I put my clones in yesterday they looked good but I didn't get a close pic. Today they are looking dry and two look almost dead. My system is an ebb and grow monster (I've only done one other grow and it wasn't ebb and flow it was bubble bucket). I'm not sure how many times I should water or if my lights are to close (last time I used led and cfls). I have air cooled hoods with 600watt hps with enhanced spectrum bulbs (but they are turned down to 360w) they are about 3 feet above the ladies. Co2 is at around 1400, humidity is about 45% and temp is 75 to 80 degrees. Totally sealed room. I've read some ones thread that had smaller ebb and grow that watered 4 times a day (that's what I started at). I have friend that has a drip system that waters every three hours. PPM's are going up without adding nutes. Started at 250 PPM and now it's at 371 PPM's! Could it be because we rinsed hydroton with tap instead of RO water? Any input would be way helpful!!
here are some pics. The overall shot was right after transplanting. We also are hand watering as well. Anyone knowledgeable on ebb and flow or babies??
Im gonna take a guess and say yes the ppm could be increased by washing with tap water since it typically has a high lvl of PPMs, but it doesnt seem very possible if you consider the amount of water involved ... As far as your clones go you did make sure they had a decent root structure before putting them in your hydro system didnt you?
If your PPM's went up without adding nutrients, your PPM is too high for the plants. Even though 250 is a pretty low PPM, I would suggest adding more water to get the PPM back to 200. Watch where the PPM goes for a couple of day (if it stays the same/decreases, it is good, if it rasies, it's too strong.) Do you have a water chiller? If not, what is the temperature of the water? How are the roots?
Yep, in fact we were supposed to plant one week earlier but the first Monster we bought had a major defect and flooded the room. We had to wait for another one to come in. The roots were hanging about two inches on a couple. We ended up changing the res (with RO water) and took some of the hydroton out and lowered the cubes. We measured this time to make sure the water was hitting them, we're pretty sure the water wasn't hitting them before. We had to replace 4 clones and we're real lucky we had them! We also raised the lights just a bit more! We'll see what happens. Thanks for the reply!
Hey marduk, That's really good to know. We didn't know PPM's went up if you started out too high. That's a good way to gauge where you should start! If too much, it's easy to change the res. I wish we would have read this before we changed, because we started out about 280 this time. It's been about 24 hours and it's gone up about 20 points already. If it keeps going up after a couple days, should we change the res again, lower the PPM's? The roots are good, we raised the lights a bit more and the res is external and heated to 75 to 80 degrees. We will definately keep watching the PPM's and keep you posted. Thanks for all the input!!
If the PPM continues to climb I would definitely change the rez and keep the PPM's lower, and keep it there until they show positive growth. Can you take a picture of the roots? If you are heating the rez to 80, you're most likely going to cause youreself to have root rot, if you haven't already. The ideal temp for a rez is around 68-70 degrees. I never let the water get over 75 in mine, and even that's stretching it in my eyes.
The rez evened out about 330ppm and I think I'm good with that. After you asked about the temp I watched it closer it never went over 76 I it set at 75 I thought I read never under 68 and not above 80 but you do so much reading It all starts blending together I just lowered the tank heater to 70 thank you I don't want root rot. All but one is doing better now heres three of the eight that are doing better here is the one that looks dry in the middle I might replace it Here is one of the last clones that looks good, the roots on the ones I planted were longer thanks for the help
If you have other clones, I would replace the one that is still looking bad. Also, if you have your clones rooting in those "inserts," you should give the roots more room to grow once the roots start coming out. This isn't a necessity, just a suggestion. When they are bound like that it's a complete cluster fck inside the insert. They will find their way out eventually though. I'm glad they are turning around.