Fox Farm, Advanced Nutrients, General Hydro, Botanicare... OH MY

I'd like some feed back. I'd also like for there to be NO arguing in this thread. I currently use Fox Farm's line up Grow Big, Big Bloom, Tiger Bloom, Beastie Bloomz, ChaChing, Open Sesame, Kangaroots, & Microbe Brew. I've only used it for 1 grow.. came across a little bit of nutrient burn.. other than that a lot better results I had been getting

There seems to be so much controversy over which nutrient brand to use. I've heard that Advanced "blows fox farm out of the water" I've also heard some REALLY bad things about Advanced. Heard some good things about General Hydro & Botanicare...

Another thing is that Advanced Nutrients seems to have like.. a million different fucking variations of base and macro and blah blah blah.. I chose Fox Farm because I read good things, their feeding schedule is in Sunlight Supply magazine and I even got good results.


Let me know what you guys use & think because I'll be needing nutrients here probably after this grow and I wanna know if I should switch it up. I'm interested in Humboldt's Snow Storm, Gravity, Bushmaster... Humboldt's whole lineup actually..

Before I contribute my opinion I'd like to ask you if you could please elaborate for me in as much detail as you can without me being a bother as to how you ran your FF nutes. I will be running FF Tiger Bloom, Grow Big, and Big Bloom along with Advanced Nutrient's Big Bud in weeks 2-4 of flower but I'm not sure of alot of how it should be done. I've never used FF nutes before and I'm growing in Ocean Forest and apparently you aren't supposed to feed for a certain amount of time when using 100% Ocean Forest to allow the soil's time release nutes to be used up to avoid over feeding, so I'm not sure when to give a first feeding and when I do that first feeding, what strengths of which ones I should use. I'll probably start a new thread asking but I would love it if you could give me some advice too.

Onto my response to your questions. I like Advanced Nutrients because of the fact that they are open advocates of cannabis. They don't hide the fact that they market to the cannabis growers demographic. Now what I dispise about them is

A) They used shady tactics with the whole "General Hydro's 3 part vs Jungle Juice 3 part" thing and thats very dishonorable
B) They package up a million different additives that should have been included in their basic nute systems just so they can rape the cannabis grower base for every dime they can.
C) They take advantage of noobs who are buying gear from the hydro store for their first time. They package up 50 different snake oils whose ingredients should have been included in their main lineup to begin with, then they put pretty and cool ass art work on the bottles to appeal to the noob grower.

All in all, I think Advanced Nutrients are the best hands down. Best quality that is. Best ethics, I think the award would go to Hydroponix (A new California based nutrient company I've been checking out) or Fox Farms. Fox Farms is like a huge family of folks with good morals and ethics banding together to help the world produce the prettiest flowers and tastiest veggies possible.

With that said, I have been using Advanced Nutrients for a awhile and I'm wanting to make the switch to FF but I will still use a few of AN's additives like Bid Bud and their PH UP/DOWN is the best on the market HANDS DOWN!

Also, how are those powders working out for you (cha ching, beastie bloomz etc.)? Thats the entire FF soil lineup right? I would be in great debt to you if you could elaborate in as much detail as possible as to how you used FF yourself or at least compare your schedule to FF's official feeding schedule. I have and always will grow soil aside from a few DWC buckets I will be building in the next couple weeks just for an experiment. I figure, "hey I have room for a few more plants legally I may as well take advantage of the medical limits in my state.

silusbotwin said:

Also, how are those powders working out for you (cha ching, beastie bloomz etc.)? Thats the entire FF soil lineup right? I would be in great debt to you if you could elaborate in as much detail as possible as to how you used FF yourself or at least compare your schedule to FF's official feeding schedule. I have and always will grow soil aside from a few DWC buckets I will be building in the next couple weeks just for an experiment. I figure, "hey I have room for a few more plants legally I may as well take advantage of the medical limits in my state.

