maxi bloom alternatives?

Indoor Growing Hydroponics
#1

Been away for a few years and wanted to look into getting something going again. I generally grow in coco hempy buckets for the simplicity but at times like dwc when the winter comes around and helps keep the water cool. I’ve tried a lot of nutes; the dyna-gro and maxibloom were the best to me in both simplicity and cost at the time. While the dyna-gro was awesome it was a pain to mix and then ph the mixture. I ran across a members post years ago that all he used was maxibloom from start to finish and didn’t even bother with ph cause it always settled right into the target range, it was easy to mix and affordable. He was right and I started using maxibloom exclusivly. I was so easy to just put a scoop of power into a five gallon bucket and mix then feed. I assume maxi has ph buffers in there to help adjust and lock in the ph? Maybe I got lucky like he did on my city water at the time. Anyways, I’m wanting to startup a small grow again and was looking at the maxi ferts and they have went up a little on price and I remember before I gave it a break I was seeing people talk about jacks line of ferts and how they are affordable. It appears I can get a 25lb bag of Jacks (5-12-26) for the price of 18lb of maxibloom. I’m reading it does not have cal so some calnit is needed. I’ve also found some other ferts you guys seem to mention a lot and am looking at them. For anybody that has used maxi ferts how would you compare Jacks to them in ease of use and ph control, does Jacks have PH buffers?

Here are the other ferts I’m looking at.

jacks
mega crop
master blend
Athena

My new home is on a well and well water is new to me. What I can say is the water that comes straight out of the well is about 5.2-5.5 on the ph meter and it does not even register anything on my bluelabs ppm/ec tds meter. The lowest on my bluelabs (500) ppm/ec meter is 100 ppm to get the first blue light to blink. There’s also a creek behind my house that seems to be spring fed as the water is just seeping out of the ground with a decent flow rate and it also does not register anything on the tds meter and is very clear…so I think I might have a spring that feeds my well. The house has a whole house filter that adjust the ph to about 8 and I get about 100 ish ppm on the meter. My meter is the bluelab truncheon.

So, I have two choices of which one I use but I assume neither has enough cal/mag. Do you guys think a bag of Jacks 5-12-26 with some calnit would work or should I go the 321 route and add extra cal/mag? I have no issues with using maxi and will probably get some but…if I can do it cheaper and still have a easy to use proccess and good results why not. At least the expermentation would be interesting. Mega crop seems to be liked but people say it’s fairly dirty to mix. Master blend is another one I see people talking about. If I had to add mag to jacks maybe some magnesium sulfate for the sulphur content with some calnit for the calcium?

Thanks in advance.

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#2

You won’t get much cheaper unless you make it yourself in bulk. Mega Crop is one I hear but I only use maxibloom and occasionally maxigro for some extra N.

You definitely need to PH, it doesn’t do that for you.

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#3

If you go jacks you will definitely need calnit and possibly magnesium sulfate depending on your water source (probably depends on who you talk to). Masterblend is a similar 2 part mix, same idea.
Athena is popular but $$$, and they mix their micro nutrients into their calnit mix so you’re stuck buying it from them…

Lots of love for jacks here, can’t go wrong starting w/ 321 and experimenting from there.

afaik all of these are PH buffered, but you still have to check to make sure it lands in range.

hope that helps a little. :+1:

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#4

Jacks is definitely not ph buffered. Also, maxibloom is not ph buffered. Masterblend im not certain but i highly doubt its ph buffered. Hell, i even ran advanced nutrients ph perfect line once and still had to adjust my ph.

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#5

I use passive hydro and I would be fucked without a ph meter.

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#6

Did a little digging, you’re correct. It doesn’t look like jacks adds an explicit PH buffer to their mix. I was under the impression that if the solution was resistant to change it was ‘buffered’.

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#7

Thanks for the reply friend. I’ll probably play around with the Jacks and Maxi. Since I’m on a well now I will also need some calmag or calnit or both? As mentioned above my well water shows nothing on my bluelabs EC/PPM meter so I assume it doesn’t have much minerals. The area I’m in seems to be known for springs.

Calnit adds nitrogen …what is too much for bloom since maxi is already at 5%? Any good sources for powered additives I might need like silica and calmag?

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#8

I’ve tried a ton of ferts and I’ve been sold on solution grade gypsum+Maxibloom as my only fertilizers. I do supplement in veg with some jacks 10-30-20 but only because I have it. I don’t like the look of my plants on straight jacks but ymmv.

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#9

Subbed to follow…

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#10

I do need to get a new PH meter soon, I never have good luck with them lasting for long. Any good ones out there that have a replaceable probe and good track record for being accurate and holding its calibration…and affordable? I’d like to find a good one around $60 or so. I see they have combo pens that do tds and ph…are those any good? It would be nice to just have one meter to check both. Are the apera ones any good?

Thanks you!

#11

I use a different brand that costs 100 but this brand is highly rated

45$

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#12

For jacks you will need a form of calnit, it has 100% of the calcium and most of your N. I’d just start with the accepted mixes and then experiment w/ different mixes if you want or need to. ex: 321 or 3.6/2.4/1.0 etc…
There are some really good threads on jacks here:

I go back to them all the time :+1:

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#13

Thank you! I plan on experimenting on some tomato plants since they are so similar, have you found this to be true for you?

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#14

Have several tomatoes ready for a little sidebyside this year. Organic in the ground and Jacks in coco. First time veggies in coco/jacks though so can’t really comment on how good of practice it will be, but I think they have similar requirements. So far they’re just getting the same mix as my pot.

#15

I wanted to try outdoor as well this year since my state allows it, I’ve never grown outdoors. Are they more mold prone, do you plant in the spring and let them go all summer long until sep/oct? I guess you have to since you can’t control the light cycle timing.

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#16

I’m on well water also. PPM is ~500, ph is 7.5

I’ve used MaxiGro/Bloom along side Mega Crop one part and the results were similar Without using Cal Mag OR ph down !

This is my current grow with Nothing but Mega Crop one part…

5 gallon pails with GroBuckets, ProMix HP, 600w MH/HPS

2 x Black African Magic, Cafe Racer and Malawi x Panama, day 44 of 98.

16 Apr The Girls day 44 of 98
16 Apr The Girls day 44 of 981170×1000 213 KB

Cheers

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#17

@HolyAngel Can you explain what you didn’t like about jacks? And what kind of medium are you using w/ the maxibloom/gypsum? Just curious :+1:

we talking weed or tomatoes now? :rofl: sorry i’m celebrating 420 over here I can’t keep it straight!! if its pot, I can’t help ya b/c my state has a strange understanding of what legal means :frowning:

#18

lol…yes I was referring to pot. While I’d like to just plant on in the ground I also loose control over it vs indoors.

Happy Saturday of celebrating for you!

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#19

Is the grow buckets insert coco? Have you ever used coco hempy and if so how does it compare? I experimented and found I like a bucket with half lava rocks on the bottom and the upper half coco with a hole drilled about 3 inch from the bottom.

#20

I’m in ~50/50 Coco/perlite.

In veg at least with the jacks, I haven’t been able to keep any plants looking nice and healthy the whole way. They always look deficient. I’ve seen good results from others in flower but I haven’t had the balls to stick with it through flower when I know the solution grade gypsum+maxibloom puts out quality.

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