Reverse Engineering everyone's nutrients

MisterBlah said:

One more thing!

Using stabilized silicic acid products allows you to use them in stock solutions. I'm not sure if you've tried making a stock solution of potassium silicates, but it's very basic and it is almost entirely useless in a stock solution as it precipitates out of solution below about pH 11. Stabilized silicic acids can work in acidic and mildly basic stock solutions. It is generally just more versatile. But again, it's expensive. Still the most expensive fertilizer I've ever used.

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And what's the penalty for not using a silicate supplement?

ttystikk said:

And what's the penalty for not using a silicate supplement?

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Not much. It's not an essential nutrient. When you grow in soil, you get some because there's always silica in the soil. When you grow in hydroponics you usually get none and your plants grow just fine. Added silica tends to improve the hardiness of a plant though.

And by improve hardiness, I mean it's increases its ability to deal with heavy metal toxicities like high micronutrient concentrations. It improves it's resistance to molds, mildews, and other pests. And any other way you want to define hardiness. It makes the plant tougher, basically.

But again, it's entirely not necessary. All plants will grow without it. It's the one nutrient that plants don't actually need to feed on to grow properly.

MisterBlah said:

Monosilicic acid? Primarily as a pure silica additive in the form that plants uptake quicker. It's H4SiO4.

If you look into the silica cycle in soil you'll find that silicates(SiO3) go through a chemical change to SiO4. It's a slow process and you usually add silicates like potassium silicate to your soil months before the growing season. Using a monosilicic acid, you don't have to wait, basically. Plants will uptake SiO4 ions at a faster rate than SiO3 ions. And all these reasons are why silicic acid is commonly used on turf, at golf courses, for example, where you need quick growth turn around.

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I reuse my coco coir. I dont really flush towards the end. I taper the ec down though. Do you think i would see more of a benefit with potassium and sodium silicate in the reused coco coir with subsequent crops? I did not know the the "normal" silicates are taken up much slower.

Ive noticed my Blue Dream responde to potassium and sodium silicate....big time. Much more tough and woody branches. It kinda makes it difficult to tie down in veg. The rest of my strains...i see benefit...but nothing like Dream.

since1991 said:

I reuse my coco coir. I dont really flush towards the end. I taper the ec down though. Do you think i would see more of a benefit with potassium and sodium silicate in the reused coco coir with subsequent crops? I did not know the the "normal" silicates are taken up much slower.

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I always believed in the Aptus pamplets about the Boron in Fasilitor being the key to everything. Didnt even know silicic acid and potassium silica were related.

since1991 said:

I reuse my coco coir. I dont really flush towards the end. I taper the ec down though. Do you think i would see more of a benefit with potassium and sodium silicate in the reused coco coir with subsequent crops? I did not know the the "normal" silicates are taken up much slower.

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Using a sodium silicate is not going to be significantly effective. Using potassium silicate you'll notice since you are increasing the potassium concentration.

If you ever go to a recirculating system, never use sodium silicate. Sodium is a micronutrient and it will build up in the system quite fast (3-7 days) and then you may notice stunted growth due to a high sodium concentration.

since1991 said:

I always believed in the Aptus pamplets about the Boron in Fasilitor being the key to everything. Didnt even know silicic acid and potassium silica were related.

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Your primary fertilizer blend will contain boron. So yeah, it's basically bunk.

MisterBlah said:

Using a sodium silicate is not going to be significantly effective. Using potassium silicate you'll notice since you are increasing the potassium concentration.

If you ever go to a recirculating system, never use sodium silicate. Sodium is a micronutrient and it will build up in the system quite fast (3-7 days) and then you may notice stunted growth due to a high sodium concentration.



Your primary fertilizer blend will contain boron. So yeah, it's basically bunk.

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I have been using Cutting Edge Bulletproof Si....it contains sodium silicate as opposed to thw standard potassium silicate found in other brands. The bottl was free...its almost gone..I will soon go back to my Europonoc or Dyna brand with the potassium.

since1991 said:

I always believed in the Aptus pamplets about the Boron in Fasilitor being the key to everything. Didnt even know silicic acid and potassium silica were related.

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For the results Aptus claims...and the real world results i have gotten from the brand line up....certainly does not justify the actual cost of the bottles. No thanks. Tried it once...said ouch...and moved on. That stuff is extremely expensive for the results you get. Not anything different than a much less pricey brand.

