First of all just wanted to say I love the show and I listen to the podcast whenever I can get away with it at work.
So my problem is that for the last year in my indoor grow I have ran into high pH problems for the most part even though my plants have looked pretty damn good to me haha. I am in a 4×4 with a 600watt hps cool tube. I use root organics 707 soil. The whole root organics bottle line including the new cal-mag they put out not to long ago. I have the root organics oregonism XL also which is a endo/echo mycorrhizae. I usually water in my nutes on the weekend and between weekends in the middle of the week I water in just molasses and every other time the oregonism XL. Every feeding and watering is always pH’d to 5.9. I pH it so low due to the fact my soil pH always rises on me and I can’t figure out why. I also was using baking soda for pH up because I ran out of the GH pH up and down. And I sometimes use vinegar for pH down.
So I’ve used jobbs organic soil acidifier (sulfer) and that didn’t seem to work. If anything it raised my pH It looked by what my numbers was saying on my runoff.
Sorry for the long message but yeah I noticed I have had nitrogen deficiency on my plants i have in flower now. The pictures I will attach is first pics of the Bad Ass O.G. Cheese from seedsman and Bruce Banger from seedsman (a freebie don’t know breeder). I ended up getting my pH to 7.5 from 8.3 on my current run. Sorry for the long message and it being confusing. Hopefully you get sense of it and can help me out and understand what might be going on. Thanks and love the show guys!!!!
Stay Medicated PeacEOuT!!!
P.s. you should allow more pics. I wanted to show you pics before chop of my last run that the pH was up to 8.5 on.
Chasing pH in soil causes pH problems. All that up and down changing shit up in an otherwise well buffered medium. What is your water source pH and ppm?
Straight out the tap is 9.5 p.h. And only 60ppms (city water) and what do you mean all the up and down changing stuff up. I water in my nuits and molasses water at 5.9 it’s whole life cycle pretty much and it still rises. I flushed my plants before like 2 weeks before I flipped to 12 and 12. That is the cause of my nitrogen deficiency and I think cal mag deficiency somewhat on one of them also. Before the flush my leaves was twisting and curled alittle at the end of some tips it was due to high p.h. I believe. But what do I know it’s hard to tell without the pics I was ashamed of these so I didn’t really take much pics. Anyways I’m just trying to figure out why I habe high spikes in my p.h…. My pen is a apera instruments p.h.20 it is calibrated also.
Well, I can’t eeally explain that in a way that sounds like I know what I’m talking about…in your post you said you used both pH up and pH down so it sounded like you were using both together. I guess what I’m trying to say is that your soil should have a buffer to combat the acidity of peat and by adding carbonates and other pH adjusters, you might end up screwing with the balance of your soil if you use too much. But with such a high pH out of the tap you definitely would need to get that in range. JustCoolin has good advice about letting it sit and stabilize. I’m just speaking from my own experience man and in the early days I tried to get the perfect pH and had all sorts of pH problems because of it.
The fact that your water starts that high suggest a carbonate source that is most likely bound with sodium and some calcium. You’ll want to let your nutrient mix sit for an hour or more after you down it. The carbonate slowly dissolves after lowering ph and this causes it to rise again over time not immediately. Also your nutrient mix contains kelp which is usually stabilized with a high ph potassium hydroxide. The microbes should help the root zone but not the entire medium. Also the soil acidifier sulfur is a slow process which could take months under the right conditions to change the soil ph. I would start by phing your water source for 24hrs before adding the nutrients. Then wait another hour before adjusting ph. Then wait another hour to check ph again. Organic type liquids nutrients combined with your high water source ph just takes longer to adjust compared to synthetic nutrients. Sodium bicarbonate baking soda is a ph up possibly just a misprint and vinegar is too weak of an acid to combat your issue. If you take your ph too low just give it time to stabilize and if required just add some 9.5 tap water to raise it. It’s not recommended to use both ph up and down in the same nutrient solution adjustment.
Thank you for the information that sounds like a good idea. I wanted to be clear about the p.h. up and down, I never used both in same mix. What I do is fill up 5gallon buckets and gallon jugs and let them sit for at least 48hours before I even use the water. Then if I’m giving nuits or water to my plant that day I usually put whatever the amount I need in water in an other 5gallon bucket and let airstones run in it until I get home from work and am able to use it. I try to mix my nuits 24hours in advance also in a bucket with airstones running. Then right before I’m about to feed my plants is when I p.h. My water. So that’s how I usually set up for when I am going to feed.
So you think I should p.h. My water that I’m about to use and let it sit for 24hours then add nuits wait an hour to p.h. then after PHing wait an other hour to check it again then water if it’s correct? How would you recomend using my airstones with that process like should I not habe them running or is it not going to hurt it.
Thank you again for the comment
I use “Roots Organic” original potting soil (coco based) and recently tried Roots Organic 707 (peat based). The 707 is much different and it’s taken time to get used to it because it holds much more water. It’s also lighter on amendments.
I suggest that you use a larger sack/container for 2 reasons; 1) With strictly organic growing there needs to be a larger volume/area for microbes to do their jobs and supply enough nutrients for a hungry plant. 2) the larger volume will be a better buffer for ph.
I’ve had problems with ph when re-vegging plants which is like reusing soil. So always use new soil every run.
The “Recharge” really works wonders. It’s Impressive.
Your pics show a pretty good size plant in what looks like a 5 gallon plant fabric pot. If you stay with that size pot and plant combination I suggest adding some synthetic nutrients.
One additional factor is that some cultivars are very hungry.
Peace
Thanks for that info. I started out using the original mix also then switched to the 707 blend cuz my hydro store told me it’s basically the same but you get 3 cu ft with the 707blend and only 1.5 cu ft with the original for same price so I switched haha. But yeah I defiantly noticed the difference with it holding more water, I’m not liking that right now because I grow in a basement in Maine and it gets cold in winter time haha.
Yes I’m in 5gallon fabric pots I want to switch to radical bags but I’m a little low on funds being Christmas in all and I’m dying to try some recharge.
I’m just on the edge about how to exactly use everything in the right way. Like I heard Scotty real saying not to water in recharge with other microbes because I use oregonism XL also by root organics and I use that on my non feed day, I’m trying to add in root organics bloom terp tea also. Haven’t used it before and I was thinking about using it with the non feed day with the oregonism XL so if I was to do that how would I add the recharge too… sorry about the confusion.
Sounds like your using almost the exact same setup as myself for nutes. One thing that may help is the order of inputs. They suggest “roots organics”, as you’re doing, get water that is dechlorinated, first add calmag, then nutes, then agitate for 24 hours, then add microbes, THEN PH if you must. With just straight roots original there wasn’t enough, so I’ve gone to a 2 part blend depending on stage of growth. Seedling cup to half gal, 1/2 & 1/2 roots original and happy frog, 1 gal radical to 3 gal use 1/2 original and half ocean forest. Same mix from 3 gal to final 5 gal bag. I use a mix of the dry and liquid (2 player packs from Aurora) nutrients and follow their 5ML master feed chart. Super easy, brew it all together, water in 24 hours later. Yet to use a PH solution or pen, with the exception of the very first bucket I filled from my tap the first grow!