Nute and water schedule question

[roperman]

I've been following the watering schedule for coco that's on the GWE site, where the GH nutes are updated week to week, from seedling to harvest. My plants are doing well. I' growing in 5 gallon cloth pots.

My plants need to be watered after about 5 days. I mix up the batch of nutes from the chart and all is good. I wait another 5 days and just use water / calmag. This means that I use nutes about every 10 days.

But the GWE schedule is for using nutes every 7 days. If enough time goes by, you can completely skip a week from the schedule. I ended up skipping the mix for the first week of flower because my 10 day nute cycle didn't land in that week at all.

So here's my question: do I use every mix in the schedule, where I just rotate through each mix, or do I skip a row in the schedule and just use the mix from the week that I'm in? In other words, do I use the plant's age to determine which mix to use?

I'm having a hard time trying to figure out how to ask this question... sorry if I haven't made it clear.

[Locrian99]

I’ve ran into a similar issue with the timing. I’d go with as long as you’re not showing any sign of deficiency you should be fine with what you are currently doing. If it’s not broke... I would go by the plants age myself. Also as your plants mature you likely will need to water a bit more frequently. Which may iron out your problem.

[DoctorJohnson]

The important thing is that you say your plants are doing well, and as Locrian says, if it's not broke...

But you might want to do some reading about coco growing and watch some videos. The consensus seems to be that coco growing is essentially modified hydroponics. And with coco, you can't overwater, so you can and should water every day.

Just for comparison, right now I'm growing in a six gallon air pot with coco and 25% vermiculite and watering from a pump in a reservoir full of nutes every 8 hours with a 24/0 light schedule in veg using Nebula's schedule an the GH nutes. The plant is growing like a weed. In the past I have had to dilute the nutes a little more with every-day watering, but five weeks into this grow, the plant (White Widow--new for me) is taking full strength with no problems. I know that's a pretty rigorous schedule, but even growing a plant on my balcony last summer, I watered to runoff every morning.

And yes, I pretty much change the nutes every Saturday, bumping the nutes to the next level in the schedule.

In short, what you're doing is working, but it sounds like you are doing the coco noob thing of watering coco like soil. You can get better performance by watering and feeding more often. Nebula says if I remember right to give nutes at every other watering. I like to feed constantly, so I usually give a weaker solution at every watering as a rule, watching closely for nute burn at the leaf tips.

[roperman]

What would you think of watering 1/4 strength every time? I'm getting what I think is very minor nute burn (about 1 mm of yellow at all the leaf tips) and am thinking more dilute nutes every time, with a lot of run-off might be better for my situation. Thanks.

[roperman]

Thanks for the input guys.

This is my first coco grow, so I'm definitely in the noob category. So the reason I've been apparently underwatering is Nebula's advice on coco grow watering, where she says to use the knuckle method. I would check after a few days and if I could still feel moisture, no need to water. But my soil grows have influenced me - I saw no drooping leaves, so that kind overrode the knuckle test.

Since the plants have been growing pretty well so far, and me being too lazy to water every day, I'll probably water with nutes once a week on Monday, and just water once a week on Thursday. That way I keep up with Nebula's nutrient schedule. Very simple this way.

One last question: Nebula says to water with plain pH'ed water for every other watering. I've asked before about using Calmag in the pH'ed water and got a lot of responses saying absolutely add the calmag. But Nebula says to use pure pH'ed water - you avoid salt build up when you flush with pure water. Not sure what to do given the varied input. Right now, I'm willing to go with Nebula for future waterings.

[Campesino]

Yes, I highly recommend that you switch your watering schedule and completely ignore the advice about the knuckle rule. If you mixed your Coco according to the tutorial Nebula provides then you can water your coco every day.
I follow the same Flora series schedule and apply nutes at Nebula's recommended levels every other day. On off nute days, and when I give secondary daily waterings I give pHed water with 1/2 tsp Cal Mag. All the water that hits my coco has Cal mag. My coco never gets dry, if even a few flakes are dry I make a note and increase watering. You are welcome to check out my journal https://forum.growweedeasy.com/forum...manifolds-grow

[gdogfunkly]

How might this apply to 30% coco/soil/perlite blend? More frequent watering, lower dose nutes? I'm on week 4 of 2 autos (and two clones) and have been watering every three days (7 gal fabric pots). Today is a water day, but could be a feed day. I've just been doing what I did for my photos, but I've been wondering about nutes since there's 1/3 less soil to provide the nutrients. So maybe feeding every time (low dose) is ok in a 30% Mix?