Blisters LED Coco grow has reached it's inevitable end...

welcome back.
 
i have never had luck with coco coir, after a while it seems to hold the moisture and become very heavy and compacted. so now i only use it as a filler. i start my seeds promix hp, then move to a cheaper peat mix, when i pot up, called Advanced Garden Products found in Costco for $9. plus i reuse the soil as plants die off.
 
what are you doing for humidity levels? that can be a killer with our extremely dry conditions.
 
you may also want to look into your tap water ph level, perhaps switching to bottled water delivered the correct ph balance. i know my ph tap water level varies from 7 - 8.5 which is too high for peppers.

Thanks for the welcome Mark.

I always ph my water - tap or bottled. I was originally using the ph tester drops, but have since bought a digital HM ph tester. The water is ph'ed down to 5.8.

It's interesting that you had compacting problems with coco. That's something I've really only seen with peat and soil mixes (I used to use Promix HP before switching to coco). I'd fill the pot when I transplant and by the end of the year I was inch or two down by harvest time. What kind of coco were you using? I know there are different mixes that range from very fine pith to extremely coarse croutons. The stuff I've been using is a medium grind coir that I rinsed and buffered with a weak nutrient solution. From all I've been able to gather on the 420 sites, it's best to stick with Canna and other buffered name brand coco because not all coco is equal.

I'm currently running about 55% humidity right now.

I'm hoping to post some pictures soon. I have to get them off my phone.

Neil

thanks Neil,
 
i did a quick google search on prince george ph tap water levels, of course no government docs but found some aquarium enthusiasts that stated 7.1 to 8.5, same as calgary's documented levels. got to love those prince george fish lovers, they get right to the point and post their results. but we do share the complete lack of sunlight issues at this time of the year, i am lucky that the sun is so low in the sky that it fills my south exposed basement where i have 75 overwintered plants, so they do get some indirect sunlight. i do have 2, 4 foot T8's running early morning and then late afternoon until 11pm.
 
i haven't turned on the humidifier yet as i am waiting to see which overwintered plants are planning to die off, looks like a few yellow bhuts are turning grey. i need to make room next week for 2014 plants and some stuff just doesn't want to die. yellow bonnets just seem to want to live for ever.
 
i originally bought into the coir idea from members on this site and then the research into the idea. i bought the pellets from cantire "planters pride" and the pucks from rona(don't remember the brand). i still have some pellets left but won't be going back to them, not even for tomatoes.  promix is such a light, fluffy mix and i find it keeps its lightness until pot up time, anytime that i found it losing shape or appears to decrease in level, i would just add in more. being so light it can appear to lose density but a quick pinch refills the cell. i have been trying coir for 6 years now and last year made the commitment not to go back as a main medium. no problem with supplementing but not as a main medium. 
 
good luck to you and your growing effort.

Germinating the seeds with rockwool cubes in a mini greenhouse and then putting the greenhouse somewhere warm is a sure way to success. I am lucky, that my tap water is coming from our own well and it is soft water.

Thanks for the replies guys.

Mark

I've updated my profile. I'm no longer in Prince George. I'm now in Quesnel, BC (about an hour south of PG). The water is extremely hard here. All the fixtures have a massive white build up around them from all the mineral content. Off the top of my head the ph of my tap water hovered around 7 and the ppm was around 500. We've got a house full of kids right now so I'll have to check it after they leave. I'm thinking all the calcium and other minerals in my tap water had been throwing everything way out of balance and locking out specific nutes. Things really turned around when I switched to bottled water.

Chilidude

I germinated my seeds between wet paper towels in a plastic bag on a heat mat. My first go round with the yellow scotch bonnets was great. I had about 30 germinate. I transplanted a bunch into pots and chucked the rest. They all died. The second batch never germinated. The third batch had a few sprout and I was able to get 5 to go. I have 4 right now that are doing great. I turfed one the other day and was surprised to see the roots were 3/4 of the way up the pot.

Neil
Finally managed to get some pictures off my phone. My iPad is absolutely no help in trying to post pictures. Can't seem to select the link from imageshack. Oh well. These are the Bhut Jolokia's. Not sure when they sprouted. Had them in a window for some time before I got my LED grow light. 
 
The light and plants
 

 
After a few days under the light.
 

 
About a week later.
 

 
Three weeks in.
 

 
Taken a few days ago
 


 
 

WB and nice looking plants ... good luck this season

Thanks walkgood! Feels good to be back growing some peppers. I didn't realize how much I missed it until I started up again.

