Soil to Soilless, anything I should know?

[seldomBLUE]

Gonna put my newest babes in a new soilless mix of 8qts+8qts+2 bricks; P'lite/V"lite/CocoGro. Looks like a good mix, hell, if I were a weed plant i'd let my root grow in it. Runoff tested -1qt [email protected]/1cup mix; poured 50% straight through then 25%, 25%, RO was 6.7, 6.5, 6.5: it drains really well so i'm looking forward to an easy fall-winter grow. The four babies are 25 day old Matanuska Tundra, the two are clones from a seed of a MT/Blueberry Kush. Had a BC clone go hermi and ferted my MT.
Now i got a batch of femanized MT/BK seeds. The one the clones came from is 5wks in flower. It'll be my first taste of what i'm gonna call Blueberry Tundra or Matanuska Kush. I'm also going to try FloroNova Grw&Blm. My issue is the degree at which it drops the pH. It sends my 7.8 water to 5.4 @ 50% strgth. Is it best to use pH adjust solution or amend with a suppliment like a root stim or vitamin that will raise the pH. Maybe a hydro guy needs to address that question. I've never tried soiless but i will figure it out. Then i'll share my findings with all who read in an effort to save you the trouble.
If there are any tips/tricks/suggestions please feel free to leave them.

seldomBLUE Reviewed by seldomBLUE on 10-04-2009. Soil to Soilless, anything I should know? Gonna put my newest babes in a new soilless mix of 8qts+8qts+2 bricks; P'lite/V"lite/CocoGro. Looks like a good mix, hell, if I were a weed plant i'd let my root grow in it. Runoff tested -1qt [email protected]/1cup mix; poured 50% straight through then 25%, 25%, RO was 6.7, 6.5, 6.5: it drains really well so i'm looking forward to an easy fall-winter grow. The four babies are 25 day old Matanuska Tundra, the two are clones from a seed of a MT/Blueberry Kush. Had a BC clone go hermi and ferted my MT. Rating: 5

[DreadedHermie]

If you're using distilled water, or really, really soft water (or successfully RO'ed water) there might not be enough "buffering capacity" to it. pH will swing wildly, like my first wife...

What kinda water is it? Harder water will be more "stable," pH-wise. In other words, the nutes won't knock it so far outta whack. OTOH, I've had good results in coco with half nutes and ~pH 5.4. :thumbsup:

[Rusty Trichome]

Coco tends to retain mineral salts, so you might need an extra flush or two during the plant's lifetime.

I use Fox Farms nutes, and follow their weekly schedule pretty closely. But living in the desert, it get's pretty hot which adds to the stress of giving full strength nutes. To compensate, I cut the dilution in half, but feed twice weekly. Same weekly totals overall with less stress to the plants. Plain, properly ph'd water in between if necessary. I use phDown (phosphoric acid) to adjust my 8.0 wellwater down to 6.8ish. My half-strength nutes bring it down to 6.3ish.

If you have to dick with soil ph to compensate for water ph, something is going wrong. If you are adjusting water with ammendment solutions to bring the ph into line, something will likely go wrong like excessive vitamins or excessive hormones/nitrogen (root stim)

What are you using to check ph, and when was it last calibrated? Could it be a simple mis-reading?

[DreadedHermie]

so you might need an extra flush or two

Very true.

My well's a salty 740ppm.

I gotta "mini-flush" the coco girls just about every week to keep 'em pretty.

"Diluting" my water with some distilled has helped a bit, I just add a touch of calmag to compensate.

Still use Foxfarm in soil. :thumbsup: Gotta flush extra there, too, with my water, even feeding on the light side (it's an led thing).

[seldomBLUE]

My water comes straight out of the tap, then i let it sit for 2-3 days. The chems are so high you can smell the chlorine. I use neutralizer solution for the chemicals and pH U/D to adjust. I use an Eco2 Ph meter and calibrate every week or two. It doesn't need it that much but one can't go wrong checking. Solutions are always around +/-78deg. The room gets hot but the air moves 24/7. I'm using FloroNova
Something that's a good idea: fert/flush all medium that you'll be using for the transplant, let it sit for a day or two, check the runoff pH before you repot. That should help insure proper pH in the medium.
CalMag is another amendment i use to correct pH, along with superthrive,root stimulators, vitamines etc.... hydrated lime or gypsum if soil ph got too far off. Now i can just flush,hahah, this is gonna be soooo eeeasy:yippee:.
There were other comments/questions that i seem not to remember and the keyboard is starting to looking funny so i'm gonna go smoke one maybe two or until my memory and vision come back.

[seldomBLUE]

Coco tends to retain mineral salts, so you might need an extra flush or two during the plant's lifetime.

I use Fox Farms nutes, and follow their weekly schedule pretty closely. But living in the desert, it get's pretty hot which adds to the stress of giving full strength nutes. To compensate, I cut the dilution in half, but feed twice weekly. Same weekly totals overall with less stress to the plants. Plain, properly ph'd water in between if necessary. I use phDown (phosphoric acid) to adjust my 8.0 wellwater down to 6.8ish. My half-strength nutes bring it down to 6.3ish.

If you have to dick with soil ph to compensate for water ph, something is going wrong. If you are adjusting water with ammendment solutions to bring the ph into line, something will likely go wrong like excessive vitamins or excessive hormones/nitrogen (root stim)

What are you using to check ph, and when was it last calibrated? Could it be a simple mis-reading?

I agree, however, each amendment sends the pH in a different direction and at a diff rate. In 1/2 gal; It takes me 28 drops of pHU to get my ferts from 5.4 -6.5: it takes 1/8tsp root stim to do the same thing so i switch between amendmente every feeding and watering. H2O requires lowering pH from 7.6+ so i'll use pHd or CalMag. The Ph+ and pH- solutions which, IMHO, do just as much to harm a plant if overused, and, used as the sole means of pH adjustment when pH is not within .2-.3 of target. I have to go almost 1 point. 45dps pHd per gal to 6.5