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I use the whole lineup of Fox Farm. The trio of Base nutrients (Grow Big, Big Bloom, Tiger Bloom) along with the trio of additive powders (ChaChing, Beastie Bloomz, Open Sesame), and the trio of the new nutrients (Microbe Brew, Kangaroots, & Sledgehammer which is a flushing agent) I use them in accordance with Fox Farm's own feeding schedule which gives 1 week of easy nutes for seedlings and cuttings then 4 weeks of veg. and 8 weeks of bloom. A full feeding schedule for soil & hydro is available on their website. I don't grow in ocean forest because it's too hot (contains too much nutrients) and burns some plants. I grow in Happy Frog soil.. this time I'm using Coco Coir mixed with Pearlite.. I start out on 1/4 dose of reccommended nutrients then 1/2 dose to ease them into full nutrients.. from personaly experience it works well.. I got a little bit of nutrient burn 2 times.. but caught it easily. I don't like advanced because it contains heavy metals in their nutrients which cannabis easily takes so when you use Advanced nutrients you're smoking some unwanted things in your buds.. and they contain WAY too many additives it's hard to know what to pick out. Humboldt nutrients are directed towards cannabis growers too.. they have a lot of additive nutrient supplements as well but they're quite enticing and not nearly as many as Advanced has. I think next time I shall try Humboldt nutrients to see the difference. They have a lot of organic stuff or synthetic.. whatever your preference is. I hope this helps. Oh by the way.. if using Fox Farm I reccommend using the WHOLE lineup for best results. Although using the base trio will work quite well too.

Blu3wid0w said:

I'd like some feed back. I'd also like for there to be NO arguing in this thread. I currently use Fox Farm's line up Grow Big, Big Bloom, Tiger Bloom, Beastie Bloomz, ChaChing, Open Sesame, Kangaroots, & Microbe Brew. I've only used it for 1 grow.. came across a little bit of nutrient burn.. other than that a lot better results I had been getting

There seems to be so much controversy over which nutrient brand to use. I've heard that Advanced "blows fox farm out of the water" I've also heard some REALLY bad things about Advanced. Heard some good things about General Hydro & Botanicare...

Another thing is that Advanced Nutrients seems to have like.. a million different fucking variations of base and macro and blah blah blah.. I chose Fox Farm because I read good things, their feeding schedule is in Sunlight Supply magazine and I even got good results.


Let me know what you guys use & think because I'll be needing nutrients here probably after this grow and I wanna know if I should switch it up. I'm interested in Humboldt's Snow Storm, Gravity, Bushmaster... Humboldt's whole lineup actually..

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If it has a stupid name, chances are it's a stupid product. Shop based on mineral content, not by brand name.

homebrewer said:

If it has a stupid name, chances are it's a stupid product. Shop based on mineral content, not by brand name.

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Agreed.

Shop based on mineral content. Really, folks, do your homework. Try some things out, see what works. That's worked for me. True, it's not always an exact science because there are plenty of other contributing factors when you grow, but and I'm only speaking for me of course, I think trying something is better than just ragging on something without experience.

As for not buying something because it has a crappy name? Really? Ever hear of the iPad? Seriously, that's the worst name you could choose for an Apple product, and still, it's become one of the most popular products.

Shop based on benefits and what works for your goals. Names don't mean anything. Labels are jsut there so we don't get confused about which product is when numerous bottles are on a shelf.

I am usung the full line up of foxfarm, so far so good, would like to see more feed back as i will be pumping this stuff for a few grows till funds allow for something better.

I also am using the full line of Fox Farm, well I was using the full line. Growing in a 5gl DWC bucket, I've noticed heavy nute burn when it came time(week2 in the hydro sched) to use the .5 tsp each of Kangaroots and Micro Brew/per gallon of h2o. I drained the tank at 1st signs, and refilled with fresh nutes that lacked Kangaroots and Microbrew. I want to say the culprit was Kangaroots, but I can't be sure; so I no longer use either with my weekly schedule. But other than that, the everything looks great. I'd recommend them all except for the Bush Doc lineup

I have used AN, GH, FF and a couple others over the years in soil and some dwc! AN I used for 4 grows and spent 90% of my time on the phone trying to get it right! Always wanted me to buy this and that, I already spent $600 on there products so I said "later days" FF good peeps just didnt get the results I did with AN and not for the lack of trying FF did everything they could including sending me freebies. Coulda been me ??? GH I have never had to call them for anything period! I use Maxibloom and the Koolbloom line! Pretty easy! There is tons of info out there about every fert line on the market. I noticed that everyone that used this or that had to adjust this or that to get it dialed in! Well maxibloom is a standard mixture. I used the same mixture for soil and dwc! Can anyone say they can do that with there nutrient line! Bsafe

