Water and Nutes - Math is hard

[Cheeba]

Skip if you don’t like measuring water and nutes, but if you do your input would be appreciated.

1st grow, happy frog soil, getting ready to start feeding in week 3 with 2 and 3 gallon containers.

For watering, I’m going to water at 15% of container volume:
1.1 liters of water for a 2 gallon pot,
1.7 liters of water for a 3 gallon pot.

For feeding, going with biocanna nutes:
2.2 ml Bio-Vega (Veg), 3.0 ml Bio-Flores (flower) for 2 gallon pot.
3.2 ml Bio-Vega, 4.4 ml Bio-Flores for 3 gallon pot.

These amounts seem a good starting point based on my research but would appreciate input from some experienced growers.

Thanks and Peace.

[Covid420]

Everything I've read recommends feeding half strength of the supplier recommendation. I'm using advanced nutrients myself and have been told a good starting point is 1/4 strength.

It's my first grow too and I've decided to use coco as a medium. Coco coir helps the gardener use high strength and high frequency nutrient feeding.

What I understand about the soil choice you've made is you're going to want to feed nutes and then water and alternate feed/water every 2/3 days. Be sure to focus your watering around the stem and not as much toward the outside of.the pot. Smaller plant in a bigger container means the roots havent established to reach the outside of the pot yet.

15% seems low to me for amount of water to use. Where did you come up with that number?

[Covid420]

Also, if you measure you're medium to a more accurate liter size, you can measure nutes better. Gonna have a little room at the top of the pot. Helps the soil dry faster so you can water more often. Don't want your soil staying overly moist

[Cheeba]

Covid420 Thank you for this info, very helpful.
Folks commenting on other sites say they water between 10% to 20% of pot size, and even 50% which seems too much.
As I gain more experience I’ll rely more on feel to figure out watering but right now I’m just looking for a starting range.


Great info, thank you

[CaptainWiese91]

The best way to do it and learn it. Is just to do it ?
look at your plants every time you feed them. You will now right away what the plant are telling you.
I never go by a “schedule” I look at my plants and they will tell what they want, or if they had too much nutrients.
All strain is different and have different needs also..

[golfnrl]

I don't hand water anymore. I grow with the Auto Pot system. But, when I was hand feeding I went by the thumbnail rule of watering when the container felt light and the soil was dry at 1"-2". I didn't think about the capacity of the pot and poured on the water until I saw some run-off and then quit. If you haven't already go over to the GWE web site and search how to water. There's lots of good guidance there. And the Captain is right...

[Covid420]

I don't hand water anymore. I grow with the Auto Pot system. But, when I was hand feeding I went by the thumbnail rule of watering when the container felt light and the soil was dry at 1"-2". I didn't think about the capacity of the pot and poured on the water until I saw some run-off and then quit. If you haven't already go over to the GWE web site and search how to water. There's lots of good guidance there. And the Captain is right...

How do you like the auto pot? What brand nutes do you use? What medium? I'll be using one myself. How often do you drain off the end valve and how much?

[golfnrl]

I love the auto pot system. Very simple. I needed it because I was trying to rig up an automatic watering system to fit my work travel schedule. That's not much of a problem right now. I use CX Horticulture nutrients. Since the system is considered a hydro operation I use the CX Hydro parts A and B, Regeneroot, Mighty Growth Enhancer, Mighty Bloom Enhancer, Head Masta. My grow medium is 50/50 FoxFarm Ocean Forest blend soil and perlite. The last grow I opened the end valve once, for about 10 seconds. That was it. I did clean the reservoir when I did the switch to flower cause I didn't like the odor. Easy peasy.

[Canuck147]

CaptainWiese91 is correct in the way he waters - I do the same - and for my autoflowers I use full strength nutes.

[SoOrbudgal]

Let's not over complicate this feeding OK. Cheeba When i water&feed i don't want all of it to wash out drain out. I just want a tiny runoff with the food to me it's wasteful to see a gallon of it's food drain out i want it to hold in soil for abit when i just give water then i want to see what the runoff looks like so i give enough to see at least 20% volume of water and i see " brown" come out that means it's removing my brown feeding cause when i really flush my water is clear at run off.