DIY Hydroponic Nutrients in 5 minutes

Michael Huntherz said:
What’s your preferred target for N? Initially I was at 125-150, and I cannot remember why I brought it down, but it is still working. Do you feel like a 2-1-3 ratio, roughly, is a good starting point?
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For N, I usually try to get around 200ppm. 2-1-3 (in terms of P2O5 and K2O equivalents), is good. I normally go for around 1 : 0.8 : 1.4

Michael Huntherz said:
I think I will try to get closer to that U of FL formula going forward, ordering some Ca nitrate and Fe DTPA, thanks a bunch.
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It's hard to imagine people growing hydroponically and not having a supply of calcium nitrate. I consider it the main ingredient yet most on RIU see it as a supplement or want to avoid adding N so they avoid calcium nitrate. Iron DTPA is also really nice to have laying around. You'll have to enter in into hydrobuddy as a substance based on what percentage Fe it has.
 
churchhaze said:
For N, I usually try to get around 200ppm. 2-1-3 (in terms of P2O5 and K2O equivalents), is good. I normally go for around 1 : 0.8 : 1.4



It's hard to imagine people growing hydroponically and not having a supply of calcium nitrate. I consider it the main ingredient yet most on RIU see it as a supplement or want to avoid adding N so they avoid calcium nitrate. Iron DTPA is also really nice to have laying around. You'll have to enter in into hydrobuddy as a substance based on what percentage Fe it has.
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I would have purchased Ca nitrate by now, but this one part formula has worked pretty well for me so far. It seems like one of the essential chemical salts for hydroponics to me, too. People think of it as a supplement? Interesting.

The Oasis mix has three kinds of iron and says it has uptake effective up to pH 8.0, as far as I can tell, it’s true. My reservoirs run right around 7.0 most of the time, but sometimes mid 7s and the plants seem to do equally well as when I was running around 6.0

Folks are funny about chemistry, a lack of scientific literacy causes a lot of weird behavior. I am a high school dropout, but I look around and feel strangely well-educated sometimes.

I made a new recipe the other day based on your suggestions, and will use it next run. I am targeting about 150ppm of N, and yes I meant 2-1-3 like what gets printed on product labels, assuming primarily p2o5 and k2o.

I am sort of surprised you run N at 200ppm, but if you are pushing them hard I suppose it makes sense. I bet your veg cycle is short because they grow so fast. :joint: Cheers, and thanks so much.
 
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churchhaze said:
For N, I usually try to get around 200ppm. 2-1-3 (in terms of P2O5 and K2O equivalents), is good. I normally go for around 1 : 0.8 : 1.4



It's hard to imagine people growing hydroponically and not having a supply of calcium nitrate. I consider it the main ingredient yet most on RIU see it as a supplement or want to avoid adding N so they avoid calcium nitrate. Iron DTPA is also really nice to have laying around. You'll have to enter in into hydrobuddy as a substance based on what percentage Fe it has.
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growing with hard water normally requires much less calcium since it is available in the water. GH has a recipe especially made for hard water to avoid adding too much calcium. I grow in hard water and have found that I must add less calcium nitrate than other things. If I am using GH for hard water, I don't have to add any calcium at all, just some magnesium.
 
zem said:
growing with hard water normally requires much less calcium since it is available in the water. GH has a recipe especially made for hard water to avoid adding too much calcium. I grow in hard water and have found that I must add less calcium nitrate than other things. If I am using GH for hard water, I don't have to add any calcium at all, just some magnesium.
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I do use less calcium nitrate in my mix than I would if i had softer water, but when looking for that perfect level, I went a bit too low on Ca and had to bump it up. That's one of the reasons I didn't share my own recipe in this thread. I was looking for the perfect hard water solution for my own water and I figured it wouldn't be useful to people growing in RO or softer tap water. I still use a ton of calcium nitrate even in very hard water.
 
churchhaze said:
I do use less calcium nitrate in my mix than I would if i had softer water, but when looking for that perfect level, I went a bit too low on Ca and had to bump it up. That's one of the reasons I didn't share my own recipe in this thread. I was looking for the perfect hard water solution for my own water and I figured it wouldn't be useful to people growing in RO or softer tap water. I still use a ton of calcium nitrate even in very hard water.
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Why do you still use too much calcium with very hard water? How many grams per liter do you put on average and for what base ppm hard water?
 
zem said:
Why do you still use too much calcium with very hard water? How many grams per liter do you put on average and for what base ppm hard water?
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Nitrate based sources of N are our friends, extra calcium won’t hurt them any. Many commercial hydroponic systems use a lot of Calcium Nitrate. My guess is his mix probably adjusts for the hard water’s more alkaline pH, rather than cut back too much on minerals. Only my guess. But didn’t he basically say exactly why already?
 