Blu3wid0w said:

I'd like some feed back. I'd also like for there to be NO arguing in this thread. I currently use Fox Farm's line up Grow Big, Big Bloom, Tiger Bloom, Beastie Bloomz, ChaChing, Open Sesame, Kangaroots, & Microbe Brew. I've only used it for 1 grow.. came across a little bit of nutrient burn.. other than that a lot better results I had been getting

There seems to be so much controversy over which nutrient brand to use. I've heard that Advanced "blows fox farm out of the water" I've also heard some REALLY bad things about Advanced. Heard some good things about General Hydro & Botanicare...

Another thing is that Advanced Nutrients seems to have like.. a million different fucking variations of base and macro and blah blah blah.. I chose Fox Farm because I read good things, their feeding schedule is in Sunlight Supply magazine and I even got good results.


Let me know what you guys use & think because I'll be needing nutrients here probably after this grow and I wanna know if I should switch it up. I'm interested in Humboldt's Snow Storm, Gravity, Bushmaster... Humboldt's whole lineup actually..

Click to expand...

I personaly wouldn't use gravity or the like because they contain P.G.E.s. which cause cancer and there is no way to flush it out of your plants

eery one needs to an experiment . go to home depo buy general purpus 10/10/10 a= for veg and buy 11/32/10 for flower vs your 300 dollar stuff what is better i a ready know

I read about a product called veg and bloom, It's supposedly is a all in one. I asked to have free samples sent to me. Just waiting to get them to try them out. The thing I kinda liked is they have a hard water and a r/o water formula.
I'm hoping I can lose the liquid cal/mag by using there high cal/mag formula. I will post my results when I get them. I am a huge fan of jack's classic and dyna-gro. so this should be similar.

Age old organics is good and simple 1 part bloom with molasses. It's also like $10 not $30 or $40 or $70 omg! I'm really surprised as to how many people are using full line ups at over $200 a grow on false hopes of bigger buds and candy flavor?

If you're buying a ton of expensive stuff and not getting results, that's just dumb. Something is clearly wrong and needs fixed.

However, there's nothing wrong with spending more money on nutrients if you're seeing proportionally more in return.
Bottom line: you spend X to grow Y. If you're happy with X and Y, great - be happy. If not, figure out which one (or both) you can change to become happy.

Either beats the hell out of being angsty and confrontational to anyone that doesn't make all the same decisions and hold all the same values you do.

Not one single person using the same nutrients you use makes your choice any better. Or worse.
It isn't necessary to convince yourself or others that people who use different nutrients are stupid, gullible, or otherwise wrong.

If every single grower in the world wanted exactly the same products at exactly the same quality-to-cost ratio, every single manufacturer would make basically the same thing as every other one.

It's great that there's variety. We don't all have to agree on everything because there's something for everyone.
But it would be nice if more people were able to be happy with their own opinions without needing to tear down anyone that doesn't share them.

I personally use Bontanicare and General Hydroponics Organic lines of nutes.

I started with fox but switched to General Hydroponics FloraDuo and FloraMicro.. Check my sig for pics

lol. BPN!!!!!!!I SPEND $35 on nutes-GALLONS. No need to keep looking at othere nutes. aS WITH JUST GROW/BLOOM I GET great smoke.

I've used gh 20+ yrs and am making the switch I was sold before this sight. Theres a lot to be gained from knowing your product. I understand they are the same. So you'd be using no micro? I don't ppm I just make em drinks around them on needs. I'm bringing plants back from the dead.

kellypinto said:

Switching from Fox Farm to GH, doesn’t sound great. I haven’t tried out GH product. But I really like whenever I use advanced nutrients product. I’m an irregular grower, but advanced nutrients help to give good quality of yield and their nutrients are not expensive.

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Well obviously the FloraDuo is working better in my case or I wouldnt be using it. If you never tried a GH product then how would you know which one is better?