'm still trying to sort everything out, but if I can get a handle on things quick, I'll hopefully be making a trip to my local hydro store for supplies in a couple of days.
I feel your pain. This is why I use Canna nutes as they have an online calculator which tells you exactly what to give them for your water container size and ppm. Tells you which product to give, how much and in what week of growth. Check it out here: Grow Guide | CANNA Gardening USA It's easy. Not cheap, but easy and it works. Used it for my first grow (below in my sig) and got great results even though I constantly fucked things up. Good luck!