NPK question

[drumin]

Hey Rev (or anyone who wants to chime in) you posted this in another thread:
If you use something like Ocean Forest soilmix, that stuff is great, but it has high levels of Ammonium Nitrogen (Bat Guano) already so try and not add, or go mellow on anything with high Amm N levels like fishy ferts or whatever cuz that will also Boom out some stretch height-wize fast!
I use FFOF and Peter's 20/20/20 and it seems like this might be too much N combined. I also have Peter's Super bloom 10/50/10. Could I give a weak dose of this combined with having greensand mixed in the soil? Seems like that would give me the lower N with higher P/K but I'm concerned about such a high dose of P during veg... thoughts?

PS, I don't have the time or desire to go organic so it's synth nutes for me.

[jj2ss3o2s]

how long do you veg stuff. FFOF has loads of nitrogen to be sure, but if yer vegin em a couple weeks before initiating flowering then I would just not worry about feeding N the first few weeks of Growth. I wait til I see about 3-4 nodes before I start heavy with the nutes. Then maybe you could use like a 1/4-1/2 the 20/20/20 for a week after that. If you put em into flower when they are tiny, you could just start with the flower a few weeks later and not even use the veg peters nutes. let me know if I can be clearer.

[Gr8Hit]

What week are you in for vegging? The closer you get to flowering the more you back off on N. a 5-1-1 would be ideal for weeks 2-4. Then upping the P-K in flowering. There are so many products out there with additives that can be quite confusing unless you know how to "read" your plant. Many in here can in fact do that. I am still learning to myself...

Please note also that every strain is different and requires more personal feedings unless you are growing all of the same strain consistantly with times of vegging and times of flowering being exactly the same.

One thing that helps me to stay organized is to make detailed notes of feedings and grow scheduals.
When- what date-- What time- when you flush- what kind of water (ro or purified through a britta or similar). Lighting scheduals can be also placed here as some have 18/6---some are 24/0 veg light times too

[Shadows]

Hey Rev (or anyone who wants to chime in) you posted this in another thread:

I use FFOF and Peter's 20/20/20 and it seems like this might be too much N combined. I also have Peter's Super bloom 10/50/10. Could I give a weak dose of this combined with having greensand mixed in the soil? Seems like that would give me the lower N with higher P/K but I'm concerned about such a high dose of P during veg... thoughts?

PS, I don't have the time or desire to go organic so it's synth nutes for me.

When in doubt, wait it out, IMO. If Im unsure the usuable levels of N in my medium I will wait until the plant calls for food. The first set of leaves will yellow from -N and I will feed 25%to 50% (depending on plant size) of veg nutes and again, wait for the yellowing.

If you are in veg, and you hit them with to much P it can cause yellowing of the lower leaves too, but more because of lockout, not a deficiency. At which time most will feed again and make the situation worse. If you feed, and the leaves get yellower you need to flush!! IMO that is...

With what you have, 20-20-20 and 10-50-10, its going to be hard to not end up with a high P lockout. Even if you cut the 2 and leave the 20-20-20 at 3/4 stregnth (making 15-15-15) and use the 10-50-10 @ 1/4 stregnth (giving 2.5- 12.5 - 2.5) you end up with 17.5-27.5-17.5. Thats better but still to high on the P for my likings in veg.

Now, peters 20-20-20 has a high content of Urea for N. This stuff I consider somewhat unstable. Some of it will break down and be usable immediatly while the rest of it could take 1 week to 3 weeks to break down fully. What it actually boils down to tho is a 10-20-20 nutrient immediatly available to your plant, with an additional 10% of N waiting to break down over time.

Just went to check out that 20-20-20, the N is derived from
4.0% ammoniacal nitrogen
6.0 % nitrate nitrogen
10.0% urea nitrogen

so to correct myself a little, its more like a 13-20-20 nutrient initially.

I use their 24-8-16 fertilizer for veg, then change to their African Violet formula for flower. During the stretch, I mix the 2 50/50 because it makes for a good balanced fertilizer when the plant needs all it can get. The african violet mix has no urea in it tho, so the N in it uptakes faster. It can cause toxicity fast if you arent careful.

