Watering without disturbing soil

pdgenoa

pdgenoa

Member
I'm currently growing four potted autoflowers and I need an idea for how to water them without always messing up the soil on top. I've tried the "shower" type watering pails but since I'm using ScrOG I can't easily get the watering head in there. I've thought of cutting some felt to place on top of the soil and letting it drain through but then I'm concerned about it molding.

If anyone has any ideas on how best to do this I would certainly appreciate the suggestions.
 
KrazyG

KrazyG

Well-Known Member
pdgenoa said:
I'm currently growing four potted autoflowers and I need an idea for how to water them without always messing up the soil on top. I've tried the "shower" type watering pails but since I'm using ScrOG I can't easily get the watering head in there. I've thought of cutting some felt to place on top of the soil and letting it drain through but then I'm concerned about it molding.

If anyone has any ideas on how best to do this I would certainly appreciate the suggestions.
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You could put a length of hose from the pail neck to the shower head.
 
psychedelicdaddi

psychedelicdaddi

Well-Known Member
pdgenoa said:
Wow, that's about the most innovative but simple idea I've seen. Do you just get like sandbox sand or something else? Also I suppose a bag of small river pebbles would work too - just rinse them good first.
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yea, if it is recommended on the bag that it is for also garden use then its probably ok. The sand and some BT helps keep flies/gnats to a minimum, which was my original intent.
 
pdgenoa

pdgenoa

Member
psychedelicdaddi said:
yea, if it is recommended on the bag that it is for also garden use then its probably ok. The sand and some BT helps keep flies/gnats to a minimum, which was my original intent.
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Excellent. Well that's what I'm going to do then. I have a big bag of BT from my last grow so that's all I should need.
Thanks man!
 
B

bigsteve

Well-Known Member
I was worried when I'd water new seedlings that had skinny stems. I could see some of them wobble so I made a hand-waterer. I rinsed out a small bottle that had held Dawn detergent in it and now am able to drip as little as I want to with the soap bottle. Just be sure to rinse the bottle well before using as it takes a long time of rinsing before the run-off is bubble free.

Good luck, BigSteve.
 
pdgenoa

pdgenoa

Member
bigsteve said:
I was worried when I'd water new seedlings that had skinny stems. I could see some of them wobble so I made a hand-waterer. I rinsed out a small bottle that had held Dawn detergent in it and now am able to drip as little as I want to with the soap bottle. Just be sure to rinse the bottle well before using as it takes a long time of rinsing before the run-off is bubble free.

Good luck, BigSteve.
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I'll give it a try, thanks!
 
OldMedUser

OldMedUser

Well-Known Member
Water from the bottom. All my plants are in catch trays and I may cover the surface with diatomaceous earth that I don't want to disturb so I just fill the catch pan with water and let the plant wick it up.

Generally tho I prefer to just dump the needed amount of water on top then walk away. If you know how much water is needed to saturate a dry pot it saves a lot of time to just fill a jug to that amount and pour it in. Lots of runoff but it gets sucked up in a half hour or less. If there is any still in the pan later I'll use a turkey baster to remove the extra.
 
pdgenoa

pdgenoa

Member
OldMedUser said:
Water from the bottom. All my plants are in catch trays and I may cover the surface with diatomaceous earth that I don't want to disturb so I just fill the catch pan with water and let the plant wick it up.

Generally tho I prefer to just dump the needed amount of water on top then walk away. If you know how much water is needed to saturate a dry pot it saves a lot of time to just fill a jug to that amount and pour it in. Lots of runoff but it gets sucked up in a half hour or less. If there is any still in the pan later I'll use a turkey baster to remove the extra.
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I'm enjoying hearing all the different ways people have found to do this.

I've noticed what you're describing when the plant wicks it up from the bottom. My pots are the kind that are solid down to about the last inch or so where the plastic is an open mesh so that makes it easier.

Normally I've been able to guage how.much water for each pot but I've found with auto's that it's constantly changing with its accelerated stages.

That's a clever use of a baster by the way. When I had two I did that but when I expanded to four earlier this year on my previous photoperiod grow I had to buy a shopvac to save my back :)
 
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OldMedUser

OldMedUser

Well-Known Member
pdgenoa said:
I'm enjoying hearing all the different ways people have found to do this.

