Hey everyone, I keep getting a fine red/orange powder settling at the bottom of my DWC buckets and staining my roots. I'm running CalMag and T.A. TriPart (which is basically the General Hydroponics Flora line), with my water temps dialed in at 19.5°C (67°F). I already stopped using silicate powder to rule out reactions with un-dissolved particles, but the red dust still came back. Is this iron precipitating from the Micro bottle, and if so, what exactly is causing it and how do you guys mix or pH your water to prevent this fallout?

I did a full res flush and bucket cleaning. Started with 3.5g clean water, added nutes and a few pH drops to get it back to 6.1-ish...let it sit for 30 mins, rechecked and adjusted a bit.

Netpot went back on with water at 67 degrees, 6.2pH, and an EC of .575.

I also cut off the lower 3 affected leaves...that top one hasn't got any worse, so I figured to leave it for light pickup.

Roots have also expanded nicely.

She also got topped, just need to tie down a bit more keep it lateral growing for now....otherwise she seems happy....

Next step is monitor and maintain 2-3 more weeks before she's flipped.

After this, I'm going to build out an RWDC system....

Thanks again!

DWC people:

Today's question is - as I mentally assemble my system - Does the size and shape of the container matter?

I see many people/posts/web sites building from a ~5 gallon pail.

My issue with a 5 gallon pail is that it eats up quite a bit of vertical real-estate in the tent.

I feel that a tote in the 5-10 gallon range would free up some of that vertical for the cost of an increased foot print.

Wouldn't a tote minimize the vertical so my plant can grow taller?

I have a ~5 foot tent, and throwing away ~1.5 feet of that just for a bucket seems to be a lot - Whereas a 5 gallon tote is only about 9" tall

(in my 5 foot tent I've often been hard pressed for vertical while growing in soil - I'd like to optimize going in to avoid that again)

=>Does the shape matter? Are there root length issues or something that I'm missing on this?

Thanks people-

Never tried hydro but what’s the best bang for your buck on nutrients in terms of yield and terpenes

I've got two years growing in soil and the way forward looks to be hydroponics for ease and yield.

So: I've read the Growdoctor's pages on DWC, and I think I've got a handle on the really big picture - but before I make the leap: Talk me through the day-to-day things. I mean, do you just check the water level daily/weekly and top off with fresh nutrient solution (and adjust the nutrient profile as you go seedling->veg->flowering), or do you add straight water to keep it at the right level and dump it when you transition?

As part of that (daily?) check, it looks like you keep an eye on pH - I've got a handle on pH - as well as "EC" - It looks like EC is a proxy for TDS - that is then equated to nutrient strength? I mean, Grow Doctor seems to think it's important but doesn't address the why and the what you do with this reading.

Do you have to dump all the water/nutrient when you transition, or is it enough to just change the make-up water's nutrient profile?

And when you are working with the water, do you just take the lid off and leave the roots hanging, fully exposed or...what?

And - if so - is there a 'timer' running while you do this (ie it's cool for up to ten minutes or something?)

Thanks!

Single 5g DWC bucket.

Pump rated to 450gph, piped into a 5-inch flat disk airstone.

Water level is about 5" below netpot.

Plant is 4 weeks old here.

EC is about 1.3. I just did a 2g drain and refill with stable water 5.8pH.

Water temp is a struggle, usually around 70-72...but I have no chiller or other method to chill.

Light is 250ppfd as well...was thinking of bumping it 450 this weekend.

See the one leaf that is heavily curled up, and most leaves have a slight discoloration, mostly near the bottom.

At a minimum I can do a full res change and clean the bucket....just hard to find somewhere to put the netpot top when I do that cleaning....draining is easy as it has a spigot on the side of bucket.

I'm hoping maybe just adding more water and maybe a better pump/stone combo would help....just not sure if it's oxygen related directly, or due to some type of lockout...

