How Do You PH Balance Soil?

ok so 2 questions, do you use your growbig thru your whole flower cycle and is liquid karma the equivalent to bud candy? cause I got a gallon of it that id like to use up. I usually dose with it pretty lite about 1 tsp per gallon which i know is super lite.. o sorry couple more, is that every watering or every other watering? and do you supplement with calmag in veg?

max316420 said:

ok so 2 questions, do you use your growbig thru your whole flower cycle and is liquid karma the equivalent to bud candy? cause I got a gallon of it that id like to use up. I usually dose with it pretty lite about 1 tsp per gallon which i know is super lite.. o sorry couple more, is that every watering or every other watering? and do you supplement with calmag in veg?

Click to expand...

GrowBig can be left out for weeks 1-2 of flower to help keep the bud sites compact, but weeks 2-4 REALLY need that extra N, and if your not using Cha-Ching, yes, i would use it until your done feeding and start your flush... no cal/mag in veg, not necessary(for me), i only add it in flower to be safe, thats why i use half strength...and Liquid K is a 100% organic supplement alot like BigBloom i believe... i dont know much about Bud candy...i do remember hearing they changed their recipe in it recently, but i believe its more so a carbo supplement than anything els, like "Botanicare Sweet" but i dont know much about AN products...and i feed every other watering, like, water, feed, water,feed ect.. but somtimes the plants need more feeding or more watering, thats where you gotta know your plants.

EDIT: for veg. i literally just use BigBloom and GrowBig, and roots excell

max316420 said:

and do you supplement with calmag in veg?

Click to expand...

If you added lime, the cal/mag should not be needed.

Wet

cool thanks for the info, I mixed a whole bag of ffof with a bag of perlite and 1 1/2 cups lime. Def diggin the ff, I used to grow about 99 plants under 3 lights and averaging 1.25 z's per plant but to be on the safe side and less work for me I'm gonna try 5 gallon buckets and only 27 plants, and hopefully i can get at least 4 z's per plant and then it should just about average out. My brain say it will but i guess i'll see soon enough lol

Ok thanks! Sounds logical to add the pellets to continue on once the powdered had depleated. I was going to ask on here how long does the powdered lime last in the container with a plant in it before the ph is no longer stable and starting to drop lower .... is there a time frame window ? Im using 3 gallon containers. Im using 2 table spoons of powder lime now per 1 gallon. So a 3 gallon container gets 6 table spoons of lime, but how long is that going to be stable for? probably 2 months ?
Then the volatilization your talking about, do you mean it becomes like a vapor or a gas ? and robs the soil of the nitrogen?

Thanks alot for your response! I Love this website

PEACE

To be honest I don't know how long lime is supposed to last but I tell you the amount they put in usually doesn't last long enough.. I'm pretty sure that when supplementing it you wont have the need to add anymore. Also I'm pretty sure I read that the pellets take at least 1-2 months to start breaking down and working so not sure if putting the pellets in there would even help. Just got on this lime kick so I don't really know a shit load about it but from what I have read it's essential, I guess we'll see cause I got my bb's almost bushed out to where I want them and bout to go into the flowering room. I'll keep them posted

Cool Thankyou! Ive done some testing yesterday and tuesday. I added 6 table spoons to my 3 gallon pots, I run 6.3 water thru it, comes out at 6.3
Perfect! Someone said the soil ph is going to be a couple points higher then your runoff, I dont know if thats the case or not as long as Im in the range Im happy with that.

Thanks again PEACE

if that's the case then your spot on... I think my problem was, no lime added and soils ph was like 5.3 can we say severe lockout.. But hopefully the lime does the trick and no more ph problems....fingers crossed

newbie1272 said:

Ok thanks! Sounds logical to add the pellets to continue on once the powdered had depleated. I was going to ask on here how long does the powdered lime last in the container with a plant in it before the ph is no longer stable and starting to drop lower .... is there a time frame window ? Im using 3 gallon containers. Im using 2 table spoons of powder lime now per 1 gallon. So a 3 gallon container gets 6 table spoons of lime, but how long is that going to be stable for? probably 2 months ?
Then the volatilization your talking about, do you mean it becomes like a vapor or a gas ? and robs the soil of the nitrogen?

Thanks alot for your response! I Love this website

PEACE

Click to expand...

2 months sounds about right. But, I transplant into fresh containers just before 12/12, so the lime is good.

I have found though, growing tomatoes, I need to add more lime ~2 months in. Tomatoes though, really seem to suck it up and you need it to prevent BER (Blossom End Rot), which will keep fruit from forming. This is where I first started adding the pellets, because they were in containers 5 months or so.

Due to a bad computer crash, I lost all the science doo da on volatilization, but basically, the blood meal and the lime react and you lose both N and lime. Like mixing vinegar and baking soda (?). Blood meal is pretty acidic.

That's why I use the alfalfa meal in the initial mix, pretty pH neutral and once everything is stabilized, blood meal can be added without all the drama.

You might want to google it for further research.

Wet