Question about DO

kpmarine

kpmarine

Well-Known Member
I see alot of people mentioning pumping ridiculous amount of air into their rez. I don't pump air into 2 of my bubble buckets for at least 13 hours a day, never had them droop. They don't look unhealthy to me. So, my question is this: Why should I be pumping more air into my rez? What am I missing out on here?
 
BigBuddahCheese

BigBuddahCheese

New Member
Well do what works for you... if it is not broke don't fix it. There are *many* ways to grow our meds, and many with modified methods on proven ones. Try it, if it works then do it, if not live and learn and do not repeat. Simple really.

You already started to step "outside the box" in stopping the air pump for x amount of hours a day, so don't cloud it by what others do. I run mine 24/7 but that's me, it works for me and well. So.. you see you already answered your own question. If its healthy with your current amount of DO then continue, more DO to the roots just lets them thrive and be healthy. Naturally MJ is a dry footed plant meaning the roots like a "dryer" environment so the DO helps with that shock to their normal natural growth routine I guess. I am no botanist.
 
H

HSA

Well-Known Member
KPmarine: adding air to your nutes with an external air pump is called 'supercharging your crop.' It helps because a lot of your plant's processes require more oxygen than is commonly found in water. The fact that you're not doing it doesn't mean you're doing it wrong and it doesn't mean we're doing it right. I for one have done it both ways and found that the addition of air to my reservoir resulted in a healthier plants with less water related problems. Take it for what it's worth but a lot of people recommend it. I wish there was an easier way, but from what you ask, I think you might be new to this so I’d suggest you RTFB and refer to the following because most of them have something to say:
1. Read: SeeMoreBud’s book, “MARIJUANA BUDS FOR LESS- GROW 8 OZ. OF BUDS FOR LESS THAN $100.”
2. Read: Jorge Cervantes’s book, “MARIJUANA HORTICULTURE THE INDOOR/OUTDOOR MEDICAL GROWER’S BIBLE.”
3. Read: Ed Rosenthal’s, “MARIJUANA GROWER’S HANDBOOK.”
4. You’ll also want to read: Mc Carthy’s book, “GROWING MARIJUANA.”
5. You should also subscribe to, “HIGH TIMES,” magazine. Each issue is chocked full of useful information. .” All these resources are very well written, well illustrated and packed with information that will answer most of your questions before you know to ask them. And I want to add a new book to the list, a 6[SUP]th[/SUP] one: “THE CANNABIS GROW BIBLE- SECOND EDITION,” written by Greg Green. It’s a match to, if not better than, the ones listed above. Doing your homework and consulting these resources will save you and your plants a lot of anxiety before you plant. These forums are great but often they can’t get the information you need to you in a timely fashion. I hope this helps. HSA
 
superstoner1

superstoner1

Well-Known Member
i just dont understand why you would not just leave it on. do is very important in dwc or the roots would drown.
 
Bigz2277

Bigz2277

Well-Known Member
The plant wont start to see any signs of damage till the dissolved oxygen in the water is used up. Usually takes a full day with a 5 gallon bucket. This is why i hail the DWC growing method, Plant can survive without that airpump for a full day.
 
mike91sr

mike91sr

Well-Known Member
DO is not the same as total available oxygen. Just because the water can't hold more oxygen in solution, doesn't mean the plant can't benefit from more. Compare to aeroponics. DO is not even a concern, yet the plant gets more oxygen than DWC. Say you max out your DO levels in a given setup, then add another air pump, it won't increase DO but the roots will get more oxygen and all the benefits of it. As a direct comparison, look at undercurrent. DO can be maxed out before even adding airstones. Yet the addition of airstones results in even more vigor, of varying degrees of course. Obviously plants dont give a shit whether the oxygen is dissolved or not.

Plants with less-than-optimum oxygen availability show less vigor. This isn't just me saying it, there are a handful of university studies done on various crops that demonstrate it. You're also creating a more friendly environment for anaerobic bacteria(the bad kind) and a worse environment for aerobic bacteria(you guessed it, the good kind). Also, if youre running a single site DWC, your water won't be moving at all for those 13 hours. Again, think of undercurrent and why its so much more effective than traditional dwc. Then ask yourself why you would willingly choose to go in the opposite direction.
 
kpmarine

kpmarine

Well-Known Member
mike91sr said:
DO is not the same as total available oxygen. Just because the water can't hold more oxygen in solution, doesn't mean the plant can't benefit from more. Compare to aeroponics. DO is not even a concern, yet the plant gets more oxygen than DWC. Say you max out your DO levels in a given setup, then add another air pump, it won't increase DO but the roots will get more oxygen and all the benefits of it. As a direct comparison, look at undercurrent. DO can be maxed out before even adding airstones. Yet the addition of airstones results in even more vigor, of varying degrees of course. Obviously plants dont give a shit whether the oxygen is dissolved or not.