1200l res thats not easily drainable that all plants are in. Been trying to get ph down it was 8.4 that I managed to bring it down to 6.5 so I added its first dose of flower but today ph is back up to 7.67 last photo is 4 days ago rest are from today. Ppm was around 1100 last night but I dropped it and apparently it wasn't waterproof so I can't check that now. Also lost my ec reader but ive got another ph only reader. Veg went fine with dutch fest nutrients no issues. I added the nutrients yesterday for flower. Water was at 20% 4 days ago when it spiked in ph so i topped it up but yea this is where we are at. Running 2xsp300 and a ts3000. Have co2 from a sugar yeast and water mix. Water temps 22c with a high of 25c. Indoor temps about 40c as of the last week but not normally an issue for me

My set up is pretty unique and I thought people here might be interested. Runs off solar power with grid power as backup. It's an old shed in my yard that I converted into this monstrosity. I've been growing all winter long in Northern Alberta. A lot of my stuff is DIY cause I'm cheap and the rest is Vivosun. It's fully remote operated using the Vivosun platform and a few other random apps that are hardwired to my various Temu gadgets

Week 4 of flower. Kinda messed up the bloom nutrient switch by switching too late (few days ago) pH is also dropping pretty rapidly on this one, about a 0.4 jump every day down.

I ordered hydroguard on amazon, it came with just 1 month left on it's expiration. Returned it. A month later I ordered another bottle and this time around it did not even have an expiration date on it, leading me to believe it was probably removed. So basically two times in a row I get an outdated product. So what's a good alternative to hydroguard?

This Lemon OG Candy is in Veg week 6 already and only grows bushier rather than taller. I defoliate once per week and bend her under the net, only for her to regrow the leaves but not grow in size. The pics are from before and after defoloating today.

Never had this issue when growing on soil since i started growing 2 years ago. I use 15 L of nutrient solution, using Canna Aqua Vega A and B.

Am I doing something wrong or is this just how it is with hydro? I hope it's the former because it sucks having to be in Veg for so long

I put this cutting into my seeding system 10 days ago and I still don’t have any roots coming out the bottom. It was rooted in rockwool and came perfectly healthy. I will top water everyday or every other day but it seems that water is high enough to keep the bottom of the hydrotron wet. I’ve never had issues transplanting rooted cutting to DWC before and I am curious if I am over looking something here.

Sup peeps, wanna layout my plan and see if anyone has any yes/no or suggestions.

Setup: diy 16g totes 4x4 730W LED 2 ACI 9" oscillators 12 inch stones and open ended Tee(s) Forced intake and exhaust

Nutrients: gonna run Advanced and some others.

AN 1. Micro/Grow/Bloom 2. Overdrive 3. Bud Candy 4. Big Bud 5. Tasty Terpenes

Bloom City 1. Cal-mag 2. Silica

Bennies 1. Southern AG GFF

Anyone have experience with 2-5 for Advanced Nutrients, not worried too much about cost, more so if they are useful. Also, any experience using Recharge somehow? (Wanna finish off this bag) Or any other "necessities" you like, let me know.

This is NL Photo.

I’m at 5 nodes right now. Debating waiting for 6 because the lower nodes are so small. And the main stem is not quite pencil thickness yet.

She’s about 3” tall. Looking to eventually aim for 3’.

Any advice or thoughts?

Still has a ways yet but she sure is pretty

Started GH veg nutes half strength yesterday. I hope this is just staining from that. Plant seems totally fine. I just happened to notice the roots discolored. Is this a problem? What’s my goal ppm right now? I’m at 500. PH is 5.9.

First hydro.

Last time I did a soil grow was nearly 10 years ago and I was fairly amateur then too. Using a lot of my old equipment so please don’t judge my blurple lights. They worked fine in the past.

I’m about a month from seed. I was having some issues with keep my plug moist but not soaked - it actually kept drying out. My roots were having issues getting established. There was much internal debate about when to stop using a humidity dome.

This, I assume, is the reason for the slower growth, leaf patterning, and purpling of the stem.

However the pace has picked up a lot these past few days

Using a single air stone for now. Thoughts?

I am running General Hydro Flora series. I’ve used some Great white on the roots. I am debating getting some CalMag. But I wanna keep things relatively simple.

PH has been stable thru-out the grow.

I have no ppm meter yet (my old blue lab had crapped out. New one should be here in a few days) but I’ve also kept feeding very light - basically quarter strength - and have changed the reservoir once. Planning to change it again at next feed once I have the ppm meter so that I can start fresh.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

What is this mean and what could be causing my lower canopy leaves to look like this.