hello fellow growers i seem to be having an issue with my plants that are about to flower, im assuming its a ph issue, i grow in organic living soils, the plants have been doing pretty good so far up until about a week ago when their leaves started twisting and curling, also one of my plants is showing what i believe to be a potassium defiency, i typically feed with gia greens 444 and some craft blend from BAS i also like to add a small scoop of flower amendments just to add it so farm 3 out of 4 plants are twisting its leaves and the one not twisting is showing the defiency i normally water with distilled water as its ph is usually around 6.0 but i may switch after learning that it doesnt hold ph very well, temps are about 77 and humidity is around 60-65 ive tried to foliar spray kelp on the deficient one but seems to make no difference thank you all who can help me along my journey i really do appreciate it
Why not use your regular tap water? I ran into these sort issues when using straight RO water. Easiest way to remedy if you have to use to RO/distilled water is use a little complete nutrient/mineral fertilizer maybe 60ppm or so and ph to 6-7. If running a RO filter you could add a remineralizing filter which adds about 30-40ppm of minerals back. Probably the best long term option if you can’t use your tap water.
i plan to start using tap water some time soon, i believe when i was starting out i was checking the tap water out and if i remember correctly the ph was like 9 something and ppm was pretty high as well so i chose a different water source and i guess i just stuck to it, i do plan on getting a RO system installed and using that water but for now im stuck with tap or distilled, is there any nutrient or mineral fertilizers you would recommend i usually water in mycorrhizae a pinch or so of recharge, kelp about every 3rd watering they get some yah whey i try not to water with straight water, most of the time it does have something mixed, i usually don’t ph as i haven’t needed to in quite some time, i do have a new ph test kit on the way, once that gets here ill do a light flush with proper phd water and ill go from there
That sounds like a good start. I’m not sure you need to flush just water in correct ph’d fert water once pots are light again. If you’ve been doing 6 try watering in 6.5 or 7 and see if there is an improvement.
I’ve tried build a bloom and build a veg which both work.
Im using cutting edge louder powder now which works too.
Cal mag and other minerals can also be added if added fert doesn’t contain them.
The very low ppm complete fert at correct ph has worked best for me when using RO water with organic grows.
first of all some leaves are too much green (either N or Mg excess) bs of THAT could be lockout P and K, so yes there is PK deficiency but bs of what ? deficiency or lockout…
chek ur N,Mg fertilisers
Distilled water in a living soil grow??
Sounds very counter intuitive 
im here to learn, please explain?
i typically use gia green 4-4-4 dry amendments, ive been slowly incorperating BAS craft blend thats a 3-5-2, and i agree its a little heavy on the N i probably used to much castings when mixing my soil, my guess is its a lockout too because i believe ive provided a decent amount of nutrients on top of what the soil already held in it
thanks for the advice man ive been interested in the build a bloom and veg i just haven’t gotten around to giving them a try
If you suspect issues with pH you should test your pH. Just some common pH strips are enough to tell you if your pH is grossly off. Lookup the soil slurry test; I think Hanna has a guide for the procedure on their website.
I was gonna say nitrogen too, needs cal/mag too the edges of some leave all along the the leaf edge dried, leaves folding down, also dark green leaves not enough light?
This is who I get a some knowledge from hes an ass but respected 
I wouldn’t attempt a flush in a living soil.
Do you have any enzymes and fulvic (or humic + fulvic) acid?
If so, I’d water with enzymes, fulvic ( or fulvic + humic), and beneficial microbes (the mycorrhizae is good, and recharge is ok too but not my fave (I don’t like that it has 12% kelp. I don’t want to add kelp every time I use beneficials as it will cause imbalances IME). If you have any EM-1 (or SCD BioAg) or home made Lactic acid bacteria I’d add that in. LAB is super easy to make if you don’t have any.
I like beneficial microbe products that are just beneficial microbes. Great white is a good one.
I’ve also really been liking Fish Brew “Bold FLO” and also their “rise and thrive soil conditioner”.
It might be my new favorite beneficials.
Or if you want to save money, just brew up some compost or casting tea for the beneficials. In a situation where I’m just looking to add micro life (not nutrients too) I like to brew it plain - just the compost tea or EWC (or vermicompost) alone. Or just a little bit of molasses added in.
A good thriving microbial community can fix a lot of issues itself!
All of the above products help regulate soil ph and nutrient availability. If you have any ph issues, imbalances or lockouts those products can help fix it.