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Michael Huntherz said:
I would have purchased Ca nitrate by now, but this one part formula has worked pretty well for me so far. It seems like one of the essential chemical salts for hydroponics to me, too. People think of it as a supplement? Interesting.

The Oasis mix has three kinds of iron and says it has uptake effective up to pH 8.0, as far as I can tell, it’s true. My reservoirs run right around 7.0 most of the time, but sometimes mid 7s and the plants seem to do equally well as when I was running around 6.0

Folks are funny about chemistry, a lack of scientific literacy causes a lot of weird behavior. I am a high school dropout, but I look around and feel strangely well-educated sometimes.

I made a new recipe the other day based on your suggestions, and will use it next run. I am targeting about 150ppm of N, and yes I meant 2-1-3 like what gets printed on product labels, assuming primarily p2o5 and k2o.

I am sort of surprised you run N at 200ppm, but if you are pushing them hard I suppose it makes sense. I bet your veg cycle is short because they grow so fast. :joint: Cheers, and thanks so much.
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What is better hard or soft water ? Rain water maybe contains weird creatures , by the other hand tap waters usual ec is 1.1 , which is not good, , ideas ?
 
RitchBitch said:
What is better hard or soft water ? Rain water maybe contains weird creatures , by the other hand tap waters usual ec is 1.1 , which is not good, , ideas ?
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Soft would be better than hard. Tap water varies by area. My tap water has a ph of 9.4 and a ppm of 644. RO or clean rain water is the best imo.
 
Im Currently using the following from week 2 flower so far so good!

How does this look:

N (NO3-) 141.298 0.9% +/- 0%
K 199.535 -0.2% +/- 0%
P 60.587 1% +/- 0%
Mg 66.5 0% +/- 0%
Ca 139.093 -0.6% +/- 0%
S 89.532 5.3% +/- 0%
Fe 5 0% +/- 0%
Zn 0.75 0% +/- 0%
B 1 0% +/- 0%
Cu 0.5 0% +/- 0.1%
Mo 0.3 0% +/- 0.1%
Na 1.207 0% +/- 0%
Si 2 0% +/- 0%
Cl 0 0% +/- 0%
Mn 2 0% +/- 0%
N (NH4+) 0 0% +/- 0%
 
I just use VitaGrow

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Thank you for making Hydrobuddy easier to understand.
Quick stupid question I was playing with a Veg formula but S is 46 is that ok for vegetative?
Thanks again and happy growing.
Veg formula.jpg
 
Mont@n@ said:
Thank you for making Hydrobuddy easier to understand.
Quick stupid question I was playing with a Veg formula but S is 46 is that ok for vegetative?
Thanks again and happy growing.
View attachment 4246606
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Sorry for the late reply. Yeah 46ppm is probably fine for S.

It looks like you're pretty much good to go. I'm glad people are finding this useful.

Imo, once you do this for a few runs, it will be hard to go back to commercial formulas. This is so much more straight forward.
 
Remember to put labels with what's inside each bottle so when they run out, you can just read the labels for refills without having to open up hydrobuddy.
 
churchhaze said:
Remember to put labels with what's inside each bottle so when they run out, you can just read the labels for refills without having to open up hydrobuddy.
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thank you for your time to put this information together and yes I will.

i spent $55 a gal for PBP Bloom,grow, LK and Cal Mag+ last grow and now its almost gone. I used hydrobuddy a couple a years ago to adjust the NPK using the copy the commercial nutrient formulation. recently I spent $122 for this DIY nutrients and I have left of the ingredients to make 15 or more times to replicate my formula. thats fucking awesome and cheap plus im supplying all the elementals the way I want

Thank you again and happy growing
 
I was using about the same mix, but with nitrogen. Then my plant began to show stress in the leaves from it. So, I rinsed the soil with ph 6.1 water and let it dry for a couple of days before replacing the nutrients without the nitrogen. My plant is doing much better, fuller, happier and about to flower. I'm working on 7 more seeds that just germinated the past few days. Thank you for the information here, it does help having input from experienced growers. I'm just getting started. Oh, I also grow a lot of veggies too. They all seem to thrive well on the mix you suggested.
 
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