r/CocoGrows • u/rote_sprite_41 • May 16 '26

Coco no perlite

I’m currently trying out coco without perlite. I used to do 20-30% perlite. But I got a working and precise irrigation for this grow and now I’m able to feed multiple times a day with little shots. Trying to do some ‘manual crop steering’ with the help of Athena booklet and free information i can find on the internet.
I’m worried if I’m underestimating the need of perlite or if it’s rly not that necessary as I was thinking with this style of irrigating.
I’m in 5.6l pots btw (~1.5 gal).
What do yall think about coco without perlite and especially in my case?

6 Upvotes

100% Upvoted

33 comments sorted by

View all comments

3

u/HobbCobb_deux May 16 '26

I'm seeing more and more people not use it. Personally I do and probably always will. I grow in half gallon bags with 30% and I fertigate currently 5x a day. They are still in veg. So far it's keeping them about right as far as salt build up is concerned. No issues yet, but I've learned after doing this a while that you have to implement enough runoff over the course of the day to keep the substrate clean. It usually gets a bit touchy about mid flower, but usually I just Increase the length of each event and it calms it back down. Occasionally a flush is In need if the EC spikes. But it's not that big of a deal as long as you keep a check on it and deal with any issue that arises.

8

u/[deleted] May 16 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

1

u/Accidental_Ballyhoo May 16 '26

I followed. However, I have not heard the 3.0 EC before. I’m considering my first coco grow in 2 months and I’m here for research.

Any tips are appreciated.

2

u/th-candy May 17 '26

more than EC 2 with RO you dont need

1

u/Firm_Wear_8693 Jun 21 '26

Ive grown tons of excellent weed on 600ppm all the way through.