You are correct. It is cool you have taken the time to get to know the osmotic process, a process which even by our modern science is not fully understood.

The "flushing" process is more concerned with providing the plants with pure water which will allow the plant to continue its processes of using up the nutrients it has already absorbed. The remaining nutrients in the plants at this point will have been assimilated into plant matter which will have one of two classifications: mobile and immobile. Immobile are just that, immobile, and they are more or less unaffected by the flush. Mobile nutrients, most notability nitrogen, will be burned up in the plants and this is the key concept to flushing. Getting the nitrogen out will allow the plant matter to cure much faster providing a more pleasurable smoking experience in the minimal amount of cure time. This can easily be accomplished without drainage, however, drainage would provide a way to more easily assure you can get the remaining nutrients out of the grow medium or soil. I would assume the lack of drainage in tranobles situation is potentially the reason he chooses to flush for 10 days (a little longer than normal). Does that answer your question?

Tranoble – Thanks for the answers on my CO2 questions! Let me list out your questions here..

>I use about two 20lb tanks for 6.5 weeks
DAMN! That is a lot of propane! Oh and I wanted to say that I agree on turning the CO2 off for the last week or two.

>What kind of burner are you using? Does your burner have a glow plug or a pilot light?
I have used both bottle injection and a burner, however neither of which is up and running now due to the bottle being used on a keggerator and the temps are like 87F in the room right now without the burner running at all.. Needless to say I’m hoping for an early winter! When I use the burner I have I just walk in the room and light it (I don’t use a pilot light). Half the time the CO2 is pretty high anyways for some unknown reason and only recently have the levels been under a thousand ppm. I live in a manufacturing town, that’s about the only reason I think the ambient CO2 levels are so high, but hell I’m ok with it! I am thinking about setting my digital controller to 1400ppm and hooking up bottle injection with a full bottle of CO2 and see if the bottle lasts long enough to be practical.

>Do you have a dehumidifer? I try to keep my humidy at about 70-75%

Yep, I have the 40 pint model too, and I have it on a timer to come on during the dark cycle only and it keeps the Relative Humidity at about 45-50%. During the light cycle my rooms humidity is only about 45% without the dehumidifier running, I am surprised at how high you run your humidity. Do you use a sulfur burner?