Day 29 from flip. Jack’s 321 in RO water, Hydroguard, 1.3EC. pH’d to 6.1, swung to 6.6 in 24hours. That’s a pretty typical swing for me atm. Like I said, the pH swings weren’t noticeable at all really in early veg. The res photo shows an aquarium pump in there but I don’t run it regularly. It’s only turned for a few minutes when I add to the reservoir or make pH adjustments so that I can get the solution mixed before I take measurements.
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beautiful roots bud
idk what could cause your changes in PH other than the temp at which you mixed the nutes was different from its final resting temp. that could cause the change.
when i go to mix my water, i heat it to 72 degrees for 24 hours and add declorinator (spelling)
my ph doesnt swing in flower either
(just cut a plant out so i need to update the stream)
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Dunno if this helps but my routine is:
Tap water from my municipal supply is around 8 pH. I fill a 30 gallon reservoir (trash can) in my garden room from the outside hose tap and let it sit overnight. To feed the plants I fill a 5 gallon bucket from the reservoir, add Jack’s, CalMagIron, silica (when they’re in veg), then pHdown. I shoot for 5.8 but only use drops to check pH to see if I’m in the neighborhood. I use an auto-siphon and 18" long ‘automotive’ funnel to move the nutes from the 5 gallon bucket into the Octopot reservoir. I’ve been using this system for a while so I don’t check pH every time. I’ve never checked EC. I don’t check pH once it’s in the rez since I haven’t experienced any issues.
For medium I mix All Purpose Pro-Mix (contains no nutes, but does have myco and some perlite) with additional perlite. I figure the plant will drink its nutrition so the soil doesn’t need to have anything added (it already has myco for the roots). In the past I’ve tried mushroom compost, EWC, etc. but feel it’s unnecessary.
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He mentioned this earlier
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Oh thanks, guess I glossed over it.
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WOW!! I am on my fourth grow with the Octo’s and still have a lot to learn. Never checked PH or EC once I fill the rez. And have been mixing my nutes with straight cold tap water from my well. And they still did amazing.
I never even thought of the temp change when mixing my nutes. Have to give a big Thank You for this conversation. Time to start fine tuning these suckers!!
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You want to get your water from the cold side, if you add anything from the warm side your adding a bunch of mineral deposits from your tank or tankless system.
That’s why it’s best to do the cold water and either get it to 68-72 degrees through ambient temps for 24 hours or adding a 100w fishtank heater for 15 gallons
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Great to have you join in
@Syn pretty much covered your questions
Sorry I’m late to the party
On feeding the recharge 8oz on top
Why not let res empty then mix only 1 gallon of feed with your recharge or specialty custom feed( like compost tea ect.) add to the res for a short time let res empty then fill with your fertilizer mix if you feel it necessary ( what I call water management )
Personally I’ve only once experienced ph swing in the res
the ph was 6.1 in my fertilizer mix then went to 5.8the res
The plant was pickier then most and needed to use ph up
But I find a good range for ph is 5.8 to 6.2
Super soil in Octopots
It really not the best fit
Once roots hit the food source they tend to stop growing
That’s the main reason @BarefootAndBlazed myself and most of us Octopots people. ( I
Nick named the octo-Posse ) 
use pro mix
Also it allows us to give the plant exactly what she needs
Ph is the root of all issues
You may be having these issues due to super soil
A good friend (Who is a very experienced grower ) on a different forum tried and had very limited success with super soil in Octopots he runs coots mix and no longer used Octopots due to his own personal Preferences
Jacks is the best
But if your using super soil why would you supplement at all ( this can cause issues in it self )
Best wishes and good luck with your grow
Paps
The gray haired bandito
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The pap has spoken!
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I always take from the cold side. But have mixed nutes with 60* water. I never thought about the temp change.
Think I will do a side by side. Mix one gal with cold water. Mix one with room temp water and test to see the change.
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Yeah take a inital test after the mix, then come back 24 hours later and check it again.
Should have enough time to equalize temp
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Another member of the Octo - posse here. I aim for about 5.9 when I mix nutes and find ph will end up at about 6.3 in my rez after bit. I don’t know why, but I don’t worry about it now. Mixing done outside of the rez then added.
I’m using Promix HP and Jacks with good results.
I tried using coco my first grow with Octos and it didn’t go as well as I would have liked. Probably me though. Syn seems to have no problems with coco.
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need to keep adding cal-mag because the coco, even buffered still eats up cal-mag
i usually add cal-mag up until the 5-6th week of flower
As Coco has a high cation exchange capacity, when you feed your plant with calcium or magnesium, the minerals may never be available to your plant, as it will be exchanging it’s self for sodium and potassium. Coco coir substrates prefer to bind to magnesium and calcium compared to sodium and potassium. This means that your plant, when given a normal dose of Calmag, will actually have sodium and potassium available to uptake as opposed to the desired Cal-mag combination. By buffering the coco completely until saturation, you can guarantee any further CalMag that that is fed into the media will not be absorbed by the saturated substrates but will sit in-between the spaces of the media ready for uptake by your crops.
