Does bucket size matter
- Thread starter Beesbuds
- Start date
Hook Daddy
Well-Known Member
It would depend on the amount of veg time, but for a general statement yes, if all else is the same, the one in the bigger pot will yield more, especially if allowed to veg any length of time. They might yield the same if flipped very early on.
jimihendrix1
Well-Known Member
Consider this.
I had several clones of 2010 Barneys Farm G13 x Haze, which generally stretches 3-5 times its size, if given enough medium.
Ok.
I vegged both clones for 60 days, under 1000w HID. In 5 gallons Promix BX.
Transplanted one of the clones, into 20 gallons Promix BX. Vegged 1 more week, to make sure transplanted clone, started to grow ect.
Well, ended up, the 20 gallon pot produced 22oz-DRY, and the 5 gallon container, produced 5oz. Big pot plant stretched 5x its size. 5 gallon plant, stretched 1.5-2 times its size.
I had several clones of 2010 Barneys Farm G13 x Haze, which generally stretches 3-5 times its size, if given enough medium.
Ok.
I vegged both clones for 60 days, under 1000w HID. In 5 gallons Promix BX.
Transplanted one of the clones, into 20 gallons Promix BX. Vegged 1 more week, to make sure transplanted clone, started to grow ect.
Well, ended up, the 20 gallon pot produced 22oz-DRY, and the 5 gallon container, produced 5oz. Big pot plant stretched 5x its size. 5 gallon plant, stretched 1.5-2 times its size.
Farmer's Hat
Well-Known Member
In theory, yes. However, there are some factors that could turn this theory upside down, such as the health of the clones. Consider this possibility: The 5gal plant produces more than the 9gal plant, because the plant in the 9gal pot is in poor health.
I'm just deciding on wether to go 9 or 5 in dwc. Without vegging longer is it worth going 9 over 5 or is it a waste of time and nutes.
Go with the largest res you can. A good metric is 3 gallons per square foot of grow space (per the attached paper). With the larger res, I think it's fair to say that your plants will grow much larger so you'll have to careful re. how many plants you grow. At 9 gallons, you might want to plan on 4 square feet. I grow in a res that holds 28 gallons and I top and LST my plants so they end up at about 6 square feet.
A larger res is more work when swapping the res but a 9 gallon res will be much more stable than a 5 gallon bucket because you're going to have at least double the volume of liquid. The larger res size will help ensure that your plant doesn't get root bound. pH will tend to be more stable and you'll have to swap the res much less frequently.
I've done the RO top off method described in the attached paper as well as adding back method that Bugbee discusses and have had excellent results with both. I do a fresh res at the start, a res swap when I go into flower, and then one in mid-flower. And, being in hydro, there is no reason to use a "bloom booster", which is an added bonus.
Thanks for that man. I have a add back tank attached to a header bucket with a float valve. So you would fill the add back tank with plain water? I've been filling it with nutes and also changing the system weekly. Pain in the ass.
You're welcome!
I've done both the "top off with RO" approach and the "add back using nutrients" and they both work (I think that's how those terms are used by I could have them bass backwards).
Manufacturers recommend weekly changes and, when I started growing in 2021, I did weekly changes for a while. It took a while for me to think about things - why am I dumping 28 gallons of nutes for a couple of 6" tall plants?
If your res is only 5 gallons, well, maybe. But then…why? Why to just add back with nutrient solution? There are times when you need to replace the res and the key issue for that seems to be when pH starts to change rapidly. Per the attached paper, nutrients are taken up a varying rates.
The paper is from Bruce Bugbee and it gets into the weeds (pardon the pun) in some places. The highlights re the parts that I found most interesting. Key point here is that some chemicals are taken up in hours, some in days. N, P, K, and Mg (I think it's Mg not Mn, but check the document) are taken up very quickly while Ca and a couple of others take days. If you're in a 5 gallon res in flower, transpiration will be high, so N, P, K, and Mg are taken up quickly but the others will still be in the res for "some time". Bugbee recommends adding back with "3 strength Hoagland solution". My practice is to just add back a combination of RO+nutes to keep EC that same.
Bugbee's discusses "mass balance" meaning if it's not in the bucket, it's in the plant. Makes sense, eh?
Something to keep in mid about Bugbee's work is that he does a lot of work for NASA and the golden rule there is that you can't throw out water (in space) so you've got to be smart about how you maintain your plants.
I've done the add back (nutes) for this grow and it's make life easy. For many previous grows, I've added back RO and then swapped the res when I'd added back 30-40% of the res but that lead to more res swaps. This grow has been a lot easier - just add some RO + some concentrated nutes and you're good to go.