Mark

I just checked my water. It's 490 ppm and 7.5 ph. Makes it kinda hard to mix the proper nutrient solution of around 700ppm when your starting water is that high.

I got home today and was going to water my plants. As usual I checked the bottom of the pots to see how the roots were doing. I picked one at random and figured I'd pop it out to get a better look since the roots were just starting to poke out the bottom. I was VERY surprised at what I found.
 
Jolokia Dec. 4. 2013
 

 
Scotch Bonnet
 

 
 
I've been pleasantly surprised by coco. I did have a few problems at first, but once I dialled it in a bit the plants really turned around. I was hoping to hold off on potting up my plants, but that may not be an option for the Jolokia's at this point. The roots were literally poking out the top of the coco. I've never had this with soil before.

Serious rootbound incoming, you need to repot them real soon.

I'm going to pick up some square pots and some extra coco tomorrow. I'm out of both. I'm hoping to control the growth a bit by letting them get root bound. I think I may also cut the nutes a little bit.

Since the plants were doing so well and getting bigger, I had to cull my crop. I selected a few of the biggest plants then gave the rest away. some went to my hydro shop guy and some went to a buddy of mine. I picked up some new coco, which is a bit too fine for my liking. I'm going to have to find some coarser coco and use that when I pot up for the summer season. I don't think this stuff will dry out fast enough to let the plant wilt often enough to produce hot peppers. Anywho, some pics.
 
Bhut Jolokia's
 

 


 

 

 
Yellow Scotch Bonnets - The first two are Advanced Nutrients Monkey Juice Bloom A+B
 
 

 

 
General Hydro Flora Bloom and Micro
 

 

 
Picture of the Canopy. Mostly Bhut's
 

 
Sorry for some blurry pictures. The beer can in the picture should explain the reason...
 
The Flora series has produced the tallest Scotch bonnet and the Monkey Juice has produced a short stalky bush like plant. The CNS17 produced a similar bushy plant, but I gave that one away so it's not pictured here.

Welcome back to the forum - I've only been here since jan 2012 so it's nice to meet ya!
Nice grow going there, Neil, plants nice, green and healthy!
 
Liked the comments and info about coco - I'm thinking of experimenting with it a little,
maybe as an additive to my own soil mix rather than peat moss.
I have found that my rootbound plants seem to grow faster once they stop making so
many roots, and that transplanting slows it down a bit while it makes new roots to fill
up the pot, and then starts growing faster again when the roots hit the margins of the pot.
Perhaps not the case growing in coco?  Those roots are awesome

Awesome work they look brilliant. How do you give them nutes do you do a drain to waste? Do you feed in every watering?

Thanks Sarge,

I do drain to waste and feed with every watering. Coco has nothing in it for nutrients so you need to feed every time. I think my nutes were a bit too strong (about 900 ppm) and was causing the crumpled leaves. I've cut them back (around 500-600ppm) and have seen the new growth produce flatter leaves. I'm still trying to get them dialled in.

I'd love to go a drip system to simplify things when I'm out of town. It also seems to help grow bigger plants because you're able to deliver fresh nutrient and oxygen on a more consistent basis. The downside is that I have nowhere to store a reservoir at this point in time. As it is I have all my plants in the spare bathroom. Only 5.5 months to go until I can move them outside.

Blister said:

Thanks Sarge,

I do drain to waste and feed with every watering. Coco has nothing in it for nutrients so you need to feed every time. I think my nutes were a bit too strong (about 900 ppm) and was causing the crumpled leaves. I've cut them back (around 500-600ppm) and have seen the new growth produce flatter leaves. I'm still trying to get them dialled in.

I'd love to go a drip system to simplify things when I'm out of town. It also seems to help grow bigger plants because you're able to deliver fresh nutrient and oxygen on a more consistent basis. The downside is that I have nowhere to store a reservoir at this point in time. As it is I have all my plants in the spare bathroom. Only 5.5 months to go until I can move them outside.

Click to expand...

 
Awesome stuff man, good info that I can use if I decide to hit the coco route. Just to confirm the nutes you use, are they the bottles with the monkey and purple background a and b?

