Nutrient Uptake Question

Wiggla

Active Member
I have been going back and forth on whether to simply listen to those that say to have PH in high 5.0 values if dealing with hydro and mid 6.0 values when dealing with soil.

I thought a simple nutrient uptake chart that shows which nutrients are available at what ph level would help, but two issues arise, is nutrient uptake the same for all plant life? Is nitrogen available at 5.5 ph to 9.0 ph for all plants? I ask this because I have two charts and one of them seems general and the other is MJ specific. The issue with the MJ specific chart is there are to graphs: one for hydro and one for soil. Nitrogen in hydro is not as available as in soil. For example, phosphorus is available between 6.5 and 5.8 on hydro chart but ranges from 7.0 to 5.6 in soil. Does that make sense? Are nutrients that are widely available in soil less available in hydro, or is there some other reason for this?

What should I rely on?
Why do hydro gardens have to be set at a lower ph?
 

Wiggla

Active Member
How is that possible? Is it the strain? I would have thought there would be some sort of nutrient lock out around that point. Do your plants seem normal/healthy at that level of ph? I know that a ph of 7 is neutral but there has to be some reason why learning material tells us to keep the nutes at lower levels.
 

COBRAKOI

Member
Hi everyone im new on here and ive currently got 4 plants 2 weeks into oxypots , ive just bought ph ec pens today could do with some advice on wot they shud be reading ,please any help appreciated ive 3 nl x sk and 1 dinafem blue hash 1 of the nl x sk is looking really droopy today but they are all sat in the same mix just evenly shared between them its canna im using ive not tested ph or ec yet as had to wait to buy pens ,other 3 are like cabbages i cant believe the growth spurts from this system
 

Wiggla

Active Member
Well Cobra,

There are clearly many different opinions on where ph should stay, and ppm as well. I often here that people are well into 1000 ppm by the time they hit flowering, but not me. I'm around 500ppm because my plants are only about 1'. PH for me has pretty much been 6.0 for years. I've looked at nutrient uptake charts (both general & MJ specific) I picked 6.0 to be the ph that covers all nutrients. I don't like to let my ph rise above 6.5-6.6 because I have lost a crop before because I didn't know that ph fluctuates daily and I would only check once a week. These plants had ph burn problems for most of their life then died in flower.

So, I like to stay at 6.0 ph and the ppms vary depend on the size of the plant, but I don't increase ppm by more than 50 when I feel I need to give my plants more.\
Hope it helps but definitely read up on it and you'll learn a lot and you'll also know what I mean about different opinions.

Good Luck

P.S. check the ph and ppm in morning and night to begin to get use to how much food your plant eats as well as how much ph fluctuates. Avoid changing ph more than once per day, make the first adjustment last 24 hours.
 
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