Hey there Scotty, Dude, “the Guru”, and community. Have a question about ppm of runoff. First time grower here. I’m growing in promix hp and im under the impression that I am supposed to water till 10- 20% runoff with nutrients every watering. I’m using general hydroponics floranova bloom and a few other ‘gh’ products. My nutrients say just use plain pH adjusted water every third watering. Currently i’m watering every other day. My girls are in 5 and 3 gallon smart pots, and just finishing up 8th week of flower.
So to the questions:
1. Do you believe that I have an abundance of nutrients hiding in that “rim” and the edges of my fabric pots is where all of these extra nutrients are hiding?
2. Do you think that the nutrient buildup on my fabric pots are affecting my runoff ppm results?
3. Finally what should I do? Just stay with 3/4 or half strength nutrients?
So as a blind man would probably have guessed the first time grower over fertilized his plants in the beginning of flower and they suffered. So now i’m very on top of checking ppm of everything going into my plants and coming out. Due to the way I have been watering the top of my soil is concave where I water as the water takes the soil and pushes it to the edge and this has built up a rim so to speak that the roots have grown into. Now I have been watering in nutrients at lower rates than suggested because the ppm of my runoff never matches what im putting into my soil its always higher, sometimes double or better. And I have been doing 15-20% runoff consistently.
stop feeding them and give em plain water for the next week an chop em down my friend. they look to be about time to harvest if you ask me.
Higher EC is good. Your plant will use up nutrients in different ways and rates. A stronger runoff EC indictates your feeding correctly. If its more than 1000 EC higher you may be overfeeding or thats normal for that strain.. If your runoff EC is lower, it may correct itself in a day or so. If not, its most likely your nutrients are too low. Every grow is different but understanding runoff EC is a great way to dial in your grow and nutrients. My last grow infeed was 3100 EC or 3.1 Yes thats correct 3100. But my runoff was 5000 EC or 5.0. Thats stupid high and would kill most plants. Learning how to read your plants will help more than answers on here. I guarantee I would have everyone telling me thats too high and do this and that but thats what they wanted for EC and they turned out fire. Hope that helps!
In soil I would not water till run off. In coco your ok.