Feeding DWC at 2.7 EC?!

Hey all!

To keep it short, I'll say that I got into a situation which forced me to fill my buckets with an extra strong nute mix. The EC was 2.7. The idea was to just top off daily to bring the EC down, but the plants are drinking it down on their own. After a day, it dropped to 2.5. The next, it was 2.3. Water level is dropping too and pH is good (around 5.9).

Seems like the nute mix was way too heavy but they're showing no signs of trouble. They're 3ft tall and I'm not using CO2.

My question is this: could I still have a problem or is everything good now?

The8thChevron said:

Hey all!

To keep it short, I'll say that I got into a situation which forced me to fill my buckets with an extra strong nute mix. The EC was 2.7. The idea was to just top off daily to bring the EC down, but the plants are drinking it down on their own. After a day, it dropped to 2.5. The next, it was 2.3. Water level is dropping too and pH is good (around 5.9).

Seems like the nute mix was way too heavy but they're showing no signs of trouble. They're 3ft tall and I'm not using CO2.

My question is this: could I still have a problem or is everything good now?View attachment 4822322

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Assuming you fed them that recently. If so, they might not show issues for a bit.

These plants seem to like what you’re doing, they look good with no visible problems. I’d back off a little perhaps seeing as you are in flower. How long have you been in flower?

They're only eating 100ppm a day that's not great

Homegrown Hero said:

These plants seem to like what you’re doing, they look good with no visible problems. I’d back off a little perhaps seeing as you are in flower. How long have you been in flower?

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I'm halfway through week 4 of flower. I changed the res 4 days ago.

The8thChevron said:

I'm halfway through week 4 of flower. I changed the res 4 days ago.

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I’m not familiar with hydro, but understand enough to think you made the right call. Some plants crave nutes, others are more conservative with uptake. I’d say you’ve got some piggies for sure! I really wanna do hydro in the future, still haven’t taken the leap

Gemtree said:

They're only eating 100ppm a day that's not great

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I don't think it works that way. In a perfect world the EC wouldn't change at all because it would be drinking water and nutes at the same rate.

Homegrown Hero said:

I’m not familiar with hydro, but understand enough to think you made the right call. Some plants crave nutes, others are more conservative with uptake. I’d say you’ve got some piggies for sure! I really wanna do hydro in the future, still haven’t taken the leap

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I've never done soil lol. Hydro is pretty easy IMO but it's all I know.

The8thChevron said:

I don't think it works that way. In a perfect world the EC wouldn't change at all because it would be drinking water and nutes at the same rate.

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Idk I do coco and mine eat way more

The8thChevron said:

I've never done soil lol. Hydro is pretty easy IMO but it's all I know.

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You’re the second person to tell me this today! I think I’ll upgrade to hydro once I’m done my soil run

Gemtree said:

Idk I do coco and mine eat way more

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So as far as I know, as long as your EC isn't increasing then you're good. But feeding so hot, I was surprised to see the EC still drop.

In the case of coco, you want the EC to be as close to the same coming out as going in as possible. If you water at 1000ppms and it's coming out at 500ppms, you should be able to increase your feed.

This is based on everything I have read of course. I could be way off...

The8thChevron said:

Hey all!

To keep it short, I'll say that I got into a situation which forced me to fill my buckets with an extra strong nute mix. The EC was 2.7. The idea was to just top off daily to bring the EC down, but the plants are drinking it down on their own. After a day, it dropped to 2.5. The next, it was 2.3. Water level is dropping too and pH is good (around 5.9).

Seems like the nute mix was way too heavy but they're showing no signs of trouble. They're 3ft tall and I'm not using CO2.

My question is this: could I still have a problem or is everything good now?View attachment 4822322

Click to expand...

If you can keep your temp under control its better, Running at 2.7 and you get a hot day/night or you get a ventilation problem and the plants start drinking lots more water than nuts you could easily get an ec much higher and then they take a hit.
Running high ec gives you no room for error a small mistake or hardware breakdown can hit you hard.
Give yourself plenty of room.

bernie344 said:

If you can keep your temp under control its better, Running at 2.7 and you get a hot day/night or you get a ventilation problem and the plants start drinking lots more water than nuts you could easily get an ec much higher and then they take a hit.
Running high ec gives you no room for error a small mistake or hardware breakdown can hit you hard.
Give yourself plenty of room.

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That's a good point. It winter though, so my house is always 68F. With the lights during the day, it gets up to 73F or so.
I guess we will see. I will definitely come back and update because this may prove useful to someone down the road.