alexonfire
Well-Known Member
Awesome thread. would this work for a DWC setup or just soil?
The Lost Art of Foliar Feeding
- Thread starter spl1
- Start date
Mindmelted
Well-Known Member
Can't spraying during flowering bring on mold issues!!!!
spl1
Well-Known Member
The purpose of Epsom salt it to soften up water and give a small bump of magnesium sulfate. Plus when soils or water tanks start to get high levels of potassium the plant may tend to lock out magnesium at the root level, so it will still take it threw the leaves.
I stop my foliar feeding once I see bud formations about a 1/4" dia.
Cool
It works on any type of growing set up.
The only time I have had any mold problems was due to high humidity and lack of air flow, or the plant immune system is week and not producing it natural enzyme to help it attack mold.
I forgot this one spraying your flower in the last couple of weeks with RO water, that's always a good mold promoter.
If you foliar spray with a nice balanced nut with potassium silicate added will really make the plant very strong and healthy.
SeriousSmoker
Well-Known Member
you think nutrients fed through water is a natural process?
you've got no idea what your talking about any good grower will use foliar spray because IT WORKS
spl1
Well-Known Member
SeriousSmoker go read some of DankShasta's other post, it was not worth really wasting time on his comment, and you and I have already wasted to much on as it is.
alexonfire
Well-Known Member
Do you water the soil too? How often do you feed them with this method?
spl1
Well-Known Member
Yes you still water and still add nut if and when you want to the soil. The same nut I put in the soil is the same nut I spray.
I foilar spray ever day when my plants wake up. Even into a few weeks of flowering until is see 1/4" bud site over the upper canopy.
That's to bad, your missing out.
Uncle Ben
Well-Known Member
After years of gardening, I've rethunk my view of foliar feeding or using it to correct nutrient disorders. There is no art to foliar feeding and no real value compared to uptake by the roots. This busts the myth regarding the value of foliar feeding, where "it" all started, etc.
http://www.puyallup.wsu.edu/~Linda Chalker-Scott/Horticultural Myths_files/Myths/Foliar feeding.pdf
http://www.puyallup.wsu.edu/~Linda Chalker-Scott/Horticultural Myths_files/Myths/Foliar feeding.pdf
spl1
Well-Known Member
Well I also read that pdf as well, she also said the foliar feeding did have a impact on non fruit bearing tress and bushes to correct micro nutrients deficiencies.
Her paper does not talk about fruit bearing trees or fruit bearing plants in general.
When I was younger working in tree orchards for apples, oranges, rubyred grape fruit, walnuts, and pecans from year to year when we could afford to foliar spray our harvest were 20% to 30% large by weight alone. So if there is no solid proof on file oh well, the yields speak in volume.
Here is a study with different resources disagree with the post you put up on my thread.
University of Tennessee - Prof. T.S. Osborne, Agronomist
"... research indicated that only 10 to 12 per cent of phosphorus fertilizers as taken up by plants in the first year; the rest was "locked in" the soil or washed away. Fertilizer applied to soil is largely wasted because it is either bound by soil particles or is washed out of the root zone. If chemical elements could go directly into leaves and bypass the wastefulness of soils, a tremendous saving would result.
The foliage of plants can take in nutrients much as roots can. Many nutrients are readily taken up by foliage, including bark of dormant trees; even at temperatures below freezing. Elements such as phosphorus, nitrogen, and potassium move both up and down from the point of application at rates similar to those following root absorption."
University of Michigan - Drs. Witter and Turkey as quoted in Readers Digest magazine
"... leaves lap up food like blotting paper and it spreads in a few hours from tip to root. In many cases, as much as 95 percent of the food sprayed on the leaves is used immediately by the plant, where under some conditions, the roots take up no more than 10 percent of the same amount placed in the soil."
Louisiana State University - Drs. A.L. Bertrand and L. L. Rusoff
"Trader elements were used to ascertain conclusively that plants absorb nutrients through their foliage, fruit, flowers, and twigs as well as their roots."