Plants with less-than-optimum oxygen availability show less vigor. This isn't just me saying it, there are a handful of university studies done on various crops that demonstrate it. You're also creating a more friendly environment for anaerobic bacteria(the bad kind) and a worse environment for aerobic bacteria(you guessed it, the good kind). Also, if youre running a single site DWC, your water won't be moving at all for those 13 hours. Again, think of undercurrent and why its so much more effective than traditional dwc. Then ask yourself why you would willingly choose to go in the opposite direction.
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I add several gallons to my individual rezzes a day, so it going anaerobic hasn't been an issue I guess. The thing is, at this point I have 6" of roots exposed to the air at all times, so what is oxygen in the water doing? Aside from preventing anaerobic nasties? I can say It doesn't cost me vigor, I've got some with stones 24 hours, and my outdoor light dep gets 13 hours of no air. I see the need for air in the water. What I'm getting at is that it seems people may be slightly overrating the need for huge amounts of air.
 
mike91sr

mike91sr

Well-Known Member
kpmarine said:
I add several gallons to my individual rezzes a day, so it going anaerobic hasn't been an issue I guess. The thing is, at this point I have 6" of roots exposed to the air at all times, so what is oxygen in the water doing? Aside from preventing anaerobic nasties? I can say It doesn't cost me vigor, I've got some with stones 24 hours, and my outdoor light dep gets 13 hours of no air. I see the need for air in the water. What I'm getting at is that it seems people may be slightly overrating the need for huge amounts of air.
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If you're saying that you believe more air doesn't provide the benefits I mentioned, then you can include me in that group that 'overrates' the need for more air. I don't believe its overrating as much as understanding the importance of maximizing it, but to each his own. Yes, there is a minimum that will get you by with a healthy plant, and anything above that will provide diminishing returns, but if more air is KNOWN to be better, I'm just not sure where there is even room for controversy. If you increase oxygen and don't see any improvement, there's always the possibility that there is some other limiting factor preventing the benefits from being realized (nutrient availability/uptake, vpd/transpiration, lighting, etc).

It's like saying that co2 is overrated. My plants grow just fine without any co2 supplementation, but it is fact that more co2 allows for faster growth. And if there are other things limiting the growth rate, that co2 will be a waste. Different mechanisms, but the principle is no different than with oxygen and the root system.
 
kpmarine

kpmarine

Well-Known Member
mike91sr said:
If you're saying that you believe more air doesn't provide the benefits I mentioned, then you can include me in that group that 'overrates' the need for more air. I don't believe its overrating as much as understanding the importance of maximizing it, but to each his own. Yes, there is a minimum that will get you by with a healthy plant, and anything above that will provide diminishing returns, but if more air is KNOWN to be better, I'm just not sure where there is even room for controversy. If you increase oxygen and don't see any improvement, there's always the possibility that there is some other limiting factor preventing the benefits from being realized (nutrient availability/uptake, vpd/transpiration, lighting, etc).

It's like saying that co2 is overrated. My plants grow just fine without any co2 supplementation, but it is fact that more co2 allows for faster growth. And if there are other things limiting the growth rate, that co2 will be a waste. Different mechanisms, but the principle is no different than with oxygen and the root system.
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I guess "overrated" was the wrong term in respect to the amount of oxygen. More oxygen is not going to hurt, if nothing else. It would be more accurate to state that the need for crazy air setups seems slightly overrated.

I was getting at the fact that with 6" of bare roots at all times, what is an air line in the water really going to do for me? I'm already exposing my root-ball to essentially limitless amounts of oxygen.
 
superstoner1

superstoner1

Well-Known Member
i still dont get why you feel the need to turn the air pump off. its not like its costing a lot of money in electric use.
 
mike91sr

mike91sr

Well-Known Member
That's not really Deep Water Culture then, technically speaking. I was assuming the roots were at least mostly submerged. In any case...Having your roots exposed allows that portion to get all the oxygen they could need, but what about the root tips underwater not getting enough oxygen? They're unable to perform at capacity, and since that's where all your nutrients are.... And the portion that's hanging doesn't have access to nutrient solution besides the spitting from surfacing bubbles(specific to your situation, a benefit of more airflow). They can't 'compensate' for each other. If you intend to have the majority of your roots out of the water, you may want to think about some type of drip/spray hybrid conversion so that portion has better access to fresh nutrient solution. The waterfall effect alone will provide enough DO for any plant to thrive as far as the lower reservoir portion. Again, not optimal, but definitely sufficient.

Do you have pictures of your roots? When you say 6", I still think of what my dwc plants looked like when I had the water at the bottom of the netpot, which was 2-4" ropes that just wanted to reach well into the water before developing more secondary roots. So I imagine a longer gap with no water/feed system would just increase the length of those bigger, less efficient roots. Could be wrong about that though, thats why I ask.

