air injected buckets around two 600 watt hps

i've done several diy hydro and hybrid sets ups and grows in the last few years, of varied sizes and methods and with varied success. this is what i'm fairly sure is the way i'll be sticking with for the future. three gallon grow bags with organic soil and moderate amendments. they sit in buckets i got for a dollar each that each have a 4" air stone underneath 5 or 6 inches of lava stones. the air line to each feeds through a short section of 1/2 irrigation tubing to keep it from getting pinched closed and to leave a gap for inserting a funnel for adding nutrients.

i'm using blue planet nutrients organic line with botnicare silica and AN's enzymes. with the light nutrient content of the soil they get a light feed schedule staying under .6 ec. i went up to .7 on one feed and got some tip burn and darker than good leaves for a couple weeks on a couple strains. lesson learned.
i'm not monocroping so i need to adjust the different plants heigths. at some point i want to do a run with only one or two high yielding strains, too see just how much i can really get. but for now i love having different strains and this makes it easy to mix em and still get excellent efficiency and quality with great flexibility.

i think these were on day 35.

So you're using an air pump underneath the bottom of the pot to supplement oxygen to the roots, is that correct? Because it seems to me it should work it should improve the amount of oxygen to get to the roots.

pilsung said:

i've done several diy hydro and hybrid sets ups and grows in the last few years, of varied sizes and methods and with varied success. this is what i'm fairly sure is the way i'll be sticking with for the future. three gallon grow bags with organic soil and moderate amendments. they sit in buckets i got for a dollar each that each have a 4" air stone underneath 5 or 6 inches of lava stones. the air line to each feeds through a short section of 1/2 irrigation tubing to keep it from getting pinched closed and to leave a gap for inserting a funnel for adding nutrients.
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i'm using blue planet nutrients organic line with botnicare silica and AN's enzymes. with the light nutrient content of the soil they get a light feed schedule staying under .6 ec. i went up to .7 on one feed and got some tip burn and darker than good leaves for a couple weeks on a couple strains. lesson learned.
i'm not monocroping so i need to adjust the different plants heigths. at some point i want to do a run with only one or two high yielding strains, too see just how much i can really get. but for now i love having different strains and this makes it easy to mix em and still get excellent efficiency and quality with great flexibility.
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i think these were on day 35.
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Your idea is very intriguing, as I was thinking of doing something similar but the only difference is I was going to have the air pumped directly into the soil through the side of the pot.

Cpappa27 said:

Your idea is very intriguing, as I was thinking of doing something similar but the only difference is I was going to have the air pumped directly into the soil through the side of the pot.

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My understanding was you run into an issue of dry spots around the injection sites. I think the air would have to be injected in a fog... kind of like a nebulizer. Even better may be supplemental oxygen in say 15 min intervals??? What say you? U want to collaborate on this? I have perfect clones that just went 12/12. I can spare two orange bud for experimentation. Gimme some thoughts

Craig1969SS said:

My understanding was you run into an issue of dry spots around the injection sites. I think the air would have to be injected in a fog... kind of like a nebulizer. Even better may be supplemental oxygen in say 15 min intervals??? What say you? U want to collaborate on this? I have perfect clones that just went 12/12. I can spare two orange bud for experimentation. Gimme some thoughts

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I was thinking of using a hydro pump for the air supply, hooking it up to a timer to go on for 10 minutes every 2 hours. I think thats plenty.

I read the reviews on this pump and I like what they were. This would be perfect with adjustable air flow valves and the dual diaphragm. Now for dry spots i was thinking of splitting each hose into two hoses so each 5 gallon Air Pot would have two hoses going in. Ill connect a large air stone on each end and plce them in the soil, one 6 almost right on bottom and the other about six inches up from that. I dont think dry spot would occur in those intervals with the long air stones.

I dont know what do you think ?

I forgot to say that where I lay the airstones I will use straight perlite under it and around it for easier flow and less dirt on the stone.

Maybe instead of laying inside the bucket I could stick them in from the top down the long way and plant the plant in between the two. Hmm all these ideas, see what you did lol

i changed / am changing to five gallon buckets. cleaner more stable more root space.
i think two six inch air stones in a five gallon would be optimal. i'm only using a single 4" right now.
i'll be adding more air pumps soon as well.

