Would it be completely farfetched to mix your nutes in your water, then freeze the mixture into ice cubes? That way for 1, it would be much easier to evenly distribute your feeding among all the plants, you can store it for much longer already mixed, it would slowly feed the plants as the ice melts, and you can pre-make your whole feeding schedule. Just an idea I had while reading through some topics on flushing with ice water
I really don't see any issue with doing this other then dropping tooooo much ice onto your soil it should be fine
Maybe a dumb question but do you think going from liquid to ice to liquid could alter the pH of your solution?
I think I might try this out then, maybe save myself some time by making everything for the extent of the grow at once
One plant people lol... My hypothesis that its going to freeze out the roots.. Growers such as myself have to build sub floors in basements and garages for my ops just because the root temp will drop... Try it out on one plant but im almost positive its just gonna shock the plant..
I'll give it a shot on one plant and report back Or worse comes to worse u could always just let the ice melt before u feed it...save urself some food mixing time
This made me think , when your almost done, about to harvest putting a bunch of ice on the soil , or watering with ice water. No nutes though! Shocking it and making it think its dying, frost is coming, and to hurry up and finish developing.
[quote name='"Love420247"']This made me think , when your almost done, about to harvest putting a bunch of ice on the soil , or watering with ice water. No nutes though! Shocking it and making it think its dying, frost is coming, and to hurry up and finish developing.[/quote] Thats a reallu good anaology it might actually work foreal... Im gonna try this on a plant
yea i almost immediately found out that it is already a fairly known method , it was interesting to read up on , and I definitely am going to try it and compare
The ice cube nutes thing should work fine. But let it melt before giving it to the plant. Cold temperatures impair the plant's ability to take up P and could lead to a potential P deficiency.
thanks for the info, any idea around what temp would be most effective? my nutes are usually at room temp as i buy my water in gallon jugs
Room temperature would be fine. Let it melt and come to room T. You could add a couple spoonfuls of hot water to help it melt faster.
Ice cubes have been used for a long time in growing to aid cool weather crops in hot temps, esp. like the thing in my hand that we're not allowed to discuss. It's a great tactic to carry a cool weather plant further into a hot summer. You'll read where people use iced irrigation water for crops like lettuce and cabbage in the hotter months. I don't see how this will help you save time though, over mixing a fresh batch of nutes each time.
I dump ice cubes on my peonies in the winter because it doesn't get cold enough here to make them bloom come spring.
one time the last 3 weeks of flowering i filled the pot with ice cubes twice a day and my buds turner purple, lol nothing to do with anything just thought id share that.
I just don't quite see why. That is a crap load of ice cube trays made, frozen and emptied into ziplocks not to mention freezer space and electricity to save yourself... what... 3 minutes mixing nutes? Just mix what you need when you need it.