Agricultural Chemicals Magazine
"Phosphorus availability studies have given a ratio of 20 to 1 in favor of foliar feeding over soil feeding. There seems little doubt that where soil fixation exists, foliar applications of nutrients constitute the most efficient method of fertilizer "placement" and with plants of sufficient leaf area, foliar feeding with ALL the elements can make a significant contribution toward the total nutrient requirement."
Ontario Agricultural College - Dr. T.E. Bates
"We increase corn yields 7 bushels per acre at five different locations with liquid fertilizer placed directly with the seed. The corn also received the recommended amounts of fertilizer in a band. The most startling difference is in the size. Some fields were half again as tall two weeks after the core cam up."
Big Farmer Magazine
Dr. S.H. Wittwer of Michigan State
"Farmer should fertilize according to soil test recommendations, follow with 'starter solutions' or 'pop-up' fertilizers and finish the job with foliar applications."
ATTRA - National Sustainable Agriculture Information Service
http://attra.ncat.org/attra-pub/foliar.html
http://www.growersmineral.com/crops/indepth-articles/foliar-feed-plans
Uncle Ben
Well-Known Member
We can both cherry pick to suit our agenda. Guess you could take it up with the good doctor. Give her a call. I'm gonna call her about her reluctance to use phosphates.
For starts, if a plant was meant to be fertilized via its leaves, God would have put some form of the essential elements in an airborne form, on a continous basis. If sugar was so wonderful, it would be sold as fertilizer....and the band plays on. The only airborne elements a plant might receive in the form of nitrates is via rain. Plants have developed their plant parts which serves specific functions over millions of years, root uptake of elements is the way it's done.
You can do all the book reading you want and with each ditty, you'll find caveats. I just haven't found it very effective nor do I believe it's required for good cannabis growth, witness my avatar which not only never received foliar applications (because they were not required) but grew from a seedling to full term exclusively under HPS lighting. It's just another forum ditty to push your plants and like all the other cannabis drills can have bad results.
You can get a quick greenup with products like Ferromec AC which contain a low biuret form of N and iron, but again I don't see much value unless there's a problem at the root zone, i.e. chlorosis caused by calcareous soils.
Foliar feeding is a short term fix or tool, it is not a miracle.
UB
For starts, if a plant was meant to be fertilized via its leaves, God would have put some form of the essential elements in an airborne form, on a continous basis. If sugar was so wonderful, it would be sold as fertilizer....and the band plays on. The only airborne elements a plant might receive in the form of nitrates is via rain. Plants have developed their plant parts which serves specific functions over millions of years, root uptake of elements is the way it's done.
You can do all the book reading you want and with each ditty, you'll find caveats. I just haven't found it very effective nor do I believe it's required for good cannabis growth, witness my avatar which not only never received foliar applications (because they were not required) but grew from a seedling to full term exclusively under HPS lighting. It's just another forum ditty to push your plants and like all the other cannabis drills can have bad results.
You can get a quick greenup with products like Ferromec AC which contain a low biuret form of N and iron, but again I don't see much value unless there's a problem at the root zone, i.e. chlorosis caused by calcareous soils.
Foliar feeding is a short term fix or tool, it is not a miracle.
UB
deflator
Active Member
Powerful lights require me to dry my plants for an hour outside the room under mild light or get bleaching from the drops acting as prisms. Other than that, it's the fastest method, just not practical under many conditions or optimum for uptake. I only do it when something needs to be corrected in a hurry.
AquafinaOrbit
Well-Known Member
I folair feed during Veg, and the starting stages of flowering. However once buds start to develop I stick to strictly feeding through grow medium. It helps a lot on clones also as their roots are often in shock or to undeveloped to uptake nutrients at a proper level.
SeriousSmoker go read some of DankShasta's other post, it was not worth really wasting time on his comment, and you and I have already wasted to much on as it is.
Spl1, love your attitude in dealing with trolls
Now onto the real issue:
1) You obviously grow in dirt - would the effects of foliar feeding not be as worthwhile in hydro? I have an E&F tray that gets flooded 15 minutes every two hours (medium is hydroton), so whereas in soil your plant's roots may be (somewhat) lacking in water/nutes for a time, mine never are - would this diminish the benefits of "going foliar"?