This it the end of my third year growing and a big thing that's clicked for me is that cannabis grows well if you "don't do stupid shit". For example, when I mix my nutes I add in the (dry) chemicals to the tent of a gram (heh, I've been a software engineer for 30+ years so that's just how I am!) but if PPM is 750 vs 820, the plant does not care. That's the interesting thing about nutrients - all you need to do is get close. Check out this graphic.
Once nutrients are in the "sufficiency zone", that's all that's needed . More nutes is not better. Just give the plant enough and that's fine because that's all it can really use.
How often to swap a 9 gallon res? I'd guess every few weeks. A big key is that, if the res is "exhausted", pH will start to rise quickly. At that point, do a new res.
That's fantastic man, so you did bugbees course did ya? I was going to do it but spent the money on the alien system instead. I knew I was always going to end up doing hydro and staying with it. It's much easier once you figure everything out. That paper goes into amazing detail I didn't know it goes that deep into information, it's well worth the money with the amount of work involved in those papers. I'll have to read it a couple of times but it makes perfect sense. I love reading that stuff, it hard to find good information on hydro.You're welcome!
I've done both the "top off with RO" approach and the "add back using nutrients" and they both work (I think that's how those terms are used by I could have them bass backwards).
Manufacturers recommend weekly changes and, when I started growing in 2021, I did weekly changes for a while. It took a while for me to think about things - why am I dumping 28 gallons of nutes for a couple of 6" tall plants?
If your res is only 5 gallons, well, maybe. But then…why? Why to just add back with nutrient solution? There are times when you need to replace the res and the key issue for that seems to be when pH starts to change rapidly. Per the attached paper, nutrients are taken up a varying rates.
The paper is from Bruce Bugbee and it gets into the weeds (pardon the pun) in some places. The highlights re the parts that I found most interesting. Key point here is that some chemicals are taken up in hours, some in days. N, P, K, and Mg (I think it's Mg not Mn, but check the document) are taken up very quickly while Ca and a couple of others take days. If you're in a 5 gallon res in flower, transpiration will be high, so N, P, K, and Mg are taken up quickly but the others will still be in the res for "some time". Bugbee recommends adding back with "3 strength Hoagland solution". My practice is to just add back a combination of RO+nutes to keep EC that same.
Bugbee's discusses "mass balance" meaning if it's not in the bucket, it's in the plant. Makes sense, eh?
Something to keep in mid about Bugbee's work is that he does a lot of work for NASA and the golden rule there is that you can't throw out water (in space) so you've got to be smart about how you maintain your plants.
I've done the add back (nutes) for this grow and it's make life easy. For many previous grows, I've added back RO and then swapped the res when I'd added back 30-40% of the res but that lead to more res swaps. This grow has been a lot easier - just add some RO + some concentrated nutes and you're good to go.
This it the end of my third year growing and a big thing that's clicked for me is that cannabis grows well if you "don't do stupid shit". For example, when I mix my nutes I add in the (dry) chemicals to the tent of a gram (heh, I've been a software engineer for 30+ years so that's just how I am!) but if PPM is 750 vs 820, the plant does not care. That's the interesting thing about nutrients - all you need to do is get close. Check out this graphic.
Once nutrients are in the "sufficiency zone", that's all that's needed . More nutes is not better. Just give the plant enough and that's fine because that's all it can really use.
View attachment 5444211
How often to swap a 9 gallon res? I'd guess every few weeks. A big key is that, if the res is "exhausted", pH will start to rise quickly. At that point, do a new res.
To be honest made the mistake using advanced nutrients on the current run, the solution in the tank always smells at the end of the week. The other tent is on canna aqua and no smell perfectly clear, I'd think I could let that run longer without changing weekly for sure
420AD
Well-Known Member
I have to say, you can have various pot sizes and depending on how many pots you wanna squeeze in your grow have pretty equal results.
If you wanna go for a lot of small pots and short veg times or big pots and rather long veg times is up to you.
I went from small to big simply because I don't wanna mess around with too many plants and rather give em a pretty decent veg time (4-6 weeks).
If you wanna go for a lot of small pots and short veg times or big pots and rather long veg times is up to you.
I went from small to big simply because I don't wanna mess around with too many plants and rather give em a pretty decent veg time (4-6 weeks).
Billytheluther
Well-Known Member
Depends on tent size and how many you plan to run to see what is bennefical
I'm doing 8 in an 8x4 tent but I'm not vegging for long maybe 30-40 days I have everything running perpetually so I have to keep it moving. So I was just wondering wether the bigger pot would equal a better yield.
