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Our grow as been going great till yesterday, took a p.h. level test and was high, so we added p.h. down and took it down to 5.6 kowing it may go up a little,,, well today it rebounded to 6.8 and we took it down and hrs. later it rebounded can anyone tell us why it is shooting up so fast.. several of our plants appears to be going into shock from it and how do we fix it fast.
Jamie.
Wildchick, are you using rockwool?? Because rockwool is notorious for increasing the pH. It is highly recommended that you soak your rockwool in a pH 5 solution (not lower than 5 as the rockwool will breakdown). Even after soaking your rockwool it still increases the pH of your nutrient solution, however, it not as bad. Grodan has now placed labels onto most of the rockwool packs informing customers how to do this.
Also try and select a nutrient with a pH buffer in it. The GH nutrients have no buffers but the Canna Aqua nutrients do. It is recommended that you mix your nutrients (Canna Aqua) and let it stand for one hour before adjusting the pH. This gives the nutrient's pH buffers time to act, this will help keep the pH stable.
You should also be changing your reservoir every week...minimum . You never know what your plants are doing...they may be very thirsty and take in more water than nutrients...resulting in your reservoir having a huge concentration of nutrients. Or the exact opposite might happen...they may be taking in nutrients but not too much water. This is going to result in your reservoir having a very weak nutrient mix. This is more than likely the problem with your pH fluctuating so much.
Hope this info.is of some use to you:thumbsup: Remember..."HAPPY PEOPLE make HAPPY plants":stoned:
Hey WC..
When you add nutes and adjust ph, go back 2 hours after its done and retest+ adjust. Also set ph to 5.2 so it has some room to creep up.
:thumbsup:
Thanks for advice everyone, as this is our first grow and it is flipping us out as it came out of nowhere it seems after all the good luck, we may just drain and refill systems tomorrow just to make sure all i swell and hopefully not lose no plants till then...as they r about 3 1/2 weeks old and doing good.
Jamie
How often do you completely drain and refill the water?
I notice that I can see right through your netpots where the hydroton doesnt fill all the way up. Take a paper or styro or plastic white plate, and cut a slit in it form the edge to the center, and cut a hole for the stem in the center, then slip it on upside down to cover the netpot so no light is getting into the water.
It's possible you could have algae trying to grow or something and messing up your PH also.
You should notice tomorrow when you drain it if anything nasty was going on in there.
Are you using tap water or some other type of water like distilled or reversed osmosis water? I hear tap water is hard to keep Ph steady.
All good advice but the faster your plants grow the more the Ph will swing. That is why you should check it a mininun of twice a day and be ready to adjust it. Change out your water and nutrients every 7-10 day's as well.
WC- If twice a day is too much add a remote resi and double,triple, whatever your volume of solution. One fish tank pump is all you would need. Pump from your remote resi to your system and do a gravity drain from your system back down into your remote resi. The water falling into the remote would help cool and oxygenate the solution and you could mix up a big batch of nutes that would be good for 3 weeks with nutrient enriched Ph adjusted add backs.
I have an 80 gallon resi that locks in the Ph I set it at and doesn't flux for 3 full weeks. I really like it.
If you want to cut your work a bit more you can get an idea of how many add backs you will need to do during the 3 weeks and fill a rubbermaid trashcan or what ever has a lid to prevent light penetration with nute solution and a bubbler stone and just scoop out your add backs as needed.
This will give you time to sit and stare at your plants like we all do.
Love -Jay
i love staring