Autoflower, AN Nutrients, and Hydroponics

[TexasKracker]

Lets talk a minute about why I do not do flood and drain. If you do not flood above the top of the media you run the risk of creating a salt line in the media where the evaporation happens inside the media. This can become toxic to the plant as the salts concentrate there. You can mitigate this by top watering once a week.

Basically that means a 4 inch fertigation depth for a 4 inch cube . In a 2x4 flood tray (2 plants) that will be 20 gallons (6 inch cubes grow a better plant but 10 more gallons). Your reservoir will need 5 more gallons to keep the pump primed. 25 gallons of fertilizer a week. Sure you may be able to go 10 days but that is risky especially in flower when they are using P-K heavily. So in veg you are looking at ~$45 worth of nutrients Then in bloom about $120. That is about $165 dollars to grow 2 plants. This does not include topping up the nutrients daily. Ouch.

You can do the same F&D with GreenLeaf, Bioag Ful-Power and NPK Raw products for about $40 including topping off the nutrients.

I grow 6 plants in 6 inch cubes using drip to waste for <$50.

You may be able to get away with only 2 inches of nutrients in the tray if you top fertigate at least once a week but you will need to change the reservoir much more often. Remember the reason we need to change the reservoir is because we do not know what the plant is using out of the mix at any given time. There is no other way to keep the nutrients in balance. In my drip system I return to the starting PPM daily by adding ~33% of the original nutrients back into the reservoir but after a week it needs to be changed because there is now way to know what the plants have taken out.

This is not a perfect schedule. It is for autos only. I need to bump up the overall strength by about 15% in the next run. I have been leaning my formula out to save on money and not wanting to over feed which is easy to do in hydro. I think I found the bottom of what will work at about 450 PPM. I will go back up to ~ 550PPM which gave me a happier plant over-all.

View attachment 1402656

I document my grows well so go see the Lil'Wild Lamb, Lil'MOBstar, Double Grape

Have Fun!

Thank you for the information. I do flood my table high. I use the clay pellets. But all the info is really helpful.

 

[420autoflower]

Hey guys. I'm doin hydroponics using a flood and drain table. I'm going to be running autoflowers with advanced nutrients. I was wondering if anyone has a good feeding schedule or point me the right direction to find one.

Hope everything is going well with your hydro grow. I just posted some pics of my flood and drain set up.

 

[420autoflower]

Lets talk a minute about why I do not do flood and drain. If you do not flood above the top of the media you run the risk of creating a salt line in the media where the evaporation happens inside the media. This can become toxic to the plant as the salts concentrate there. You can mitigate this by top watering once a week.

Basically that means a 4 inch fertigation depth for a 4 inch cube . In a 2x4 flood tray (2 plants) that will be 20 gallons (6 inch cubes grow a better plant but 10 more gallons). Your reservoir will need 5 more gallons to keep the pump primed. 25 gallons of fertilizer a week. Sure you may be able to go 10 days but that is risky especially in flower when they are using P-K heavily. So in veg you are looking at ~$45 worth of nutrients Then in bloom about $120. That is about $165 dollars to grow 2 plants. This does not include topping up the nutrients daily. Ouch.

You can do the same F&D with GreenLeaf, Bioag Ful-Power and NPK Raw products for about $40 including topping off the nutrients.

I grow 6 plants in 6 inch cubes using drip to waste for <$50.

You may be able to get away with only 2 inches of nutrients in the tray if you top fertigate at least once a week but you will need to change the reservoir much more often. Remember the reason we need to change the reservoir is because we do not know what the plant is using out of the mix at any given time. There is no other way to keep the nutrients in balance. In my drip system I return to the starting PPM daily by adding ~33% of the original nutrients back into the reservoir but after a week it needs to be changed because there is now way to know what the plants have taken out.

This is not a perfect schedule. It is for autos only. I need to bump up the overall strength by about 15% in the next run. I have been leaning my formula out to save on money and not wanting to over feed which is easy to do in hydro. I think I found the bottom of what will work at about 450 PPM. I will go back up to ~ 550PPM which gave me a happier plant over-all.

View attachment 1402656

I document my grows well so go see the Lil'Wild Lamb, Lil'MOBstar, Double Grape

Have Fun!

Hello
With all due respect, I think all this is overthinking and flood and drain shouldn’t be so technical.
I can grow 20 autos yielding 4 pounds of solid colas by only using $50-$60 worth of nutrients. I only flood my tray a inch to a inch and a half at the most, and change my reservoir once every 2 weeks. I always keep track of my PPM and PH but not much more than that. I grow some of my autos on 9x8x3 Grodan slabs with a 4x4 Grodan cube on top, and never encountered any salt buildup problems

 

[Mañ'O'Green]

Hello
With all due respect, I think all this is overthinking and flood and drain shouldn’t be so technical.
I can grow 20 autos yielding 4 pounds of solid colas by only using $50-$60 worth of nutrients. I only flood my tray a inch to a inch and a half at the most, and change my reservoir once every 2 weeks. I always keep track of my PPM and PH but not much more than that. I grow some of my autos on 9x8x3 Grodan slabs with a 4x4 Grodan cube on top, and never encountered any salt buildup problems

Of course there are many environmental factors involved in hydroponic gardens and your methods are working. This is a good thing. A salt zone is just something that can happen in flood and drain it does not have to.

 

[TexasKracker]

What do yall guys think about running Recharge, Great White, or Orca in hydro.

 

[420autoflower]

What do yall guys think about running Recharge, Great White, or Orca in hydro.

I use recharge with all my coco grows but never with my hydro grows. I do add myco in both hydro and coco grows, but only during veg.