Hello.. I am starting to grow. I wanted to know how much nitrogen my plants should have they are about 5 inches and have probably 4 sets of leaves. My fertiliser npk is 22.6.12 is that to high in nitrogen.. I know it is for flowering but I'm not up to that... Another question. One of my plants probably the biggest about six inches does not have any serated leaves at all just the round ones. Is that weird? Thanks guys
How much nitrogen
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Hello.. I am starting to grow. I wanted to know how much nitrogen my plants should have they are about 5 inches and have probably 4 sets of leaves. My fertiliser npk is 22.6.12 is that to high in nitrogen.. I know it is for flowering but I'm not up to that... Another question. One of my plants probably the biggest about six inches does not have any serated leaves at all just the round ones. Is that weird? Thanks guys
I probable should have added I added about half of a 2.5 g spoon to about 400 mls of water between 3 plants. One of which only has round leaves Haha. Only one is in a big pot so it got a bit more. And they had a bit of a normal water in the morning so I just gave them a little bit.
It's helpful to think of NPK as a ratio. That's about 3.7-1-2. Not a bad ratio. People grow in 1-1-1. Often 3-1-2 is recommended for veg. 1-3-2 for flower.
I created a spreadsheet (<<link) to show how adding calmag, silica, or mixing your bloom and veg together produces different NPK ratios. If you download it, keep in mind I intend to update it in the next 3-5 days.
That's the ratio of N : P : K as they relate to each other. In the US, product labels are a percentage of weight. So, yours is 22%-6%-12% of a 1 pound bag. That might be useful info if you're comparing to 11-3-6 for the same price. The former gives you twice as much NPK for your money. You'll have to feed half as much. It will last twice as long.
But, your question was whether 22% nitrogen is too high. When thinking of NPK this way, it's better to reduce it to a ratio. The lowest number is 1. Divide it into the other two numbers to find the number of "parts" relative to 1 part.
Yours is 3.7 parts N to 1 part P, to 2 parts K. Whether it's sitting in the bag, or mixed into water, it remains 3.7-1-2.
Maybe what you're asking how much to use. What does it say on the label? Usually half that much is a safe way to start. When you add it to the water it will be measured as "total dissolved salts (tds)" in parts per million (ppm). You can buy a TDS meter online for about $15. That's handy to answer the question of how much to use. You could add a 1/4 tsp and measure the PPM. If it's 220, that's pretty good for plants that are a week old. If your plants are 2-3 weeks old, you'd want to be around 400-500ppm. (Assuming you're in soil.). In flower I've gone as high as 1000ppm.
Back to the ratio, if you added enough fertilizer to create 100ppm (above the ppm of the water before adding anything), 22ppm would be N, 6ppm P, 12ppm K. The ratio now exists in water.
It's customary to start at half the label's suggested strength. Move up from there if they seem starved. Move down if there are signs of nute burn (burnt leaf tips).
This is where the ppm meter would be useful.