Craig1969SS said:

So you're using an air pump underneath the bottom of the pot to supplement oxygen to the roots, is that correct? Because it seems to me it should work it should improve the amount of oxygen to get to the roots.

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yes. and it does.
i've had some grower errors and let the plants drink their buckets dry, but as long as you don't do that it works like a hybrid of organic soil and deep water culture.
i don't get why you would turn the air off, ever. as long as roots don't get dried out it's practically impossible to give them to much air.
putting an air stone in soil works ok and makes it near impossible to over water a plant, but i don't believe it's anywhere near as effective when you don't have an open medium like the lave rock or grow rocks that let's the air dissipate and reach more of the root mass.
dry spots are only an issue if / when they don't get watered for too long of time.

started two chocolate rain and two c99 on the 20th. my camera is near the end of it's life and being a fickle b. so only got this one pic to load that's of the bigger of the two chocolate rain.

43 inches from soil to tip on day one of 12/12. stretch should be fun.

I always double up on hoses. Two hoses going to each plant both hose from a different pump. So if one pump fails you're not screwed. Also run it all the time.

I'm going from the top down. I have A small three watt air pump with two 2-inch cylindrical stones sitting next to the stem. The container is sitting on about 3 inches of Coco pebbles so there is airflow from top down to and through the bottom. I used a self adhesive sandwich wrap to place over the stones. This makes a tight seal around the top to encourage the air to move downwards. The plant is Dutch passion Mekong High @ 3 weeks old vegging 18/6 under a 125watt cfl 6500 K. Compared to other plants I've grown this sativa strain is on the slow side. I'm going to try this for at least another month if it shows signs of being successful, if not I'll nurse it back to health inside. I so want this strain to grow and do well. I've been waiting many months to get this baby going. Thoughts anyone?

I think pumping air into dirt containers is a waste of time. If you really think you need to, you probably have some issues with the soil you are using not being a good mix.

I tend t

Bugeye said:

I think pumping air into dirt containers is a waste of time. If you really think you need to, you probably have some issues with the soil you are using not being a good mix.

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i tend to agree with you but I want to give it a few weeks to see what will happen. I have a good soil mix with my others and am straight organic and watering with areated teas of budswell and such. Here's a few pics of the ones that are finishing

Craig1969SS said:

I tend t

i tend to agree with you but I want to give it a few weeks to see what will happen. I have a good soil mix with my others and am straight organic and watering with areated teas of budswell and such. Here's a few pics of the ones that are finishing

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It never hurts to experiment but I think you'll find that oxygen is not a limiting factor in your soil mix, it already has plenty as witnessed by your pics.

craig - i'm not sure i understand, do you have the air stones sitting on top of the soil, not buried?
i don't think that will have any positive effects, and i would worry that it may make a better environment for insects or mold.
or if they're only pushed in a few inches that's not likely to be any better. imho. if you want to supplement oxygen it needs to get to the root zone.

you need to get away from the turnpike to get to where good stuff is happening.

if you have a plant that's been over watered, stick a long screw driver or pencil into soil a few inches from the stem and push in an air line. no stone. the plant will recover much faster. keep the air line in and it'll make it near impossible to over water in the first place.
the biggest benefit is it makes things close to idiot proof.
of course i'm a pretty big idiot and haven't found much that's 100% proof from that.

pilsung said:

craig - i'm not sure i understand, do you have the air stones sitting on top of the soil, not buried?
i don't think that will have any positive effects, and i would worry that it may make a better environment for insects or mold.
or if they're only pushed in a few inches that's not likely to be any better. imho. if you want to supplement oxygen it needs to get to the root zone.

you need to get away from the turnpike to get to where good stuff is happening.

if you have a plant that's been over watered, stick a long screw driver or pencil into soil a few inches from the stem and push in an air line. no stone. the plant will recover much faster. keep the air line in and it'll make it near impossible to over water in the first place.
the biggest benefit is it makes things close to idiot proof.
of course i'm a pretty big idiot and haven't found much that's 100% proof from that.

