Coconut coir. 1st time. No mix. Only nutrients
- Thread starter Youth89
- Start date
chillok
Well-Known Member
that looks like a 30-50L loose bag, if so many off brands of it and yes mixed with at least 30% perlite it's quite good for cannabis. Definitely want to flush it with water, let drain out a bit and mix with perlite. Feed as described, recommend 5-10ml /gal calmag. After trying several big name starters I settled on all Botanicare PBP line
Youth89
Member
Thanks im excited to get started
westcoast420
Well-Known Member
Would suggest cutting with at least 50% perlite, and yes feed with nutes.
MickFoster
Well-Known Member
I use a 70/30 coco/perlite mix - rinse twice with 1/4 strength nutes. Don't know what you mean by water weekly with nutes. Once the roots are established, coco should be fed nutes daily. Large plants twice a day.
Youth89
Member
Waterwhen needed and nutrients weekly
MickFoster
Well-Known Member
That's great advice if you're growing in soil - but very poor advice if you're growing in coco.
Last edited:
TurboTokes
Well-Known Member
I grow in coco/perlite and also only water/feed when the pot is light.
You can do a constant feed daily/twice daily if you had a drip to waste system or alot of time to dedicate I suppose. But waterring every other day isnt an issue in coco. I would think waterring daily/constantly would lead to overwatering symptoms but I suppose Ive never tried it
You can do a constant feed daily/twice daily if you had a drip to waste system or alot of time to dedicate I suppose. But waterring every other day isnt an issue in coco. I would think waterring daily/constantly would lead to overwatering symptoms but I suppose Ive never tried it
MickFoster
Well-Known Member
I hand water twice daily, and yes I have a lot of time to dedicate. Do you feed every other day or when the pot is light? You mentioned both. Even when saturated, coco still holds 30% oxygen, so once you have a good root system established overwatering is impossible with good drainage. Allowing coco to become dry (when the pot is light) is how soil is watered. Coco is hydroponics DTW. Frequent watering washes out the salts, replenishes the nutes, and draws in fresh oxygen to the root zone. I'm not saying you don't grow great plants - that's just the way I do it.
Last edited:
Youth89
Member
Thanks for that good to know
Youth89
Member
Fuc it. Cool.
Walterwhiter
Well-Known Member
Spot on.
dtl420
Well-Known Member
I run in 60-65% coco and 35-40% perlite. built my own emitter ring out of a rubber hose and a clean hydraulic T fitting, connected to a water pump in a 18 gal tote with a few air pumps bubbling the solution 24/7. Pump activates 4 times throughout the light cycle and once at night each time for 1 min except right when the lights come on it goes for 5 mins(where I start geting decent runoff).
My point is that coco can be whatever you make it. If you mix some amendments with it you can make an organic super soil, or you can use synthetic nutes. You can hand water the same way you would soil or you can feed/water daily. Feeding daily it's important to get some runoff every day to simulate a good rain shower and keep the nutrients in the medium in balance and protect from ph fluctuations and lockout.
And any coco is good. I use the dust, it's great for smart pots as the fibers keep the coco in. I tried to use terracotta pot to wash coco once, and it all fell right through the drainage hole... Which brings me to my biggest point, wash your coco. I buy the 5kg bricks from eBay (hydrates to roughly 20 gal) for 18$. But I've seen actual chunks of salt in it as I was working it with my hands, this is from the processing of the coconuts in the salty environment in which they grow. It's not a bad thing as long as you soak it really well and flush it before use, or else the salt will overload your medium with sodium and chlorine.
I love coco. I wish I would have known about it when I first started!
My point is that coco can be whatever you make it. If you mix some amendments with it you can make an organic super soil, or you can use synthetic nutes. You can hand water the same way you would soil or you can feed/water daily. Feeding daily it's important to get some runoff every day to simulate a good rain shower and keep the nutrients in the medium in balance and protect from ph fluctuations and lockout.
And any coco is good. I use the dust, it's great for smart pots as the fibers keep the coco in. I tried to use terracotta pot to wash coco once, and it all fell right through the drainage hole... Which brings me to my biggest point, wash your coco. I buy the 5kg bricks from eBay (hydrates to roughly 20 gal) for 18$. But I've seen actual chunks of salt in it as I was working it with my hands, this is from the processing of the coconuts in the salty environment in which they grow. It's not a bad thing as long as you soak it really well and flush it before use, or else the salt will overload your medium with sodium and chlorine.
I love coco. I wish I would have known about it when I first started!
coreywebster
Well-Known Member
That's will serve you well. There are other varieties of coco that are not for plants but for lizards, that stuff is usually more chunky which can cause a problem.
In coco for plants its made up from 3 grades of coco coir, I dont know the names of each off hand other than one of them is pith. The chunkier grade has the ability to hold onto calcium due to its ions been negative or something too technical for me to remember. So calcium is attracted to those chunks and it is then not available to plants. The stuff made for lizards (for bedding) has more of the chunky stuff but very little of the fine stuff so its more problematic than the stuff which is better blended for plant.
What you have will be perfect. I have also tried those bricks the poster above mentioned because they are pretty cheap. Too much hassle for me personally, I stupidly soaked and washed mine in the bath tub... A whole world of shit ensued.