I would not trust those meters too much, the one I had was practically useless, and totally off.
Do you PH your water with it?
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@Shadey I was pretty disappointed with this meater… I have a nice digital meater to PH water so I’m good with that… any recommendations for a digital soil PH meter?
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I agree with @Shadey. Those meters suck. You will need a relatively pricey digital - with a special probe - to accurately read soil PH directly.
Id suggest you over water at least a little bit next time - until there is a good bit of runoff. Collect some of the first bit of runoff and measure its PH. Then collect some of the last runoff and check it. The later runoff should be closer to your waters new PH.
Be sure to let them dry out adequately afterwards and be sure the pots are not sitting in any water. They need to be raised up so the bottoms drain completely and get air circulation just like the sides. Over watering is as bad as anything else - especially if your soil doesnt have good aeration = enough perlite/vermiculite etc.
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@anon32470837 so I watered ths morning and tested the LATE runoff… what I got was actually opposite of what I thought I would have.
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The earlier runoff was about 5.5… the late runoff 5.7 so it was .03 lower than what I PHed to.
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I told you those other meters are useless 
looks like you’re shutting out Calcium, Magnesium, Molybdenum, and P with that PH.
You may need to add a bit of lime to it to bring the PH up.
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Maybe you could do a soil slurry test of the ph and ppms, ph especially, it always seems to be my bugaboo in serl
I am always hesitant to give advice, as I have so much to learn , and regularly mess up to boot.
But there are some things that are known quantities that I can repeat here.
If your soil is 6.0 water at 6.8-7.0 — and if soil is 7.0ish water at 6.0-6.2ish, as you want your soil to sit as close to 6.5 as possible. Stuff probably already said earlier.
If the soil is stubborn and always low, who cares, just water with high ph and ride the swing, in some cases plants love it , cuz they hit all the ph zones from 6.0-7.0 in the same day and get a smorgasboard of nutes to suck up thru the swing 
I am just repeating what others have spent years honing, but it has worked for me in the past, and you may find it works for you.
Teas tend to lower ph too in many cases, so tea and enzyme it, if your serl ph is hi, if your soil ph is low, maybe top dress with some worm castings, as the ph of the poop for me hovers near 7.0. slurry the worm castings if u wanna get anal aboudit, i do
My soil ph is always high, much like it’s creator - so I am always watering at 6-0-6.3 in veg and early flower and 6-4-6.6 in mid to late flower. I also use alot of nectar bone meal to keep the engine running and the roots happy. Plants seem to love it.
Sounds like you are dealing with very low soil ph, so, if it were me, I would water heavily with nectar bone meal at 7.0, to get that soil ph up. then i would do a lite nutes at 7.0, then another bone meal over the course of a week or so, maybe a tea,all with 6.8-7.0 then slurry again.
just spitballing, things looks good, and I wish you the best with your grow.
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@Cartwright @anon32470837 @Shadey
I think I’m finally figuring this out now…
I truly feel like the only way for me to learn is to mess something up… lol
Thanks guys!
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Nothing to be ashamed about, you want to see ashamed, look at a couple of my plants :0
Plants can be finicky, don’t get discouraged, once you get the soil thing you got it.
One other thing i shud mention if no one else has already. The wet dry cycle, yes very dry can be good, and is necessary for airation and pest control. But don’t neglect the super duper wet cycle every once and a while. Some people call it a flush, but in soil, you really never flush, you just drench every so often. heard that on a forum a while back, and i like it.
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The smartest people are the ones that made the most mistakes, providing they learned from the mistakes, growing well comes from experience of knowing, its all theory until applied to a situation, and everyone’s grow is different. Using different strains together can be a pain when they dislike the same nutrient levels and environment.
Do another test in a few days when the soil has had time to dry out properly and see what happens if you PH your water at 6.5 before using it this time, and see how much it drops again. I don’t like relying on just one measurement so I usually check things twice before making a decision, you always have more time than you think, and rushing a decision can make things a lot worse. Sometimes when you are waiting it sorts itself out, the plant will start taking its own action to correct the problem, its only autos that have a time constraint, photos can sit for as long as you want them too.
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That is not the result I was expecting to see - which proves that you get advice thats worth what you paid for it 
I know next to nothing about “Teas” but if they lower PH that much then thats your problem - or - something you are adding is certainly lowering the PH. Either way, your PH is badly off - just not the direction I thought it was off!
I am also no expert on soil amendments, so I will let the others advise you on that.
By the way - these types of issues are one reason I switched over to hydro. Plus, and far more important to me - soil is boring
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Ok so here are the issues I have figured out…
When I water and feed tees to my plant I take tap water let it sit for 24-48 hours. I then PH my water to 7. Add all my amendments and feed my plants. After more research I found out that I should have been PHing my water after everything had been added. This is what most likely is locking out nutrients. At this stage of my autoflowers I would like to be around 6.7 PH so I’m low 1.0.
