Dwc.. How Do You Guys Do Guys Top Off?

[MED-Jack]

Well been growing for about 3 weeks.... very new to this... So fun but so dam many people tell you the best way to do stuff....

 

OK I have 6 5gal igoo coolers with alot air and alot of roots!!! nice looking and healthy plants. I use CYCo brand nutes from Kalamzoo indoor garding. Well I hate the idea of dumping 4 gals of RO water with 1000ppm nutes in the drain every week, thats what the cyco company says to do. So I mix a batch up every week for 6 girls... thats alot of water and nutes. Got any other ways to do this? fill it up nutes every few days or keep dumping it and making fresh every week? just trying to find out what the PRO's do!!!! thanks

 

 

Oh and um sorry for the F'ed up topic... I guess you cant edit the topic...lol

[Grow Thread]

well, i dont want to be just another noob throwing false info at you so if you wish to get into detailed info about ppm and ph and maybe when the best times to flush may be you feel free to p.m. me

[+RevThad]

Get some testing equipment. Next start taking readings daily, you will see a pattern develop with your ph and ppm. You can then get an idea of what your nute water mix is doing with the particular strains. From that information you can either start with a stronger mix, and just top off with water as needed until you either replace all of the original water, or until the mixture is no longer viable. This saves the math of trying to figure out exactly how much nutrient to add to the water addages.

 

The other method is to figure out how much nutrient to mix up with each water add... too much room for error in that method for me, and way too many small mixings.

 

As you have probably figured out, the reason that the nutrient manufacturer recommend more frequent dumps and complete changes of your rez. It is about them selling more product.

 

Just my opinion, I am sure there are others with advice on how they do things...

[+RevThad]

I would also recommend taking BG up on his offer for personal advice...

[MED-Jack]

Oh thanks alot.... by no means I dont mean anyone is a noob other then me... its just that there must be a bunch of diff ways to do this. Thanks alot. Its such a fun hobby.... I just want to be better @ it!!!

[MED-Jack]

I got a cheap PPM meter and a cheap PH meter..... not cool... I learned the hard way! they dont have a good repeat cycle. so this week end after my pay check im off to get a good hanna meter some where then that mite help me.

[budpuffer]

what RevThad said,,take Bubblegrower up on his offer...lol..zzb

[pipefitterman]

take how ever much water it takes to fill your tote and put it in a clean sterile bucket with a lid, test the h2o and add nutes and adjust ph if needed as you would if it were your grow tote, keep in a cool dark place and use it to top off your tote. maybe put a pump in it to pump it out so you dont have to take the lid off and dip into it and just pump it into your tote.

 

edit: you may need to adjust nute level a little high to compensate for the low count in your tote.