It’s usually what I do when having issues in living soil. If I think they are underfed or lacking certain nutrients, I do a balanced feed top dressing and then water with the products above. (or I make a balanced nutrient tea instead of top dressing. Usually the base mix is 1/2 cup alfalfa meal, 1/4 cup kelp meal, an 1/4 cup of malted barley ground to dust and some LAB or EM-1 into 5 gallons of water, then let steep for 24 hours. That covers most bases, but sometimes I tweak it with a TBSP of high P guano if I think they need P too. Or some rock dust or a bit of epsom salt. Maybe some fulvic/humic acids too).
Sometimes I also use amino acids (specifically the nectar for the gods amino because it has less nitrogen than a lot of competitiors and I’m using the aminos for chelating, etc. not N).
I think you already have enough nutrients added, so I’d skip the top dress or nutrient tea and alternate between plain water and the enzymes, humic/fulvic/ + beneficials.
Also, when I used to water soil with plain RO water I found myself having more imbalance/deficiency issues. So I started using tap water again. I just add some organic inputs to it to get rid of any chlorine/chloramine first. My tap water is pretty decent though. Ph is around 7-7.5 and ppm is 100-150 without any filtration.
Using RO and adding minerals back in is also a good option if your tap water isn’t great.
This is all really great information. Thanks for this @TeddyNuggets . I’m curious about what organic inputs you use to get rid of any chlorine / chloramine. I’d love to add that to my repertoire.
@vinivv I have a question about this video, at that end of the video the way he went to talking about using Mag sulfur for whenever the flowers are ripening I am wondering if epsilon salt will work
Seems to high in phosphorus. The main issue for a living soil to thrive is nitrogen inputs.
The P is slowly required, so, with this inputs ratios, we boost the N in early veg and get lockout in the pre flower fase. Excess of P can lock calcium and other cathions.
Flushing can be effective to get down excess nutrients (eutrophication).
As you have the ratios, and knowing the amount used, you can get some clues about the next move, like… If your ph 9 water is duo the presence of calcium and magnesium, maybe using It is going to be just fine.
Really anything works AFAIK. The way I understand it is the chlorine/chloramine react with most organic substances. Just like bleach or pool chlorine, it loses its power as it disinfects. I don’t know all the science behind it. lol. But it’s the same reason why you need to continually add chlorine to a pool or a sterilizing agent to the water of a sterile hydroponic system. As the chlorine disinfects the water (reacting with organic substances) it loses its power.
My favorites to use are either just adding a handful of worm castings to the water or some fulvic acid.
Dr. Elaine Ingham (the “soil food web” lady) and microbe man (the guy from Microbe Organics) both say that fulvic acid is their favorite way to get rid of chlorine/chloramine in water.
I was using BioAg fulvic acid but switched over to ferti-fulvic plus because It’s dirt cheap. It’s a powder and you only need like 1/4 tsp per gallon so a 1lb bag will last a long time.
From the testing I saw it’s higher in fulvic acid than the BioAg fulvic acid too. (in both standard and LAMAR testing)
Em1 is the stuff!! I like to use it to water in organic topdress. Sometimes it goes in the reservoir also. I alternate sometimes with recharge but the em1 is awesome. I make an activated em1 w molasses.(very affordable that way) and keep a gallon around throughout veg and flower. Works fantastic for ph down also as it sits at like 3.6 ph in the bottle.
i have used a bit of kelp on these ladies, on top of the recharge, i try to hit the gals with Yah-Whey its got yeast, lactic acid and humic and molasses i dont think i have and fulvic outside of what’s in the recharge, would it be a good idea to just water in the yah-whey by itself and i may try to doctor up my tap water and give that a go i may also try a compost tea for the microbes, i was once told by a pretty experienced guy that if i ever did need to flush organic soil is best to do so with a tea so your not washing away everything you’ve established i may also do something along that line to get things back on track before flower, maybe my issue stems from the overuse of kelp, now that i think about it i usually add about a half teaspoon of kelp powder to my water along with a teaspoon of recharge almost every watering, ive also been using kelp foliars on the one thats showing the potassuim deficiency to try and slow it down untill i can water again i wonder if thats causing an excess of other nutes while locking potassium out. Thank you so much man for taking your time to give me all this info i really do appreciate it as i try to absorb as much info as possible there’s just so much its easy to forget some things
tested the tap water with some test strips i had for aquariums, ph was about 8-8.5 and ppm was 300+ i also did a slurry test with them and ph was showing under 6.2
In my experience 6.2 is fine and won’t cause issues. Issues start at 6 and under for me usually.