I'm on my first indoor grow into my second week of flower. I've got 5 plants going in a 4 by 4 room, I know it's a lot. Anyways, I'm growing in 3 gallon fabric pots in soil right now and I'm feeding/watering every 3 days. I'm giving the plants about a quart and a half of water each feeding with 2 tsp of mega crop evenly split up. I'm noticing the plants look pretty rough before I water/feed them. I'm adding a PK booster from mega crop next week I'm probably going to use one time a week. I'm thinking of moving over to an automatic feeder like a blumat and just feed them with a tiny bit of water the mega crop and pk booster twice a week. I'll let the blumats do the bulk of the watering and just concentrate on feeding twice a week. Thoughts?
I use peat moss and perlite as a medium and go by feel, when the pot feels very light and dry i water her, if your plants are looking rough before watering maybe you are over or underwatering? Sometimes i felt like i might have waited a day or 2 too long to water but my plants always look good as new when it comes time to water even when the pot is dry. How many gallon are those pots? Just from looking at the size my GUESS is you might be over watering when comparing the plant to pot size from personal experience, how light does the pot feel when you lift it up before you water? Also big tip, never go by schedule, let your plants tell you when they need water, sometimes after LST/topping or even heavy defoliation (stress) they can take a day or 2 longer to dry.
My medium is 33% each of happy frog/compost manure/perlite. The pots are 3 gallons. I'm definitely not over watering as the day after i water them, they look great again. My environment is very low humidity. The pot is definitely light before I water them.
Just my opinion, no experience with soil other than google search lol How much water do you use when watering? You should always take time to water and do little by little, should take around 15-20 minutes, spend some time with your plants while waiting and enjoy their company . Not sure if soil is the same but with peat moss and i believe soil is similar as well your plants do better with large amounts of water less frequently than they do with small amounts frequently. (Coco is completely different but soil is more similar to peat moss in ways when it comes to watering) I give about 4 liters of water to my 3 gallon pots everytime (I believe there is around 20% perlite in my medium, 20% compost and the rest is peatmoss), just enough for a bit of runoff. Also make sure not to get water on your leaves as it could cause problems, only water the soil not the plant and try to go around the stem keeping the middle dry at first. When my pots feel pretty light, almost dry, i usually give it 1 more day before i water. There are times i was busy and had to wait an extra day until it was bone dry but so far my plants have always looked like they never needed water even when it came time. Just an example here's what i'm working with in 3 gallon pots
Each plant gets 1 1/4 quarts each watering, probably a little more. I water slowly also. I do always spray the leaves when done watering. I thought that was a good ideal? Just straight water no nutrients on the leaves.
I'd personally stop spraying your plants when in flower spraying water near buds developing is actualy a bad idea ive found in biobizz soil cal/mag is a must from week 3 through to flower and the trick with soil is and peatmoss is never let it dry to a crust on top because water drainage becomes restricted with soil clumping up in thick and stodgy soil roots won't like that environment in flower I'd feed every other day because the pearlite helps massively with aeration good luck with your girls.
I'm not expert but i don't think I'm overwatering. Yesterday, before I watered, my plants looked like hell. I watered them yesterday and they perked all up today.
Never spray the leaves after you water in flower, i don't even do it in veg! 1 liter seems a bit too little for a 3 gallon pot and don't worry man when i grew outdoor for the first time 2 years ago i used 1 liter of water for a 7 gallon pot every 2-3 days and had problems as well, my plants turned out skinny and barely had any yield because of it, who would have thought i could have watered with easily 6-7 liters and even waited up to a week maybe longer with smaller plants before watering again (humidity and temps are a factor). It was a game changer when i decided to water with large amounts until the whole pot was heavy and full of water and let it fully dry before watering again, seems to increase the health and size exponentially. When i first transplanted to the 3 gallon pot i think i waited over a week before the first real watering. Overwatering might be a problem if the plants just arent sucking it in but 1 liter of water isn't enough to saturate a 3 gallon pot fully, you could go 2 liters and still get no runoff.
Feel the bottom of the pots. Soaked? Sometimes the pots will dry out with the exception of the bottom. It gets soggy. Are the pots heavy? It has all the signs... Just saying.
The pots are feather light when I water. They are elevated from my drip trays so they're not sitting in water run off.
My 7 gallon also felt feather light after 3 days with 1 liter of water with a skinny plant similar to yours but even worse, its because i used way too little water! Give it a good soaking with about 3x as much water as you normally use until it just starts coming out the bottom and see how long it takes to dry after that.
Well they don't look bad, pretty good just a few leaves here and there. Underwatering can look the same but you would see some brown splotches on the leaves usually. Ph maybe?
Are you getting runoff from 1 liter of water when the pots are dry? That means the water is running through your medium without soaking it up thoroughly, either its your medium that has a problem or you need to change your watering technique. I water 500ml at a time around the edges until i reach about 3 - 4 litres that causes about 5-10% runoff since i use nutes. If you don't have any runoff then problem solved, the bottom of your pot is most likely dry. PH isn't the problem here
On next water, I'll try more water. Reason I'm on 1 1/4 quarts now is I still get about half a quart of runoff in the drip tray the plant sits in. I figured if I water slowly and take my time, all the soil will saturate and any excess will run out. When I'm getting a half of quart of runoff, I figure that's enough.
I'm not sure if you should have a lot of runoff with an organic soil medium because you might be draining out some of the benefitials but 1 1/4 quarts (1.18 liters) should not come close to draining out a 3 gallon pot, anyone else have an idea on why its draining? Only thing i could think of is its still wet and the water has nothing to attach to but i'm not there to check myself so i can't judge.
I think you're right on the money. Fiber pots suck to pull plants out of to mix up the medium. Maybe soak the pot in a 5 gal bucket for a bit to suck up some water?