I don't know if MisterBlah has reverse engineered Advanced Nutrients line yet but from all the threads I've read on it, people seem to conclude that after adding up the NPK of all the 10 million products that one is supposed to use during a grow, their Bloom products and additives result in a summed NPK of 1-1-2-1-.5 (N-P-K-Ca-Mg). Does this sound more or less right?

I'm going to aim for a bloom formula using that 1-1-2-1-.5 ratio. Another common bloom formulation is 1-3-2 but people argue vigorously over the amount of phosphorus that should be included.

I'm also including Nitro-amino formula, fulvic acid, humic acid and kelp at a ratio of 1-1-1-.5 using about 1/4tsp per gallon of all except kelp which is 1/8tsp per gallon.

Any opinions on these application rates or ratios?

I'm Trying to emulate Advanced, though I've never actually used their line, I'd like to see approximately how their formulation performs

Vegetative growth has been excellent, entering week 5 of flower, not getting quite the bulk and swelling that I want so trying to figure out what I should tweak

The only reason to go higher than ~30ppm of P is to protect you from going under 30ppm over the period of a week. So if you start at 60ppm P, it's unlikely that the plant will pull it down to 20ppm before the next reservoir change.

churchhaze said:

The only reason to go higher than ~30ppm of P is to protect you from going under 30ppm over the period of a week. So if you start at 60ppm P, it's unlikely that the plant will pull it down to 20ppm before the next reservoir change.

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It makes me wonder how much phosphorus our plants really need. I wonder why all bloom boosters are basically just phosphates in one form or another...seemingly combined with ammonium in many cases? Do vegetables and other plants require significantly more phosphorus than cannabis? Is that why these companies up the phosphates in bloom formulas and additives?

Redoctober said:

It makes me wonder how much phosphorus our plants really need. I wonder why all bloom boosters are basically just phosphates in one form or another...seemingly combined with ammonium in many cases? Do vegetables and other plants require significantly more phosphorus than cannabis? Is that why these companies up the phosphates in bloom formulas and additives?

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I started using plant amp which is a calcium booster. I spoke with mrblah and up to 150ppms is acceptable to keep all else in balance. I was hitting them with pk 13/14 and really didn't notice much delta above the base nutes. Calcium on the other hand is looking like the key!

pinner420 said:

I started using plant amp which is a calcium booster. I spoke with mrblah and up to 150ppms is acceptable to keep all else in balance. I was hitting them with pk 13/14 and really didn't notice much delta above the base nutes. Calcium on the other hand is looking like the key!

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Very interesting pinner, I remember Hearley Smith talking about that in one of his lectures (it's on YouTube). I can't remember what element it was, but there was something that was a limiting factor for calcium uptake and if you provide it to the plant, it allows the plant to absorb 10x more calcium. I'll have to go back and watch the lecture again to see what he said it was. He also said that Calcium was indeed a crucial factor for robust plants. I do believe that amino acids help with uptake as well.

I will share my iterations over the last 8 months going down that rabbit hole... all positive rock those left turning amino's... are you rdwc or soil?

pinner420 said:

I will share my iterations over the last 8 months going down that rabbit hole... all positive rock those left turning amino's... are you rdwc or soil?

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Nice, my popcorn is buttered! I'm doing low pressure aero, are you in soil?

Redoctober said:

Very interesting pinner, I remember Hearley Smith talking about that in one of his lectures (it's on YouTube). I can't remember what element it was, but there was something that was a limiting factor for calcium uptake and if you provide it to the plant, it allows the plant to absorb 10x more calcium. I'll have to go back and watch the lecture again to see what he said it was. He also said that Calcium was indeed a crucial factor for robust plants. I do believe that amino acids help with uptake as well.

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Harley Smith was talking about L Amino acids and Glycine in particular for extreme calcium absorption.

silca opened up the key ways and aloud the maximum calium uptake.?

since1991 said:

Harley Smith was talking about L Amino acids and Glycine in particular for extreme calcium absorption.

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YES!! exactly...also Glutamic Acid in addition to Glycine. I just watched the lecture again haha.
After watching a Harley Smith lecture I just want to feed my plants everything!
He's like the Bob Ross of horticulture.

Are these two products comparable/interchangeable?
Can one replace the other?: