Low pH-- Flush Problem

Hey there, I'll jump right into it:

I have been feeding with the Botannicare line of products for soil in about 6.7-7.0 pH balanced tap water. The waters great, comes out of the tap at about 7.0 . I figured everything was okay, until a Calcium def. started to form. Bought some Cal-Mag and was feeding it in with every watering, at about 1 tsp. per gallon. The Calcium deficiency began to worsen; Got some pretty bad necrosis (brown spotting in between veins?) along with yellowing, all this mostly on the larger fan leaves. I started to suspect lock-out, so i checked the run off pH. Needless to say, I got a reading of 4.0 and under and almost shit myself. I immediately started flush (which i should be anyway, at about 1.5 weeks from harvest).

Out of my 3 gallon pot with FFOF soil, I've run about 5-6 gallons of water through it, only to raise the pH to 5.0. Should I keep flushing until I get to the 6.2-7.0 range? Should I wait?
Also, when putting the last 1/2-1 gallon through the soil, should I add Cal-Mag?

+rep for quick response, THIS IS A CURRENT CRISIS!

-Smo

Yeah, you should've kept flushing til your runoff came out the same as you were pouring in. That'll tell you you've cleaned out all the nasty shit(build-up) from your medium. I'd flush again, if I were in your shoes, and possibly give them a light dose of fert, with the last 1/2 gallon you pour through. That's preference though, you may also choose to simply flush, and leave whatever is left in the soil, to carry them through the last 1.5 weeks. Either way, would be fine. The latter, would likely have a slightly cleaner smoke, if that's the last time you plan to flush.

Yeah, I hear you Jawbrodt, I just dont want to misread the bastard and end up having to harvest early. Whatever, we'll see how it goes.
Gave 'em half strength ferts with the last half gallon. thanks for your advice.

Any other input?

shit, sounds to me like you added to much calcium..maybe your water had to much calcium and u just saw a calcium def. not knowing it was actually getting to much not to little..happens all the time

i would let it be till it dry's out a little then flush it again OR maybe get sometype of product that raises ph so u dont gotta keep stressing your girls out by constantly flushing

I got my soil to around a 6.0, a little lower though. with the last 1/2 gallon i added 1/3 strength bloom, and 1/2 strength cal-mag, along with a higher pH of about 7.4

Just trying to make it to harvest guys and gals, will post pics when ready =)

Smolenja10 said:

I got my soil to around a 6.0, a little lower though. with the last 1/2 gallon i added 1/3 strength bloom, and 1/2 strength cal-mag, along with a higher pH of about 7.4

Just trying to make it to harvest guys and gals, will post pics when ready =)

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you can give it all the calcium it needs but your ph is still to low to activate it u need to get ph up giving the nutes in water check your ph before sure you got 7.0 but after you add your nutes i bet your ph is 5.8 or even less chances your food has a ph buffer in them u need PH up

you want a 6.7 to 6.9 ph with all nutes added and life will be good it happened to me and it was a lesson learned i bought both PH up an PH down only after i added my nutes into my barrel is when you adjust ph

DrFever said:

you can give it all the calcium it needs but your ph is still to low to activate it u need to get ph up giving the nutes in water check your ph before sure you got 7.0 but after you add your nutes i bet your ph is 5.8 or even less chances your food has a ph buffer in them u need PH up

you want a 6.7 to 6.9 ph with all nutes added and life will be good it happened to me and it was a lesson learned i bought both PH up an PH down only after i added my nutes into my barrel is when you adjust ph

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I do indeed have ph up and down, as do i check before and after adding nutes. when i added nutes at the end, i had the ph of the solution higher, because the soil was already a bit low.
thanks for the advice.

sounds like you got it covered. I would definately let things dry out before adding anything again. PLants actually benfit from a little moisture stress now and then.

jawbrodt said:

Yeah, you should've kept flushing til your runoff came out the same as you were pouring in. That'll tell you you've cleaned out all the nasty shit(build-up) from your medium. I'd flush again, if I were in your shoes, and possibly give them a light dose of fert, with the last 1/2 gallon you pour through. That's preference though, you may also choose to simply flush, and leave whatever is left in the soil, to carry them through the last 1.5 weeks. Either way, would be fine. The latter, would likely have a slightly cleaner smoke, if that's the last time you plan to flush.

Click to expand...

Good advice.