Watering half coco half soil

[braves1995]

I’m doing a grow using half so I will have Coco. With soil I wait until it’s completely dry to water again but I know you water more with Coco so my question is, how often do you water.? Do you wait for the mix soil to get completely dry or do you water a little more often to get the nutrients in that the coco is missing? I’m having a bit of yellowing from a deffiency but I don’t want to overwater trying to get them back.

 

[ANC]

See if you can get some Biobiz fish mix.
You can also do a calmag foliar feed in the meantime to get some nitrogen in.

 

[Cold$moke]

Im not a soil guy but when i was in coco
I would like to let them dry the top out a bit

Need to build that root system to handle the volume of coco/soil or youll drown it

Why did you mix soil and coco?

I mean you mixed living soil doesnt need a ph with inert coco that needs a ph of about 6

So how do you treat it like a soil plant or a coco plant lol

Not trying to be rude just trying to get the reasoning. Behind it

i always ran a coco perlite mix of 70 coco 30 perlite so it would dry faster then when its time to repot you can go to straight coco to keep it wet longer

 

[braves1995]

It was a suggestion from a friend who grows with it. The idea being it has the benefits of soil and coco I believe. You get the benefits of coco and still have the forgiveness of soil. You could also use straight water more because of the soil. That was the reccomendation. Now that I’m a month or so into it I’m thinking one or the other is best. There are plenty of people who mix similar mixes on here, so I know it’s possible but I see your point coldsmoke. I still don’t know how to water it though. It seems like the coco would need more water to get the proper nutes but the soil would have root problems if not allowed to dry out.

 

[Kingrow1]

Treat it like soil, the coco will cause it to dry slightly faster

 

[Cold$moke]

I agree to treating it like soil since it's the non inert of the 2 medias

But i wouldnt say it will be dryer coco has pretty high water holding capabilities

I always had to cut mine with perlite to keep plants from being droopy from over watering.

But to each there own thousands of ways

 

[fearnoevil]

It was a suggestion from a friend who grows with it. The idea being it has the benefits of soil and coco I believe. You get the benefits of coco and still have the forgiveness of soil. You could also use straight water more because of the soil. That was the reccomendation. Now that I’m a month or so into it I’m thinking one or the other is best. There are plenty of people who mix similar mixes on here, so I know it’s possible but I see your point coldsmoke. I still don’t know how to water it though. It seems like the coco would need more water to get the proper nutes but the soil would have root problems if not allowed to dry out.

I've been doing this for several years now with great success. When I first tried my hand at hydro, even though I've had decades of outdoor and indoor dirt grows, I kept running into problems which led me to believe that hydro systems are more prone to problems, and most of which can affect your entire grow, not just individual plants.

That's when I switched to the Hempy Bucket and I never looked back - it has to be the simplest and idiot-proof method out there, imo. I liked the fact that quick drainage made adjusting nutes easy with faster reaction time, not to mention much quicker flushing times and less water use than soil. That said, I did notice that when plants got larger, especially if you're pushing the boundary of the bucket's size, that if you're not careful they can dry out too quickly causing unnecessary stress and damage to the root system. In my case this happens more often when I want to go away for a few days, seemed anywhere near the latter stages, more than 2-3 days could spell trouble.

So with my xp with dirt, I decided to start adding a percentage of soil to my Hempy system in order to give them the ability to hold water/nutes for a longer time and make it more forgiving. What I found was that it worked quite well, and so each grow I added a little more, found a point where it was too much, and so settled on about 35-40% soil added to the coco/perlite mix as working best (Edit - should add that that's more by weight than volume). Btw I also use lava rock for the res, the cheap red stuff you can find in the garden section of most builders supplies.

Another benefit is that you can add some nice organic ingredients in the soil, giving the plants access to a lot of micro nutrients not available with coco/perlite and a much better environment for beneficial bacteria and mycorrhizae to thrive in, something Hempy systems aren't great at imo. It does have the disadvantage of making flushing more work and needs lots more water to flush fully, but it's a minor drawback considering the benefits. I now find I can easily leave my girls untended for up to 3 days, even near harvest, without any serious issues. I think of it as a hybrid system and it certainly works for me anyway ;?)

 

[braves1995]

I've been doing this for several years now with great success. When I first tried my hand at hydro, even though I've had decades of outdoor and indoor dirt grows, I kept running into problems which led me to believe that hydro systems are more prone to problems, and most of which can affect your entire grow, not just individual plants.

That's when I switched to the Hempy Bucket and I never looked back - it has to be the simplest and idiot-proof method out there, imo. I liked the fact that quick drainage made adjusting nutes easy with faster reaction time, not to mention much quicker flushing times and less water use than soil. That said, I did notice that when plants got larger, especially if you're pushing the boundary of the bucket's size, that if you're not careful they can dry out too quickly causing unnecessary stress and damage to the root system. In my case this happens more often when I want to go away for a few days, seemed anywhere near the latter stages, more than 2-3 days could spell trouble.