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I find it very difficult to over-water a well structured soil to begin with. If you are having lots of over-watering issues, you most likely have a soil structure issue, too much clay content or not enough aeration elements.

The space between soil particles in a good soil will be about half water and half air. When you water, old air is pushed out and new air is pulled in. Some of the water gets absorbed by the plant, some stays in the soil, and some breaks down into additional oxygen in the root zone. So the watering cycle alone provides enough oxygen.

Consider that you can drive coast to coast past thousands of miles of commercial farmland and never see anyone pumping air into their fields. Just saying...

pilsung said:

craig - i'm not sure i understand, do you have the air stones sitting on top of the soil, not buried?
i don't think that will have any positive effects, and i would worry that it may make a better environment for insects or mold.
or if they're only pushed in a few inches that's not likely to be any better. imho. if you want to supplement oxygen it needs to get to the root zone.

you need to get away from the turnpike to get to where good stuff is happening.

if you have a plant that's been over watered, stick a long screw driver or pencil into soil a few inches from the stem and push in an air line. no stone. the plant will recover much faster. keep the air line in and it'll make it near impossible to over water in the first place.
the biggest benefit is it makes things close to idiot proof.
of course i'm a pretty big idiot and haven't found much that's 100% proof from that.

Click to expand...

One thing I did do was placed the bottom of the pot in water and found that within a couple of seconds it bubbled so that tells me that air is being moved down through the soil into the pebbles. It's enough of a primer to continue and see what happens. I figured it would dry the soil in 18hrs time. Again today it's still in the norm. So yes the diffusers are on top next to the stem.

i wouldn't expect it to push oxygen down and out, especially enough to make bubbles. that's very cool.

i still can't afford new glasses but i need them badly. plant above grew big balls barely a week into 12/12. not shocked. i didn't bother using any magnification to check, thought i saw a lady hair. but how much he towers over the others, i'm not shocked. a bit bummed.

This is my second grow, the first one was hydroponic which was a great teacher. Bio and hydro are a tenuous match to keep in balance for so long. I see why people rely on flushing and h2o2. Bio, soil and organic will never burn a plant as long as you hold fast on another watering until it dries out like bugeye states. I underestimated organic because of what I've read and now I see it's not the low man on the totem pole. Feeding the soil and not the plant is the surest way to get through 4 months of growing without the associated hiccups and setbacks ive read so much about. I didn't expect the thickness of the colas or the aggressive rate at which they have bloomed to be possible without synthetics but it is and without burning or overnuting.

pilsung said:

i've done several diy hydro and hybrid sets ups and grows in the last few years, of varied sizes and methods and with varied success. this is what i'm fairly sure is the way i'll be sticking with for the future. three gallon grow bags with organic soil and moderate amendments. they sit in buckets i got for a dollar each that each have a 4" air stone underneath 5 or 6 inches of lava stones. the air line to each feeds through a short section of 1/2 irrigation tubing to keep it from getting pinched closed and to leave a gap for inserting a funnel for adding nutrients.
View attachment 3357755
i'm using blue planet nutrients organic line with botnicare silica and AN's enzymes. with the light nutrient content of the soil they get a light feed schedule staying under .6 ec. i went up to .7 on one feed and got some tip burn and darker than good leaves for a couple weeks on a couple strains. lesson learned.
i'm not monocroping so i need to adjust the different plants heigths. at some point i want to do a run with only one or two high yielding strains, too see just how much i can really get. but for now i love having different strains and this makes it easy to mix em and still get excellent efficiency and quality with great flexibility.
View attachment 3357760
i think these were on day 35.
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So this is a vertical grow? I didn't see a bulb. I have 5 around a 600hps in a cool tube but I've never grown this way before. 3 are in full bloom @ 6 weeks 3 are their clones. I've used the back hand rule and gotten an 80 degree temp but I'm unsure of how high to place the bulb. Right now I'm covering the bulb and lifting it to where I get the highest reflective light off the plant. This submerges the bulb halfway from the top of the plant. Does this sound right to you?