Calling Weezard - Coco Questions

[ledtime]

Sounds great. Just worried about the drying out part. It means I have to be on top of it everyday. Doesn't leave much room for taking a weekend vacation.....

[Weezard]

Sounds great. Just worried about the drying out part. It means I have to be on top of it everyday. Doesn't leave much room for taking a weekend vacation.....

Not so!
If you have to water everyday, it's past time to transplant.
I water every 3rd day.
When it gets to every other day, I grab a bigger pot.:thumbsup:

Weeze

[stra8outtaWeed]

good info from all...i've been looking at going to a straight coco since switching to all LED lights....but i have seen great results from some friends using House and Garden nute line....it jumped the yields bigtime and they have a specific formula for Coco!

Has anbody here used House & Garden? :hippy:

[ledtime]

The Wee little lizard always seems to know how to bring a smile......That's the best news I've heard all day. It's been a really bad day between work and the plants.

Finally a good note. I can water every three days in coco. If any of you have looked at Weezard's albums, you will agree that this gentleman knows what he is talking about.

Pleased. Very pleased.

[Jord0713]

@Jord0713 - How do you like Boost? I'm currently only using A, B, and PK. Deciding if I want to grab Rhizotonic, Canazyme, and Boost for my next grow. I read mix reviews on Boost.. almost seems like the star line for Canna is: Coco A + B, PK, Rhizotonic, and Cannazyme. Boost just costs so much.


I highly highly recommend Rhizotonic. It is an awesome nute. My roots are blowing out of the sides of my 7 gallon smart pots...also if your plants are looking a bit sickly juice them with a little bit more Rhize and they are good to go. As far as the Boost this is my first go with it. I'll let you guys know after harvest. I painfully dropped the $110 for a liter so I hope it does what it says ALSO jump on the cannazyme. It doesn't look like it does much, but the best way to look at it as like an insurance policy for your girls. It also builds and maintains those good bacterias in your coco...canna reccomens actually the last week of flowering to double the dosage of cannazyme. Doing this will keep your coco healthy and ready to re-use.

I am defiantly not an expert by any means on the stuff, but what I've done with it so far works (after LOTS of research). If anyone else has any recommendations or tips I love figuring out how to do this better.

[Jord0713]

Not so!
If you have to water everyday, it's past time to transplant.
I water every 3rd day.
When it gets to every other day, I grab a bigger pot.:thumbsup:

Weeze

Depends on your pot too!! I grow in smart pots therefore I am a glutton for watering. I have to water every day to day and a half even from the very beginning...I might have been able to go 2 days, but no more for sure.

[ledtime]

Weez, I hate to ask a man to do this, but please describe your pots. :S2:

[Weezard]

Depends on your pot too!! I grow in smart pots therefore I am a glutton for watering. I have to water every day to day and a half even from the very beginning...I might have been able to go 2 days, but no more for sure.

Smart pot?
They that smart, they should go get dey own water, yah.

I use what evah is at hand, but usually start wit' tall, (no cramp da tap root), paper cups, fulla coco.
Den drop dem in 4" square, plastic, seedling pots.
Den 6", den 8" square, white, plastic.

Because it's coco, I do 2 things differently.
1. I drill extra holes in, and near, the bottom.
2. I cut reflectix insulation to a close fit and cover the soil.
That stops Fungus gnats from breeding and slows evaporation loss from the soil surface.
It also reflects 97% of the light back up.
You needn't bother with perlite, or gravel in the bottom.
I don't use 'zymes either.

Not needed with this medium.

(Might not hurt, but does not help.)

Coco is NOT soil.
It's solid-state hydro and needs none of that kine stuff.
There's no "micro-herd" to coddle.
No good bugs vs. bad bugs.
We feed them directly with the end-result of the millions of hit or miss, organic, chemical reactions and digestions.

The bottom line of all that organic activity, are simple compounds that roots can absorb and the plant can apply without working too hard.

Bug poo.


With Hydro, and Coco, we skip all the underground drama and jus' feed 'em "Da blood of da vanquished", the end product of good organic activity.

Just that which they require and can use directly.:jointsmile:


All coco does is serve these compounds to the roots efficiently That, and it let's 'em have sweet, fresh air while they eat and drink all they can hold.


Is it organically naughty?:silly:
Is it cheating?

Perhaps.
But it works a treat!!:jointsmile:

Aloha,
Weezard

[ledtime]

Sounds good. I'm hopping on this train then. Looks like I'll be going to the hydro store on Friday for some Botanicare Coco! Have three and a half weeks approx left on the girls now. Then I can start the next batch.

Have some Lemon Skunk, Sharksbreath, Rock Lock, and some more Critical Sensi Star. I kept a few clones of the White Widow too. Should be interesting to see if I can get through a grow with coco with limited issues.

[DreadedHermie]

Hey, Ledtime! You will be happy. Coco rocks. To me, it's easier than soil, but it kinda handles like a soil, so I can't imagine anyone who's figured out "dirt" having any problems with this stuff. If I use larger pots so I don't need to water as often, the growth rate is more comparable to good soil. If I keep the pots smaller and "water" (with nutes, heh, heh) twice a day, the growth is freakin' unbelievable. If you screw something up, the next watering fixes it. It's not like having to re-balance a whole hydro circulation system.

I have some coco I've been using over a year now without problems. The fibers seem to get broken down to a finer consistency but still transport water just fine. I've also re-used it, but for indoor gardening I only run it once, then it goes to the outside potted vegetables. Sweet peppers love it. I just let it dry out and half-ass sift the roots out with some .25" screen. Anything left behind becomes "beneficials" eventually, IMO.

I've used only Botanicare coco in the small bricks. It's the most expensive way to buy it, though. For me, the storage / transport convenience is worth it, YMMV. But I test it every time, and it's never had salt. Some kinds do, so be careful.

Also, on Weezard's recommend I tried the Dyna nutes and I will buy them again. I've used Botanicare PBP before (in DWC, too) to see how organic treated me, and I liked the Dyna better, for potency and flavor. It produced better tasting peppers and tomatoes, as well. I like to run a pretty sterile grow environment, so I guess for me the chemical nutes offer better bioavailability than stuff that needs to be fermented, putrified, or otherwise decomposed first. Although I think Weez said that already with different words. :thumbsup:

In soil, letting your medium dry out a bit so your roots can breathe is a necessary evil. My "problem" with it is: as the soil slowly dries out, the nutes tend to become much more concentrated. PH gonna change just because of that, also. If you try to run hot nutes you'll scorch your plants a bit each time the pots dry out.

But in coco, you can run a fairly stiff (heh, heh) nutrient solution that gets flushed out / displaced by your next watering, before it has the chance to concentrate to stressful levels for the plant. It's like hydroponics; and each time you water you're giving the plant a new reservoir(?)

What was I talking about?

Oh, yeah. Search some of Sarah Louise's posts; she's been using coco for awhile and always has good advice.

Coco be da next big thing, mon. The big box stores' small houseplants are all arriving in coco all of a sudden. Vegetable plants that used to ship in "peat pots" are now arriving in "coco fiber pots."