I've noticed what you're describing when the plant wicks it up from the bottom. My pots are the kind that are solid down to about the last inch or so where the plastic is an open mesh so that makes it easier.

Normally I've been able to guage how.much water for each pot but I've found with auto's that it's constantly changing with its accelerated stages.

That's a clever use of a baster by the way. When I had two I did that but when I expanded to four earlier this year on my previous photoperiod grow I had to buy a shopvac to save my back :)
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I use the shop vac to suck up the water when doing a flush but rarely ever have to flush. I use RO water only and do almost all of my soilless pot grown plants from sprout to harvest without ever flushing once. I've done DWC many times without ever doing a nute change tho like to change once after the stretch is over.

Even with autos the only thing that changes is the frequency of watering not the amount the pot will take. Same thing happens with photo plants as they get larger. As a rule of thumb I up-pot my photos once they need water less than 48 hours since the last soak. My 4gal pots with ProMix take 3 - 3.5 liters to saturate them well with no or little runoff. If there's a bit left in the pan the plant will draw that up in a few hours so it's not soaking in runoff long. At each up-potting I saw the bottom inch off the rootball to get rid of any long roots and promote root branching that fills the pot with fine feeder roots. At harvest the rootball is a solid mass held together with near invisible root hairs and no mass of thick roots anywhere.

Girl_BlueHeav071114_01.jpg

Girl_BlueHeav071114_02.jpg

I shave down the roots on the sides too and in a few days new roots are peeking out of the drain holes in a bigger pot. I find 4gal pots to be plenty big enough for the largest plants I grow indoors tho I've heard that 5gal from seed is best for autos with no up-potting to get the best yields.

:peace:
 
pdgenoa

pdgenoa

Member
OldMedUser said:
I use the shop vac to suck up the water when doing a flush but rarely ever have to flush. I use RO water only and do almost all of my soilless pot grown plants from sprout to harvest without ever flushing once. I've done DWC many times without ever doing a nute change tho like to change once after the stretch is over.

Even with autos the only thing that changes is the frequency of watering not the amount the pot will take. Same thing happens with photo plants as they get larger. As a rule of thumb I up-pot my photos once they need water less than 48 hours since the last soak. My 4gal pots with ProMix take 3 - 3.5 liters to saturate them well with no or little runoff. If there's a bit left in the pan the plant will draw that up in a few hours so it's not soaking in runoff long. At each up-potting I saw the bottom inch off the rootball to get rid of any long roots and promote root branching that fills the pot with fine feeder roots. At harvest the rootball is a solid mass held together with near invisible root hairs and no mass of thick roots anywhere.

View attachment 4030141

View attachment 4030142

I shave down the roots on the sides too and in a few days new roots are peeking out of the drain holes in a bigger pot. I find 4gal pots to be plenty big enough for the largest plants I grow indoors tho I've heard that 5gal from seed is best for autos with no up-potting to get the best yields.

:peace:
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Love those pics.

It's been a couple crops since I did photo's but on my first one I used the 4gal with two big hybrids. I started them in the larger pot from the beginning so I didn't up-pot but since I wanted to try re-vegging I pulled them out of the 4gal, cut the sides and bottoms like you showed then put them in 5gal with a new soil mix. They went weird for awhile but I ended up with a larger harvest the second time around with the same two plants.

I don't attribute that to the re-veg method so much as me just learning how to grow better though.

*On the watering I should have been clearer - I meant the frequency was different on autos, not the amount the pot holds. I should have specified.*

I'm glad there's people with your experience when there's questions you can't find anywhere else. Thanks.
 
OldMedUser

OldMedUser

Well-Known Member
pdgenoa said:
They went weird for awhile but I ended up with a larger harvest the second time around with the same two plants.
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I've revegged plants in pots and DWC and once they get going they go nuts. I was doing a 3rd reveg on some DWC plants when I had to go out of town for a 5 week rig job and spider mites wiped me out as the wife didn't know what to do. No cell phone service so I only talked to her once on a sat phone and that was before she knew there was a problem.

Came home to a horror show and just burned the whole thing in the garbage burner. Got mites now in some gifted plants and they're going down tomorrow.

:peace:
 
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