So with my xp with dirt, I decided to start adding a percentage of soil to my Hempy system in order to give them the ability to hold water/nutes for a longer time and make it more forgiving. What I found was that it worked quite well, and so each grow I added a little more, found a point where it was too much, and so settled on about 35-40% soil added to the coco/perlite mix as working best (Edit - should add that that's more by weight than volume). Btw I also use lava rock for the res, the cheap red stuff you can find in the garden section of most builders supplies.

Another benefit is that you can add some nice organic ingredients in the soil, giving the plants access to a lot of micro nutrients not available with coco/perlite and a much better environment for beneficial bacteria and mycorrhizae to thrive in, something Hempy systems aren't great at imo. It does have the disadvantage of making flushing more work and needs lots more water to flush fully, but it's a minor drawback considering the benefits. I now find I can easily leave my girls untended for up to 3 days, even near harvest, without any serious issues. I think of it as a hybrid system and it certainly works for me anyway ;?)

Thanks for the info. So how do you do your watering. Do you let it dry out completely? Do you use more nutes than normal soil?

 

[fearnoevil]

Brave, well a lot of it is just feel, something you develop with time and experience with your exact setup and since there are so many variables it's hard to give detailed advice. That said, I don't let them dry out too much, although in the early stages it's always better to err a bit on the dry side since over-watering is certainly one of the main bugaboos of this hobby. We fuss and tend to them too much and end up killing them with kindness, lol.

In the early stages, since their roots haven't reached the reservoir at the bottom, you only need light waterings - how often depends on the ratio of your mixture, temps and ambient humidity. If you're uncertain about the moisture content, just poke your finger down into the medium about a couple of inches to see if it feels moist, but once you feel confident that the root system has reached the res, then space out feedings (3-4 days say) and when you do feed, make sure to add enough so that you get a little overflow, 10-15% say, so you keep it fresh (if you never water to overflowing then nutrient salts could build up and cause you some issues).

As your grow progresses, try to get an idea of what your buckets weigh right after a feeding and then again when they're definitely in need of water. Also dependent upon the strain, and especially if you have a fair amount of soil added to the mix, you can alternate between feeding nutes one time and then watering the next, adjusting nute strength if you begin to get nute burn, or simply watering twice say to every feeding. You just have to find out how to dial in your system, and that's probably going to take a few grows before you get it where you know where that sweet spot is.

I admit that I try to push my girls to the max (after they've gotten well started) and then back off and watch for nute burn like a hawk. I'm convinced that serious nute burn can stunt growth or at least slow development, and when I see nute burn I will flush with water, make adjustments to the nute strength, and then I cut off the damaged tips of any leaves so that next time I check it's easier to identify new damage from old.

Btw, this works best when you run the same strain several times, but if you're like a lot of folks, they end up growing different strains every grow making it harder because you won't know if a problem is specific to your system or if it's the strain(s) you're growing (been there, done that ;?). Patience and an eye for detail are crucial, and taking notes helps you to recognize patterns as well. That's it in a nutshell, follow my advice and you'll be an expert in no time.... just kidding, you can do this hobby half your life and you'll find there's still things to learn dude, but good luck and grow well ;?)

 

[fearnoevil]

One last bit of advice, and the best I've found over the many years I done this is just to KEEP IT SIMPLE. I've gone from one extreme to the other and then back again, and it all comes back to the fact that these really aren't hard plants to grow, they have a certain set of requirements, proper lighting, proper growth medium and proper nutrients, and indoors add proper heat and humidity.

Most of it is pretty straight forward, certainly a lot of variables to chose from, but like I stated earlier, the Hempy system is best in my opinion exactly because IT IS SIMPLE, none of the complexities and wide range of problems (not to mention expense $$$) you can run into with various hydro setups, more forgiving and easier to correct than straight soil and can be scaled from small grow closets to massive commercial grows. I know folks will disagree, lol, but just my experience.

And one more thing, KEEP THE NUTES SIMPLE, don't fall for all the bullshit additives and growth/bud enhancers, ESPECIALLY the expensive ones, and in fact a good rule of thumb (yes, yes in general ;?) is that the more expensive it is, the less likely it is that it's necessary or even works at all. I've dialed it back to using the Jack's system of dry nutes along with GH Floramicro, a kelp extract and fulvic acid solution (as a foliar this works early to increase the development of internodes but be very careful with this lol), silica (for stronger branches and disease resistance) GH Subcultures B & M (healthy bennies increase nute uptake, decrease pathogens and even improve a plants immune system), and molasses (really just to feed the bennies) pretty much it. Sorry to ramble, lol, a symptom of senility I think ;?D

 

[braves1995]

Great advise! I’m trying to simplify it as much as possible. Thanks!

 

[resinousflowers420]

I grow in a 40/60 coco/peat mix and treat it just like soil.

 

[Cold$moke]

I grow in a 40/60 coco/peat mix and treat it just like soil.

Do you add amendments?

 

[KhanTheOG]

I grow in a 40/60 coco/peat mix and treat it just like soil.

Hydroponic nutes? Or dry organic items?

 

[MickFoster]

Hydroponic nutes? Or dry organic items?

I doubt you'll get a reply.........he/she hasn't been here in 3 years.