420AD
Well-Known Member
Oh I'm a bit late properly read the op and realized what this is really about, lmao.
So that would actually be an interesting test doing two plants in 20L/36L str8 up comparison in yield with the same amount of veg/bloom time.
Isn't that going to be a pain in the arse with watering tho?
So that would actually be an interesting test doing two plants in 20L/36L str8 up comparison in yield with the same amount of veg/bloom time.
Isn't that going to be a pain in the arse with watering tho?
ttystikk
Well-Known Member
Having grown big plants in RDWC, I feel like I can add to the discussion.
Bucket size is misleading; you want to know how fast the plant is turning over water and nutrients and then adjust your inputs to that. Increasing inputs can be done in two basic ways;
1. Bigger res; you make a big batch of nutes and then let the plants eat and drink things down while keeping EC and pH levels in line. This is "lazy" but not necessarily in a bad way; you get consistency in the root zone plus relatively slow changes to confusing. This makes it easier on the plants. Also, you get buffering in that conditions tend to change more slowly. Finally, you don't have to monitor as often. The downside is that a big res can go off in terms of what's taken up fast and what's taken up more slowly. Also, it can get expensive to dump and refill a big res if you're having problems and trying to eliminate potential sources of issues.
2. Smaller res; you make smaller batches (or water often from a big batch) and feed the plants more often. Taken to an extreme, this is basically the approach of drain to waste, although I think that's wasteful as fuck unless you have someplace for those nutes to go other than down the fucking drain. The upside is that the plants get fresh nutes on a regular basis, there's no drift as plants take up some nutes faster and others more slowly, as everything is replenished often. The downside is that you have to be on the ball adding nutrient solution early and often and depending on substrate you may have to watch for over or under watering. Also, adding constantly means there's potential for screwing up a mix although this is pretty easy to avoid. Finally, beware of nutrient buildup and the potential for toxicity.
I've grown 26oz (finished net salable weight) in 5 gallon buckets of coco and I've grown as much as 2 lbs in 27 gallon tuffbox RDWC, where half a dozen tuffboxes were connected together. 100 gallons of water can be a 'small' res when the plants are drinking a much as 20 gallons a day!
Hope that helps!
A few pix;
Bucket size is misleading; you want to know how fast the plant is turning over water and nutrients and then adjust your inputs to that. Increasing inputs can be done in two basic ways;
1. Bigger res; you make a big batch of nutes and then let the plants eat and drink things down while keeping EC and pH levels in line. This is "lazy" but not necessarily in a bad way; you get consistency in the root zone plus relatively slow changes to confusing. This makes it easier on the plants. Also, you get buffering in that conditions tend to change more slowly. Finally, you don't have to monitor as often. The downside is that a big res can go off in terms of what's taken up fast and what's taken up more slowly. Also, it can get expensive to dump and refill a big res if you're having problems and trying to eliminate potential sources of issues.
2. Smaller res; you make smaller batches (or water often from a big batch) and feed the plants more often. Taken to an extreme, this is basically the approach of drain to waste, although I think that's wasteful as fuck unless you have someplace for those nutes to go other than down the fucking drain. The upside is that the plants get fresh nutes on a regular basis, there's no drift as plants take up some nutes faster and others more slowly, as everything is replenished often. The downside is that you have to be on the ball adding nutrient solution early and often and depending on substrate you may have to watch for over or under watering. Also, adding constantly means there's potential for screwing up a mix although this is pretty easy to avoid. Finally, beware of nutrient buildup and the potential for toxicity.
I've grown 26oz (finished net salable weight) in 5 gallon buckets of coco and I've grown as much as 2 lbs in 27 gallon tuffbox RDWC, where half a dozen tuffboxes were connected together. 100 gallons of water can be a 'small' res when the plants are drinking a much as 20 gallons a day!
Hope that helps!
A few pix;
No they would both run on the same system since the buckets are the same height as the res and the res has a float valve that is connected to a tank so it could be so simply which I might just go ahead and doOh I'm a bit late properly read the op and realized what this is really about, lmao.
So that would actually be an interesting test doing two plants in 20L/36L str8 up comparison in yield with the same amount of veg/bloom time.
Isn't that going to be a pain in the arse with watering tho?
DAMNNNN!!!!! They are some serious roots. As someone said to me imagine you're growing roots not plants, if the roots are big and healthy then the rest will follow
Greengrouch
Well-Known Member
Yes, even in recirculating systems it seems. My 5 gallon buckets are absolutely packed with roots and I didn’t veg but like 2 weeks. Will be upgrading to 8 or 13 gallon with 3in pipes in the near future. Probably after this coming harvest.