Hi I’ve been here before, but I got a new phone and forgot my password for here and my email. Apparently I don’t know enough about myself to retrieve the email so I made a new one.
Anyway, I’m going to experiment with raising the pH in mid flower. I have four identical phenos to do a side by side. I chose to use potassium bicarbonate crystals as my up. First time using it and mixed in a little at a time till I was happy then checked the ppm and turns out that little bit I added was 360ppm…..said screw that and dumped the mix and added only 70ppm. That sounded better even though the pH wasn’t as high as I wanted.
Is this one of those things that give an initial reading, but will continue changing as the mix sits?
And does 70ppm sound right for soil growing? I was thinking maybe there is still more chemistry happening once the soil is watered in.
Any info to help me understand would be great. Thank you in advance.
What does your soil consist of? What other sources of nutrition are you using and how? What is your soil pH and what are you raising it to? All I have is questions right now before I can give any answers.
The soil consists of composted forest humus, peat, perlite, granite dust, earthworm castings, bat guano, humic acid, oyster shell and lime.
I’m using General Organics Bloom, Bud, and Marine. Typically I mix Dyna-grow Pro-Tekt first then the pH balances to 6.2 after mixing nutrients, but I took out the Pro-Tekt when I first used the potassium bicarbonate and since the ppm was so high, I used Pro-Tekt at about 50ppm for the new mix and upped it to 6.4Ph with the 70ppm potassium bicarbonate. The soil runoff has been a stable 6.5 pH throughout the grow, but I was trying to manipulate it to 6.8 pH.
My tap water is <150ppm at 7.2 pH
Thanks.
I originally went with calcium carbonate but it really bumps the ph and calcium can cause problems in excess. I also grabbed some potassium bicarbonate, which is less reactive since it has another bond already happening. The npk is like a 0-0-50 that’s why it shot the ppm up but not the ph. Trying a lime, oyster shell or other calcium carbonate might be a better option to reduce ppm but still not ideal. Im trying to find the right up.
Right I was trying to add any calcium. Sounds like maybe what I am trying to accomplish is more obtainable in a hydro grow.
trying not to add calcium I meant
If you’re trying to pH your water for soil then dont unless your pH is over 8 or under 5.5.
If its actual soil with microbes and amendments like Oyster shell flour, etc then the soil will balance the pH.
If you’re soilless like coco then you need to pH your nutrients.
Thanks for your input.
You don’t need any more calcium and you have plenty of potassium with the General Organics liquids. There’s no need to add more potassium. 70 ppm isn’t going to mess with your soil or nutrient ratios. I wouldn’t add any more though. If you want to raise the pH of your water source, just use baking soda (sodium bicarbonate). I don’t see any need to raise it though. A pH of 6.5 is perfect for soil. The reason it’s ok to use water with a neutral pH is because the microbes in the rhizosphere will help lower the pH when they excrete acids.
Ok thanks for the reply. I was hoping to experiment with raising the pH in mid flower for, perhaps, the benefit of phosphorus availability at the higher pH. It’s really not anything important to my grow, I wanted to take advantage of having 4 identical plants to do a side by side and my stoner brain took me here lol. I guess back to business as usual.
Availability is the wrong word there, but I think you know what mean.
fyi phosphates really start to lose solubility above a pH of 6.0.