Just pulled a Jolokia that I potted up last week. Literally one week ago today. It was a root bound plant like in the above picture. Here it is today. It is growing on Flora micro and Flora bloom

December 12, 13



Hi Sarge,

Monkey Juice Bloom is a now discontinued line produced by advanced nutrients. It is a two part A+B fert designed for coco. It has a picture of a creepy monkey holding a stick that was dipped in a broken coconut. If you can't find it look into CNS17 bloom (great price) or the Flora series by General Hydroponics. Both are very easy to use. The Flora nutrients are extremely common and are easy on the wallet.

Neil

Tons of roots in GREAT soil doesn't a;ways mean rootbound.
WHITE to me is the key color.
With the right ferts balanced out you can grow stuff bigger in smaller pots.
A balance IS needed to be maintained.

I see a LOT of 1gal/#1 pots growing great plants.
Yours appear to be 3 1/2 - 4 1/2 in pots.

All in all,it boils down to your great growing conditions.
Plants look great.
Don't fix what isn't broken.
Maybe pot up BUT use the same everything you already use.
I see nothing wrong with your plants.
Bigger plants will need more light though.
Something to consider.
Seems you have your grow going great.
Just do the same things with bigger pots IF you have the room for bigger plants.
Your plants look killer now.
Potting up will double+ their size.

Thanks for the reply smoke! It's good to see another old friendly face still around. I agree with what you say. White roots are a good indicator of a healthy plant and good balance. My original plan was to start the Bhut's early and hold them back a bit so that I could have decent set by the time I get to plant out in spring. Unfortunately I had no idea that they would be growing this good and this fast. I've never experienced this kind of growth in soil. In hindsight, I could have waited until mid- to late january before starting them and still had a decent plant. Oh well, live and learn...

Edit: Yes they are in 4" pots at the moment. Good eye. I picked up some 6" square pots for when I get closer to spring. Given how fast the roots are growing I should be able to pot up about about 2 months before plant out and have a decent root ball by the time I make the jump to a bigger pot for the season. I'm shooting for a final pot up size of 1 to 1.5 gallons.

I figure I should probably put the mixtures I'm using for the plants. I use bottled water for all the nutrient mixtures. This is because my water is terrible. Not only is the bottled water better than my tap water, it has the added benefit of allowing anyone to follow the same ratio's for nutrients and have similar results without the need to buy a TDS meter etc.

I started my ventures into coco by reading a lot of the 420 sites. This is mainly because I had a hard time finding information on coco and peppers. I have to hand it to them, they know how to grow. The three nutrients I've been using are listed above, General Hydroponics Flora Micro and Flora Bloom; Advanced Nutrients - Monkey Juice Bloom A+B; Botannicare CNS17 Grow and Bloom. I'll cover off General Hydroponics first and update the post when I can get the ratios and ppm's for the other two.

General Hydroponics 3-part Flora series.

I stumbled on GreatfulH3ad's mixture on my search for info on coco. H3AD's recipe is a modification of the Lucas formula. Both use General Hydroponics Flora Micro and Flora Bloom. As I understand it, the Lucas formula came out of a desire to find a readily available, cost efficient nutrient that would simplify the grow and still produce respectable plants. The use of the two parts also came from the realization that Flora Micro contains everything that Flora Grow contains, so you can safely eliminate it and save some money. The Nutrient and mixture ratio has become so popular that Advanced Nutrients is marketing a line with the same NPK and the same micro nutes. The only difference is in the main source of nutrients. I've been told by my hydro guy that they're discontinuing the line.

The Lucas formula uses a 1:2 ratio of Micro to Bloom. In this case the mixture is 1 Gallon RO water with:
- 8ml Micro
- 16ml Bloom

H3AD's version of the formula is scaled back somewhat for coco and provides a nicely balanced NPK nutrient system. He uses the same nutes but has changed the ratios a little. He still uses 1 Gallon of RO water and mixes it with:
- 6ml Micro
- 9ml Bloom

This mixture ratio produces around 700ppm.

Originally he had been mixing in extra Calcium and Magnesium in an attempt to address the special needs of coco, but has since abandoned it. He has found that there is no need for extra Calcium or Magnesium in his crops. While this ratio grows great 420 friendly plants, it tends to produce somewhat crumpled leaves in peppers.

From what I've been able to find in searching through the hydro sites, crumpled leaves like mine is a sign of a nutrient solution that is too strong. In an attempt to solve this, I'm working on scaling the mixture back to around 500 ppm to see if my plants improve any. So far the new growth is showing a marked improvement.

I haven't really experimented with Cal/Mag much, and have really only used it as a supplement here and there. I may have to use it more regularly at some point to address the increased need for calcium when dealing with hot peppers.

Neil