2) If the answer to "1" is "no", I'd be willing to run an experiment for you, if you'd like (and would benefit me as well - trying to run an experiment each grow) - I'm gonna be flowering out 144 clones in about 7-10 days, so I'd be willing to foliar feed 72 and leave the other 72 to be fed "normally".
Lemme know if you're interested - would using GH nutes be fine to spray them with? Guessing yes, but would love a confirmation.
Again, thanks for sharing and your great attitude.
spl1
Well-Known Member
I have had emails with the good doctor over her paper and she does say it was on landscape trees and shrubs not fruit bearing plants.
As for plants millions of years ago micro nutrients that were air born and also a high amount of CO2 were also in the air. with volcano's kicking ash into the air rich in all the most important nutrients and extreme humidity coupled with lots of rain. I can see why planets would indeed uptake what it needs threw it leaf system.
Earth crust samples show this to a solid fact.
Plus plants that have had tissue samples tested were one has had foliar feeding and the other did not, have shown that the plant that was foliar feed to be higher in nutrient storage and better cell division ,also had a higher activity of enzymes both in the root level and as well as on the leaf.
As for my avatar it was done that way as well with foliar feeding and all MG. Not to mention I got three harvest from each plant by dividing it into about a 1/3 per harvest. I like to re-veg and do multiple harvest from one plant, so I tend to really load them up.
I am not trying to take away that nice big single bud you have grown over and over.
The second picture is not my grow but a friend of mine that grew it, he was my mentor and he foliar feed all the way up to 20 day until harvest, this was the biggest of 30 main colas that he triple harvested off this plant. Like I said this last picture was not my grow but my mentors grow. I fist picture is my grow.
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spl1
Well-Known Member
I run 3000 watts right now and the closet plant I have to the light is less than 6" away from the lamp. with lots of fans and cool air I have no problems at all. No light wash out or stress. I foliar feed about 20 min before the lights kick on using green lights to see what I am doing.
Keep up the good work.
Spl1, love your attitude in dealing with trolls
Now onto the real issue:
1) You obviously grow in dirt - would the effects of foliar feeding not be as worthwhile in hydro? I have an E&F tray that gets flooded 15 minutes every two hours (medium is hydroton), so whereas in soil your plant's roots may be (somewhat) lacking in water/nutes for a time, mine never are - would this diminish the benefits of "going foliar"?
2) If the answer to "1" is "no", I'd be willing to run an experiment for you, if you'd like (and would benefit me as well - trying to run an experiment each grow) - I'm gonna be flowering out 144 clones in about 7-10 days, so I'd be willing to foliar feed 72 and leave the other 72 to be fed "normally".
Lemme know if you're interested - would using GH nutes be fine to spray them with? Guessing yes, but would love a confirmation.
Again, thanks for sharing and your great attitude.
I foliar feed every type of grow,right now I have dirt grow going on as well as DWC, all my clones are done on hydroponics the put into DWC or Dirt, it's what ever my patients or dispensary customers want.
SeriousSmoker
Well-Known Member
SPL1 i need to know the strain of that giant bud next to the milk jug PLEASE
Thanks
Thanks
spl1
Well-Known Member
I was told it was from on of his breeding programs, he called Comptche Killer. That's been over ten years ago.
He did a lot with Casper strains, Pigmy Gold, Black Affy's, Purple Candy Affy, Bubblegum, and good old Thai stick.
Dr. VonDank
Active Member
I don't foliar feed as from all my experience it slows root growth and temporally changes the osmotic flow within the plants. I grow roots, 100% of my attention goes into growing bright white fuzzy roots. If there anything but that I've done something wrong. I'm with UB on the health and mass of leaves. I want them standing straight out flat as a piece of paper with a nice shean of green that's not to dark or light in color. If your plants are healthy they should be drinking lots of mild nutrient balanced water every couple of days. I don't like to transplant then immediately switch to flower. I give them 6 to 10 days to establish a massive root system then switch the lights. Back in the day I used to try to keep a high humidity in veg and foliar sprayed every week because I thought I had to. I never run humidifiers or foliar these days. It's all about the roots now... (my2cents).