I've never been a fan for 10-50-10. That may be great for other plants, but our beloved MJ needs as much K as P during flower, sometimes more, and feeding only 10-50-10 will force K deficiencies and infact reduce your overall yield.

just my .02. I hope I dont sound stoned, I wont be for another 2 hours still, lol

[rolanterroy]

OK.... You've got a "thing" here with your combo, first of all in my opinion, you should prolly be cutting your FFOF soil like with 3/4 Large Nugget vermiculite cuz you are really cancelling out the *magic* of the FFOF with the synth nutes. Your plants are shifted to break down nutes on their own instead of via decomp and microlife. Just for a money saving gig, plus that Peter's (Great Synth Nutes by the way) will wicked drop your pH too and the Vermiculite will act as a buffer to bring it back up especially for the P and such to "make it through" the pH "gates" heh heh.

Here's your biggest concern with the High P dosage during vegg bro in my opinion...

As long as you have sexed these plants already, no worries, but, many many genotypes/strains will select for higher male ratios in higher P environments during their first 30 - 45 days of life, or, until they have shown sex, whichever comes first.

Greensand and cannabis go together like Peanut Butter and Jelly sandwiches bro, cannabis LOVES greensand and it also brings to the table a nice array of essential micro nutrients the plants thrive on as well. With your dynamic, keep the greensand down low in the containers, near the "floor" around the rim, that way those big feeder roots will gobble up the K and micros bigtime as they need it. They are better at breaking down mineral elements than the upper roots are in a synthetic dynamic like yours.

Usine FFOF my friend, as long as you keep good container sizes going, and not cutting the soil, you should easily be able to take them their first 30-45 days within a 1 gallon container size (mebbe 2gal) just adding good water (no synth nutes or no synth pH adjustments) like reverse osmosis water or distilled water only all good with jjust a couple tweaks:

Per 1 gallon container size:

About 1 cup of Steer manure mixed with about 1-2 tablespoons of Greensand and about 1/4 teaspoon of Blood Meal all mixed together and placed like I said above w/ the greensand, on the floor of the container around the rim at the bottom, then just fill with FFOF soilmix (don't compact too much) and you should be all great to go with just water. Then when you get to your next transplant or whatever, use the cut version of the FFOF soilmix with the Vermiculite, and start your synth dynamic from there on once they have shown sex.

You will get higher fems this way from most genetics, and using the fan method and stuff like in my other post they should stay wicked stocky too. Cuz the FFOF soilmix is Boomin' with High levels of N bigtime! Heh heh

Whew sorry for babblin' on so much but I hope that helps ya amigo! :D

- REv :smoke1:

[drumin]

Great info from all of you!! Thanks a bunch! :notworth:

I should mention a couple other things like, I'm trying out Beastie Bloom this time around for my girls in flower. I just gave them their first dose of that on Saturday heading into week 4 of flower. I also add 1tsp per gallon of Blackstrap molasses to their water once a week during veg.

Anyway, great info. I hope others find it useful too. :gthumb:

[CB]

say bro just wonder'n why you dont grab a FF 3 or 6 pack of nutes when ya grab there soil? is it not available?

3 pack and BB works for me and is like considered 98% organic.... you can go 100% if'n ya plan it out tho ( alot of X-plants in veg and NO grow big then just bigbloom fer flower)

i figure if'n ya use there soil why not use there nutes made for it as they do work great hand in hand with a easy to understand feed chart

just read rev's post and he is spot on about the veg time and pot size

oh and the results from my double blind placebo test on 4 females trick'n 2 of them into think'n they got some BB results will keep me use'n it :p


grow on

[drumin]

I might just do that CB, but I already have Peter's so once I'm out of that stuff...

[jj2ss3o2s]

say bro just wonder'n why you dont grab a FF 3 or 6 pack of nutes when ya grab there soil? is it not available?

That would be truly the easiest way to remedy the problem.