Has anybody used general hydroponics water farm? If so just let me know what you think about it or any tips for a first time grower.
I've been using a GH ecogrower that is top feed like water farm, but uses squirting tubes instead of a ring. The top feed doesn't do much after veg starts, but it can splash fluid on young plant leaves and burn them. Bubbles from below eliminate most of the need for top feed even when the plants are young. Both water farm and ecogrower come without air stones, but the top feed is insufficient to create enough reservoir aeration in my opinion. I've since added air pumps/stones to ecogrower, and the plants are happier. Insufficient reservoir volume can also be a problem, and the water farm holds only 4 gallons of solution. Your one plant might create a lot of vegetation that can't be sustained by roots in that small volume. Top feed also leads to clogging of feed tubes. Not to mention tubes coming loose and water spilling if careless. I'm going to scrap my top feed ecogrower, and make or buy a 30+gallon deep water culture setup for the future.
Do you think I should just get a regular dwc system like the rootspa it’s my first grow and I’m tryna make it as simple as possible. Google rootspa and tell me if you think that it’s a better system then the waterfarm
Also how do you get water to the plant during the seedling stage because the roots have to grow through the basket to reach the water. Should I just give it ph’d water and hand feed it till the roots reach the water?
Whatever system you get needs to have a convenient method for adding water and removing water from the reservoir. Water farm has the same vertical blue hose as ecogrower, and it's very convenient for removing tank fluid, but I never am able to see the fluid level thru the opaque hose. Ecogrower has an inlet hole that allows easy addition of fluid, but I missed seeing that in the water farm picture, but if it's missing, maybe something could be rigged thru the pot area. I don't think there's a lot to choose between these, and many others, and water farm with an air stone would be fine. What I'm most worried about is that your single plant might fill your whole grow space, and then the roots might run out of room. Lack of root space can lead to all sorts of problems that mimic deficiencies, burns, etc. Deep water culture can grow huge plants. There's more than one way to deal with seedlings, but here's what many people do: put clay pellets into the net pots adjust the reservoir level so than liquid splashes onto the bottom of those pellets put germinated seeds into rapid rooters set rapid rooters on those to be splashed clay pellets The roots will find their way thru the pellets into the reservoir There are different opinions on how much wetness the splashing should cause. This is a controversial statement, but if you don't have seeds already, consider growing autos. Most growers who have tried them consider them to be easier than regulars.
So when my seeds are germinated I put a seed into a small Rockwool cube, fill the resorver with water and then fill the basket with clay pellets, should the water be touching the bottom of the basket? And can I put the seedling toward the top of the of the clay pellets? Sorry if I’m asking a lot of questions man I’m just tryna make sure I don’t screw nothing up. And I’m fact I am growing auto flowers. I have auto black berry Kush and wipeout Express auto I’m excited to get this grow going but I feel like imma mess something up. Also how many times a week do you take the ester out of the resorver and replace it with the nutrients water?
There is no universally agreed method for germination/planting. I've stopped using rockwool because of the supposed pH prep needed, and switched to rapid rooters, but it's a matter of preference. Here's what I'm considering doing my next grow as an experiment, but it might be unorthodox: (1) Soak in water and/or paper towel til tap root first shows, about 1 mm long. (2) Put germinated seed into rapid rooter starter cubes with the root pointing down, and something like crumbled rapid rooter on both sides of the seed to keep it in place inside, and away from light. (3) Fill reservoir with very weak nutrient, about 100 ppm, so that it reaches about 3/4" into the net pots (4) Put clay pellets in the net cups until they barely cover the water level (5) Set the rapid rooters on top of the wet clay pellets, and fill in the sides between the net cups and rapid rooters. (6) Put the LED as high as it will go in the tent, and install some aluminum foil to reflect some light away from the plants, and onto the tent walls. (7) Crank up the humidifier to above 70% and the temp to around 80 F. This will be wasteful, but hopefully the plants will like not being stressed by transplanting. Most people use germination chambers, then transplant (8) Hope for the best (9) Slowly increase nutrient level if the seeds come up
Perfect you answerd exactly what I needed to know. That you very much and good luck on your grow brotha.
Google it, but my recollection is that they start with too high pH, and must be soaked in pH 5.5 water to cancel out the alkalinity. They also are slightly dangerous, like asbestos, and some people even recommend wearing masks!
If you have the means, build your own. Outfit drain valves for easy reservoir changes, I beleave the independent Buckets are more customizable, allowing you to grow different strains without being tethered to a main reservoir, some strains have different nutrient needs, also if one plant has a problem, it won't spread to the others.
Are those autoflowers? And do you turn your pump on as soon as you put the germinated seed in there? And how long do you keep it running? And does your drip system get clogged up? If so how do you fix that
No, not auto, one plant, 1 ss 315 watt cmh for each plant, each plant topped only one tine at 10 inches.. Trained to scrog screen.... 5 week veg on each plant... The drip ring runs 24/7 beginning to end.... Google, "Scottyballs g 13 labs pineapple express seed to harvest"... Thats the thread that got me started...
I drill an extra hole between each of the existing drip ring holes... I also keep a couple extra pumping columns on hand and pull any that seem to be clogging.. Only takes a minute... Also i drill more holes in the brown bucket, about twice as many as they come with. Don't drill them any larger than the existing holes...I made that mistake and some of the smaller hydroton kept falling through....