We may just not agree on this part, but I still don't really see what's crazy about any air setups I've seen being used. Considering the amount of pumps, ducting, ventilation, cooling, filtering, medium, lighting, etc that go into a hydroponic setup, a bigger air pump seems pretty mild. Maybe the high pressure oxygen tanks from metal shops or medical facilities I've seen talked about is a little out there, though I like the innovative thought process behind it. But nothing as far as centrifugal pumps, venturi pumps, etc seems outlandish to me. They're efficient, run cooler, usually quieter, and the benefits of the increased airflow are pretty much widely accepted in the field. I have a 110lpm 'commercial' pump for 8 plants. I'd just stack 2-3 more to increase my airflow even more, but their noise and heat prevent it. So I'm looking into something like I mentioned above which will replace several of the biggest conventional air pumps I can find. If that makes me crazy, so be it. Call me crazy for wanting to add better lights to my setup too.:leaf:
 
kpmarine

kpmarine

Well-Known Member
mike91sr said:
That's not really Deep Water Culture then, technically speaking. I was assuming the roots were at least mostly submerged. In any case...Having your roots exposed allows that portion to get all the oxygen they could need, but what about the root tips underwater not getting enough oxygen? They're unable to perform at capacity, and since that's where all your nutrients are.... And the portion that's hanging doesn't have access to nutrient solution besides the spitting from surfacing bubbles(specific to your situation, a benefit of more airflow). They can't 'compensate' for each other. If you intend to have the majority of your roots out of the water, you may want to think about some type of drip/spray hybrid conversion so that portion has better access to fresh nutrient solution. The waterfall effect alone will provide enough DO for any plant to thrive as far as the lower reservoir portion. Again, not optimal, but definitely sufficient.

Do you have pictures of your roots? When you say 6", I still think of what my dwc plants looked like when I had the water at the bottom of the netpot, which was 2-4" ropes that just wanted to reach well into the water before developing more secondary roots. So I imagine a longer gap with no water/feed system would just increase the length of those bigger, less efficient roots. Could be wrong about that though, thats why I ask.

We may just not agree on this part, but I still don't really see what's crazy about any air setups I've seen being used. Considering the amount of pumps, ducting, ventilation, cooling, filtering, medium, lighting, etc that go into a hydroponic setup, a bigger air pump seems pretty mild. Maybe the high pressure oxygen tanks from metal shops or medical facilities I've seen talked about is a little out there, though I like the innovative thought process behind it. But nothing as far as centrifugal pumps, venturi pumps, etc seems outlandish to me. They're efficient, run cooler, usually quieter, and the benefits of the increased airflow are pretty much widely accepted in the field. I have a 110lpm 'commercial' pump for 8 plants. I'd just stack 2-3 more to increase my airflow even more, but their noise and heat prevent it. So I'm looking into something like I mentioned above which will replace several of the biggest conventional air pumps I can find. If that makes me crazy, so be it. Call me crazy for wanting to add better lights to my setup too.:leaf:
Click to expand...
It stands to reason that the roots up top should have no problems carrying oxygen to the lower areas of the roots; much like the roots in the solution transfer nutes upward. I have considered top drip additions. Bubble buckets appealed to me due to their sheer simplicity and portability though, so it didn't work well with how I am currently using them. I think that's most of why all this extra stuff seems a bit crazy to me. You're looking at it from it optimum potential. I'm looking at it from where I stand. I'm using it outside where there's no external controls, so any optimization it would provide is probably lost due to that. Sorry if I came off as insulting your way of doing things. I can see where high levels of aeration might be more useful one day when I get some fancy gear.

Here's the roots so you can see what I'm talking about hopefully. I'm using 5gal. buckets with 10" netpots. I think they're 10" anyways, the mesh takes up the whole mouth of the bucket. So, the widest ones you can use.

Plant #1 (ATF):
ATF roots.jpg

Plant #2 (Jack Herer)
JH roots.jpg
 
mike91sr

mike91sr

Well-Known Member
That's kind of my point...Why would you want the root tips to not have enough oxygen available to create their own ATP and thus provide for the active transport of nutrients. Sure, they're getting what they need in your case, but thats definitely not the most efficient for the plant. Literally using energy to move oxygen to create energy. And I'm honestly not even sure that plants will do that, I've seen cases where root tips die off when submerged in non-aerated water. Obviously in that case the plant either can't, or didn't want to use the oxygen to 'save' those parts of the roots.

Try thinking of it this way: You are trying to lift 250lbs overhead, anyway you can. Sure, a squat or clean and press is the easiest way to do it. But what if you prevented your legs from doing the work they're capable of by limiting ATP production. You can use your upper body to do the work, but are you going to be able to do it as easily? And since youre now exerting yourself more than you would have, your body's immune system, digestive system, etc. are all going to be neglected so your body can focus on the immediate requirement: lifting that weight. Why knowingly leave that limitation in place for your plants? That's all I'm really saying. Obviously, being able to move your plants around is a pretty good reason to leave that limitation. Is the hassle worth the benefit? Your call. I dont implement co2 because its not worth redesigning a sealed room in my case. I know it would benefit me, but I choose not to.

And I'm in no way offended if you don't like what I'm saying or how I do things. My decisions are based largely on the research from credible sources which IMO cant and shouldnt be denied, though there will always be enough variability in all our environments, setups, requirements, preferences, etc that we will make different decisions based on the same set of data.
 
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