My question is this…
To raise my soil PH do I flush the soil? This would get rid of all my preamended nutrients that I built my soil with that are now crucial for flowering…? Or can I add something that is organic that will help raise the soil PH???
@Shadey ? @anon32470837 ?
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I have no clue what you could use in soil that is also organic. I dont do organic anything in my hydro grows any more. It screws up my PH like crazy, so I go out of my way to be 100% sure nothing in my rez has any organic component of any kind.
My use of the word “organic” is a little different than the typical use. I am not talking about growing organically or growing organic weed. I mean anything plant derived or from once living organisims of any type. This includes beneficial bacteria and even things like vinegar etc. No “teas” for sure.
Yeah, PH is usually the last thing you check and adjust in hydro as well. - after any additions to the water. PH has to be correct or nothing else works right.
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Yes there are natural things that will raise and lower PH in your soil.
First off teas are really about boosting bacteria not really feeding the plant. With organics you are feeding your soil. You don’t really PH a tea, as that can kill off the bacteria you’re trying to produce.
So during flower the bacteria die off because the P and K input increases and raises the soil PH, so you are battling with keeping the PH of your soil right and bacteria levels high as it switches from using mostly N to P and K.
After the stretch the plant switches over to a fungal bacteria as they prefer a higher soil PH.
By adding certain nutrients in your tea you are promoting the bacteria that use those nutrients for food to repopulate your soil as they die off
Elemental sulfur will lower soil PH dolomitic lime will increase it.
Safers do a sulfur, I use it for killing PM, spider mites and boosting the sulfur in the soil. Epsom is magnesium and sulfur or as it’s called in its salt state, magnesium sulphate.
I use Epsom salts in every other watering. Plants will use a lot of sulfur magnesium and calcium in flower as well as P and K.
Gypsum is high in sulfer, magnesium and calcium, and is also balanced so it doesn’t change the soil PH. I use this a lot.
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So basically the whole time since i started my seeds I have been PHing my water to 7.0. What you are saying is that I should never PH my water? Just give my plants 24 hour tap water with whatever PH it’s at?
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No, although some would argue that its not necessary to PH your water at all. The pot size is what allows you to not PH water, if you have a 10 gal pot or more it naturally buffers the PH, small pots don’t have that capability.
You don’t PH treas, but you would PH your water, and for organic soils you should be PH ing to 6.2 but uaually 6.-6.5 is ok as it allows a swing that covers the nutrients the plants need to uptake. The bacteria are making your plants food, the plant signals the bacteria, its called chitlin signalling I believe, by releasing carbohydrates and enzymes that promote the right bacteria it needs for the nutrients it wants at that time.
All you have to do is make sure that food is in the soil for the bacteria to break down, and provide the right PH for them to thrive in, the teas just add more bacteria to the pot. So you have this constant movement of PH bacteria and food in the right balance, being broken down in the soil for the plant to access.
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Sounds easy when I say it like that, but it’s not 
getting the right amount and balance of nutrients is what I find hard.
Plants will get a deficiency, in one thing, so you add more, but most of the time you are guessing how much, and how fast the bacteria are working, so it’s easy to screw up and throw the whole system out of whack, adding too much of one thing.
With bottled nutrients you know exactly what is going in, what your ph/EC is, all they have to do is guess how much the plant can handle before it burns. Organic is kinda like driving blindfolded and someone telling you left or right on the steering wheel lol.
When you buy these JAW soils you trust that everything in the bag is as advertised but there will always be descrepences, and to know properly, you have to have it tested at some cost, to know exactly what you have at the start, in order to know how much to replace when it depletes. To understand the tiny details of a plants expression of when it needs or doesn’t need something takes a lot of time and experience, to act just before it becomes a problem.
When it’s going well it’s a breeze to grow good weed, but when it’s out of whack it’s a pain on the ass, and frustrates the hell out of me, because there is so much more to learn, to keep it consistent. It’s also why I love it as it’s the challenge I enjoy the most. I would still grow even if I didn’t use it anymore.
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Wow that was spoken perfectly! My hats off to you sir!
I really appreciate all the help. Thanks @Shadey !
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I have a suggestion that may help you here.
I collect my egg shells (chicken) and once I have a good quantity I toast them for 20 min. At 375F (typically just slide them in when cooking something else). After, I buzz them in in a scavaged Magic Bullet (yard sale). Usual caveats about PPE for handling powders etc. I would suggest a top dressing; I typically mix about a cup of Promix, 1/2 cup of worm castings and a tablespoon or so of the powdered eggshell. That’s enough to do a 5 Gal pot.
Toasting the eggshells speeds up the uptake (hint: uncooked is a nice slow release soil amendment).
And best of all – it’s free!
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Appreciate the advice, I did read something about using eggshells before as well.
As for now Im about 2 weeks out from harvest (this was an autoflower). Buds are stacking up nice and looking pretty dense. Unfortunately I never figured out what was wrong 100% but I believe that it was low PH that was causing a nutrient lockout. Since my troubles I have been super diligent about my PH and things are looking (and smelling) really great!!!
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