Remember when you buffer the media with a calmag solution you have to wash the sodium and potassium out of the media other wise you will get toxicity. If you are half way through your grow and did not take this precautions, taking a calmag and foliar spraying it on your crop leaves can be a more efficient way to directly remedy the problem. Make sure you do this at low light levels or this can results in burning of the leaves. The addition of a wetting agents will aid with the uptake of calcium via the leaves. In addition foliating calcium is a great Idea as it is quite an immobile mineral, which means it has a lot of trouble moving from one are to another regardless of media.
Taken from 3 Disadvantages When Growing in Coco Coir and Their Solutions
When I go to mix up my nutes, I make sure the mix is at room temp, Illput about 10ml of declorinator in 14 gal of water and then I’ll add my Jack’s TAP, bud candy (first 6 weeks of flower), hydroplex (occasionally), silica (3-4 feedings), and once i get that to the EC i want, then i add the cal-mag and set the PH.
i don’t count the Cal-mag at the end for the total EC.
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Just to clarify, I don’t use soil. I’m using buffered Cyco coco coir from a brick. Rinsed and then buffered twice again with CaliMagic and mixed with 40% perlite. When I use Recharge I take 8oz and pour it in a small area right against the stalk so I’m not soaking the entire surface of the coco and it should drain down deeper into the sleeve. I read about this on another forum, whether it is ideal or not is another issue. It certainly doesn’t seem to hurt anything. I do like the idea of layering mycos in the media while packing the sleeve and will try this on my next run.
I notice that while Hydroguard does not alter the pH of my nutrient solution upon addition I have read that the biological activity of the bacteria while they are doing their thing is supposed to raise pH. I am not clear on how much it will raise it in a given time.
I should also clarify that at least one of the two plants is doing fantastically well with impressive growth and no notable deficiencies. My other plant has issues but I don’t believe they are related to the Octopot.
As I only have two plants I’m somewhat reluctant to experiment with letting the pH swing for days to see exactly how high it would get or if it would stabilize at some value. Initially I checked pH and EC every day in early veg and they weren’t moving much. As the plant grows the values change more rapidly. I was just shocked I guess to see how much change was happening inside of 24 hours here in week 5.
As this is my first run with the Octopots, or with any system other than hand-watering in buckets, I started to wonder if the pH swing was just an aspect of the system that was to be expected and perhaps somewhat minimized in the promotional literature. A large rapidly growing plant with a big root mass consuming lots of water would be expected to raise pH as it consumed the nutrient solution. However, it seems some of you do not have this issue even in late veg and peak flower.
I’m very impressed with the Octopots and think the design really is an elegant set of engineering compromises, particularly for casual home grower. My only goal here is fine-tuning my process so that pH swing upwards during heavy growth periods don’t prevent me from leaving them unattended for more than 48 hours. I don’t believe I would come back to dead plants or anything like that if were to leave for five days but at the moment it seems leaving for that long would put my pH in a dangerously high range.
I do appreciate everyone’s feedback here.
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Growing in sunshine 4 using general hydro nutes I never bothered to check ph on the octopot plant I’d grew outdoors. No noticeable difficulties in doing that and she seemed to love the 100 degree days of summer I did however wrap the octopot in a window sun shade to help keep the res temp down.
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Here is another question I’ve been wondering about. From the Octopot FAQ:
DO OCTOPOTS NEED TO BE FLUSHED OR DRAINED DURING THE GROWING CYCLE?
No, Octopot Grow Systems do not require flushing or draining during the growing cycle. The Hybrid nature of the Octopot Grow System prevents fertilizer and nutrient build up in the Hydro Reservoir. Octopots work with a wider range of pH levels and nutrient levels than most hydroponic systems. Plants grown in Octopots utilize the optimum levels of fertilizer and nutrients so they can grow to their greatest potential. Unused nutrients remain available to plants for luxury consumption. Luxury consumption occurs when nutrient levels are above optimum and plants take up more of a nutrient than needed for functioning and production. If you want to flush a plant, simply stop adding nutrients to the Hydro Reservoir and just add clean water.
and the manual:
There is NO reason to drain Octopot Hybrid Grow Systems DURING the grow cycle,
unless you have over-fertilized your plant
I’ve never personally used a DWC system before but I gather from my reading that the general recommendation is to do a reservoir change every 1-2 weeks rather than continuously top it off with fresh nutrients solution as over time some nutrients are consumed more than others and eventually the nutrient ratio in the reservoir will become something quite different from what you are adding to it. I also gather there is a camp that never changes their reservoirs and they claim to have no major issues with this practice.
As Octopots are a closed system, why would it NOT be considered a best practice to periodically empty the reservoir and reset it with fresh nutrient solution?
I constantly read how important the elemental ppm ratios are as an excess or deficiency of one element may affect availability of another element. What is it about the Octopot design that would prevent the reservoir ratios from drifting over time, or, if they do, why isn’t it an issue? If the answer to that is “luxury consumption”, why doesn’t that apply to DWC systems as well?
Do you periodically reset your reservoir or do you just top it off through the whole cycle?
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Hi I allow mine to empty
I reset the res when I do a fertilizer change at specific times during the grow cycle
I have also topped off but I fine it just easier to start fresh and readjust the feed
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I don’t measure. I don’t really do anything besides eyeball mix and drop, even when she ain’t empty. Not what I would do running coco again though. But for soil I would say that it’s definitely luxury consumption for a plant.
This is in coco unmeasured and just banging the bottom of the octopups
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because after 5 days theres nothing left in the res
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