Soil new grower

[Boco2017]

I am using happy frog right now and it seems like no matter what I do the soil is never moist the top 1/4 inch gets wet and it drains well but if you dig down some the soil is bone dry any thoughts on how to get the soil to absorb more of the water? I have read to try and soak the pots for about 10 minutes but that dose not seem like a great idea to me. I have 2 seedlings (2 weeks old) in small pots and I have a clone (4 weeks) in a medium nursery pot. The medium pot seems to have the biggest issue with the soil. It may be a dumb question but I can't seem to get the soil to be actually moist and they dry out in a few hours..

[Californiakid]

A suggestion...
Try soaking the soil before you plant anything in it. Really saturate it well. Allow a couple of days to drain and go from there. Once all of the soil is moist it will take water better with future watering. It's weird, like a dry towel won't clean up a spill as well as a moistened towel. Seems counter intuitive but it's true.

[Boco2017]

I had done that but I may have needed to soak it a bit more. I will try and soak it down tonight in a bucket of ph'd water to try and get it to fully moisten. Like I said I made it moist but I didn't saturate it soak it so that may be my issue. Thank you for your suggestion.

[Boco2017]

They are perking up! I tried to soak them a bit but the soil didn't seem to interested in holding water. After talking to a local hydro shop here in Colorado they recommend adding a yucca supplement to help restore the dry soil. It seems to be helping alot already. But the soil seem to also have a phone I'm balance I'm watering with 6.5 pH and the drain off is testing at about 8.. I'm going to try flushing out the soil with some lower pH water hopefully that helps resolve the phone issue and I should be good to go.

[BlueBudz]

These plants need more light I think.

[Boco2017]

They currently have about 250 watts on them it looks darker in the picture then it actually has. I have considered upgrading to a LED set up but that may be a grow or two down the road. And the tent is about 3x4x5.

[D.A.A.S.69]

Evening Boco2017, I learned long ago don't trust what the soil ph, is written on the bag or what they say it is until you check it first.
. PS. I don't ever water my MJ, until the leaves first start drooping a little from lack of water. Was that Yucca supplement very expensive ? Why not just add more perlite ?
Good luck 2017.

[Boco2017]

It was not to expensive ($20 per qt needing 5 ml per 5 gallons), and my soil would not take water at all I was trying to get all the soil moist but even fresh after watering about a 1/4 inch down was bone dry. And about 95% of the water would run off. And it already has a pretty heavy perlite ratio but when I transplant again to a bigger pot I will probably add a little more but we will see. And the soil pH is a lesson learned for sure. The soil is now wet all through so I'm going to let is be till it's dry again and see how it dose. Tha k you for your feedback.

[D.A.A.S.69]

You are very welcome Boco2017, good luck an happy growing.

[BlueBudz]

If your certain they are dry I would give them a good watering from the top and let a half inch of water sit the the trays for an hour and it should wick up into the soil. And remember equivalent wattage on bulbs are only for the human eye not for plants. The actual used wattage is what the plants are getting.

[Boco2017]

Yea I have heard that the wattage is different I'm not entirely sure how to find the wattage the plants get. And in my next grow or two I plan to upgrade to LED lighting because I will be in a new place with more room to grow. The soil finnally started holding water with the yucca supplement. I did also find that it was time to transplant again the clone was about to become root bound only a week and a half since the last transplant I also made the perlite ratio closer to 40% so that should help also. My pH is finally leveling out around 6.5 and I can see the plant starting to look better also.