Understanding ec run off

[Jedlod]

Probably a silly question but I'm not 100% sure what to do with it

Say I'm feeding 1.4 and the run offs coming out at 1.2.im guessing you up the feed.

Or if its higher than 1.4 I will drop the feed.

What do I do if it stays the same?

 

[Guest]

Nada

[Darknight420710]

Your ec is how you measure the strength of your feed and your run off is to see how your plant is feeding.

 

Ideally you want to be around where you are, if you ec run off is very low then you need to increase the number of times you water but not increase the EC

 

if your ec is high, say feed 1.3 and run off is 2.0 which happens in my case then it means there's a build up of salt in the pot so you increase your watering but at a lower EC in and wait until the run off reaches an acceptable level of around 0.2 below 

 

If your EC is same going in and out then slow down km the watering and make your plants root search for feed

 

Its all new to me and if you now come back and say your not in coco then ignore everything I've wasted my time

Edited September 5, 2022 by Darknight420710

[catweazle1]

The idea in hydro is to  reset the EC within the media by periodically flushing the media through with fresh nutrient solution. This removes the build-up of unused nutes and waste products. and resets the pH as well.  We don't measure pH runoff as some variation in the media pH is desirable because different chemicals each have their own range they are best absorbed in. Under normal circumstances, you will mainly find the runoff ec rises. Just keep restoring the nute balance by running some excess clean solution everyday.... 20% unoff is typical.

[Guest]

All this multiple watering events to control ec sounds like very hard work.  I'm disabled and grow in coco, hand water once a day is all I'm doing.  

Adjusting as you mentioned is fine. 

[catweazle1]

1 minute ago, DankStank said:

All this multiple watering events to control ec sounds like very hard work.  I'm disabled and grow in coco, hand water once a day is all I'm doing.  

Adjusting as you mentioned is fine. 

I only water once a day normally. When you are learning something it's nearly always hard work because you have to think. Once you understand the process and you have got a feel for how much you give and how much the plants respond it's no more time-consuming than watering a dirt grow.

[Jedlod]

Cheers for the info folks

I am in coco and it's automated

The pump runs for 6 seconds. 5 times on the 24 hour timer.theres always run off.not sure how much as there's 8×5 litre pots in each danish tray.

Been doing it for a few year now but never bothered reading the ec run off.

its not been going great recently as I'm getting a deficiency So I thought I would start reading the run off to see if this was my problem.

I will get a diary up next time 

 

Glad I asked because I would have dropped the ec if it was slightly higher

 

Edited September 5, 2022 by Jedlod
Edit

[mysticriver]

12 hours ago, Jedlod said:

its not been going great recently as I'm getting a deficiency

any chance of a photo(graph)?

 

 

mystic

[Jedlod]

@mysticriver heres a couple 

Been happening for a while now

it starts around 5 weeks of flower.

the first few runs I done with the mother went all good But then this started happening.i started adding cal mag to see if that was the problem but still happened.i asked on here about it and was told it will be the cal mag causing the problem.so I cut out cal mag and it was still happening

I use growers ark grow and bloom and extra traces.use root tonic up until the second week of flower.

Nutes get mixed in a 240l plastic res

Temps are usually between 25-29c but in the summer days it hit up to 34 sometimes

Rh 50-65

 

[mysticriver]

im not an expert so dont take this as definite 

I cant decide whether its Mg or Ca

do u know what ur tap water EC is, and what is in ur tap water (by a water test)?

if it starts around wk 5 of flower.... Ca [calcium] issues usually show earlier than then [like early in veg]

are u sure that there are no issues showing in veg? because ive had it where they show early in veg, then go away and everything looks fine until u hit flower & it comes back, with a vengeance 

how does it progress from wk 5 - does it get worse

u say just lately u having these problems - does that mean you've grown some before & not had these issues?

 

 

mystic

[SmokeTester]

I grow in coco and also not an expert but, growing in coco you deffo need some calmag imo.

 

 

 

[JonDaMon]

On 06/09/2022 at 5:17 PM, Jedlod said:

@mysticriver heres a couple 

Been happening for a while now

it starts around 5 weeks of flower.

the first few runs I done with the mother went all good But then this started happening.i started adding cal mag to see if that was the problem but still happened.i asked on here about it and was told it will be the cal mag causing the problem.so I cut out cal mag and it was still happening

I use growers ark grow and bloom and extra traces.use root tonic up until the second week of flower.

Nutes get mixed in a 240l plastic res

Temps are usually between 25-29c but in the summer days it hit up to 34 sometimes

Rh 50-65

 

 

by how dark green those leaves are I would be more inclined to say you’ve got some antagonising happening. 
 

 

could you post the following information. 
 

 

source water EC and pH

 

Nutrients used

 

nutrient strength and feeding pH

 

Also are you in coco??

 

 

if your input feed is too strong it can cause lock out due to low rootzone pH. 
 

 

if you’re feeding outside the uptake range of Ca it can cause a Ca def but supplying more doesn’t stop it and just compounds the issue. 
 

 

if you’re supplying Too much Mg it can antagonise Ca and cause a def symptom. 
 

 

usually Ca def will begin on the older leaves first appearing as light coloured spotting (almost like mite feeding marks)

 

Ive also seen excessive use of high P and K feeds  which can cause issues with uptake of Ca too. 
 

 

[Jedlod]

@mysticriver yes the seed was fine and so was the first couple runs(I think it was a while ago now)

@JonDaMon I'm in coco and base ec is 0.2

When I first tested the ec run off it was off the scale on the ec stick  when 1.6 ec was going in(I've now dropped it right back to 1.2 and the ec run off was 1.6 the other day)

Growers ark nutes

Ive not checked ph for a while now because it was always good using ga nutes.(spoke to martin at ga and hes told me to check it)

It was at 6.0 after food was added

Al need to check base ph

I start at 1.2 in flower and work up to 1.6 but I think that's a bit high now that I've read the run off ec.

Here's some photos @Fatboy77

1st pic Water test

2nd pic the plant i took the mother from

the rest of the photosare from a few runs later

 

[mysticriver]

as the other chap has suggested, I think it might be Ca causing an issue with Mg, or vice-versa

I say that because it looks as though there are Mg & Ca issues

and as u probably know, 1 of these 2 elements can cause an issue with the other, if there's an imbalance

sorry I cant be more specific but maybe someone else can clarify

 

 

mystic

p.s. that 'mam' looks nice & frosty by the way!

Edited September 8, 2022 by mysticriver

[Jedlod]

Cheers for the help @mysticriver

I will be reading the ec next time I run this strain.

Hopefully be OK if I stop overfeeding

Thanks bud one of the reasons I kept her  be good to get it back looking like that