Trouble using AN nutes in coco

Grow from Home Nutrients and Watering
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Howdy folks. I’m new here, but i’ve been growing for 15 years. Mostly in coco, but i have done DWC bubbler buckets and grown in dirt (FFOF with Fox Farms nutes).

Before AN changed their formulation to the newer pH perfect stuff, life was great. I was growing in coco, using the hobbyist bundle Sensi Grow and Sensi Bloom and getting 6-8 ounces per plant in 3 gallon containers. I was using full strength according to the nute calculator, feed, then plain water, then feed then plain water, etc, rinse lather repeat. When I started using the new line, yields and quality dropped. I noticed the buds would smell like perfume, the trichs would either not grow or they would disappear after feeding. They would come back after a couple of rounds of plain water, but the potency dropped. Obviously they were being overfed so I cut back my nute strength. I’m at the point where i am doing maybe 10-12 ml’s base nutrient (Sensi Coco Bloom, half that of the additives) with about a liter of runoff to flush out the salt build up. The buds I am getting now are beautiful and some of the most potent i have ever grown, but my yields are so low it’s not worth the money i am spending on the grow. I use Voodoo Juice for bacterial inoculation, and was using Great White (but i think i got a bad batch, because it wasn’t doing anything and i was getting root rot, slow growth, etc). My pots used to smell of mushroom mycelium when i harvested. So I went through a bag of Mykos and the plants did much better. So I’ve revamped my root additives and I will say since i started using Voodoo Juice again that it made a HUGE difference. Even though i m vegging my plants to about 3 feet in height, i still am not able to raise my nute levels past about 4-600 ppm and my yields still suck.

here’s a quick rundown of my set up:
10x12 room, cooled by 18K BTU mini split.
Lights are a BC Blondes LED
and a 4 foot Cooltube mounted Vertically with a 1K watt HPS in each end - for growing large plants. I like growing large plants.
Water is from a Hydrologic Evolution RO filter system.

currently feeding:
AN Sensi Bloom A&B - about 12 mls each in 2.5 gallon mixing container (gas can, actually)
B52 - 5-6 ml
Bug Bud - only once in a while. I’ve found that i get bigger buds (strangely enough) when I use this sparingly; 5-6 ml when i do use it
a pinch of epsom salts
about 1/2 teaspoon of organic molasses, premixed in RO water.

now with the above formula i get great, tasty, smelly and ridiculously potent buds, but yields suck.
When i feed according to the nute calculator, i get tiny buds, much higher yields, but potency is not there and the buds smell like a lady’s perfume. and that’s y=using the feed water feed water feed water method recommended to me by Customer Support at AN.

can y’all help get back to where i was? I’m at a total loss.

current batch of plants in veg are getting full strength Sensi Coco Grow, roughly 30 mls each, with B52, Calmag, pinch of epsom, molasses, Voodoo Juice and Mykos.

I’m praying someone else has had this problem, because everyone looks at me like i’m crazy.

please help

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@hellraiser and @Tygrow78 use these.
I’m using micro grow bloom

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Try a roots organic sample. Id recommend you try “Surge” liquid. I really think it helps and i use it a lot. Im also not a huge fan of that nutrient sensi bloom (Got some) I prefer roots organic line.
https://www.aurorainnovations.com/8oz-sample
You pay shipping but you get a good size sample.

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Also AN customer support will tell you to use more than you need. I like them and they are helpful but it’s their job to have you buy more

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i appreciate your replies, folks, thank you. I’m trying to figure out why this is happening. I do have my eye on a few other nutrient lines as well. Blue Planet organics c=aught my eye and a friend recommended Heavy 16 - have the heavy on the way. It was cheap and the way he uses it is stupid easy. I’m looking at vegamatrix too.

That being said, can anyone offer an idea of why i have to feed such a low amount of nutes? I try to bump things up and everything goes to heck.

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I use AN PH Perfect in Coco - Octopots and Air Pots. I love it :+1:t2: Just harvested a couple BBA’s

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My experience is yes…use less than they say…and secondly I had a problem two grows ago similar to yours using AN nutes however I was using the Connoisseur A&B, grow A&B flower lineup. No matter what I did pretty much didn’t do any good to fix the problem…but I don’t think it was the AN nutes, I think mine was bad coco coir. I switched to Canna coco and just got a yield of 4oz per plant. Plants were 40" from top of pot to top of plant.

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I’m not sure what’s going on with your grows @freakshow? I’ve been using AN lineup for a few years now. But in dwc.
My first suggestion would be to call growers support, but it sounds like you’ve done that already. I feel like it’s got to be the coco that’s causing your problems because I’ve never heard of anyone else having this issue.
I know lots of people that use AN for hydro and coco.
:v:

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Nice buds, poseidon! thanks for posting.

@sssportsmfg, that’s interesting. Seems when i get my plants up to a decent level of feeding, the fan leaves turn yellow and the buds are tiny. I though it was salt build up from the AN. That being said, I have been using Canna Coco and it’s the only coco i use. Mainly the compressed bricks which i reconstitute with RO water with Cal Mag added. Do you find yourself needing to flush the Canna coco?I thought it was supposed to be the best most washed, least salt in the world. I used the bagged canna for a while then Hawthorne Group too over Hydrofarm and my local store cant get Canna Coco. I frigging hate Howathorne group - it’s the shell company owned by Scotts/Monsanto that’s bought up GH, Gavita, Hydro Farm, Botanicare, etc.

@TyGrow78, yeah, I’ll call them today.

My order of Heavy 16 Grow and Bloom A&B arrive yesterday. I’ll be flushing 3 or 4 of the bigger plants in veg today and feeding the Heavy Grow for a week then they’ll hit the flower room. Fingers crossed

thanks everyone for chiming in. keep the ideas coming please…

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I’ve been thinking, if the coco were the problem, wouldn’t it be a problem at lower nutrient level, not just higher nutrient levels? I mean if it were excess salts, they’d still be there and causing problems in both situations, right?

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Well hell…looks like we had the same problems but on the exact opposite of what each other did, so it’s back to square one…damn if you do and dammed if you don’t lol. I didn’t know when I wrote that, that you were using Canna coco as well. A great big HUMPT… lol

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High @sssportsmfg . Yeah, I’m a bit perplexed as well. I flush a couple plants in veg that looked like hell and the runoff measured about 1000 ppm. So there’s definitely nute build up in a couple strains’ pots. the flushing will continue today. I did flush 3 of the biggest plants (iCookies, Fruity Pebbles OG and Skywalker OG) and fed them full strength Heavy 16 Grow with B52, Epsom salts and Molasses. We’ll see how they react…

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figured i’de give this thread a bump and report my progress. Using AN Sensi Coco Bloom with additives at a rate of 25 ml’s of Base (Sensi coco Bloom) 1/2 that if the additives, and feeding then water then feed then water, as per manufacturers recommendations, works exceptionally well. Just don’t let the coco dry out too much. I’ve added Sensizym to the nute mix and my problems with salt build up are gone. Plants are healthy and making beautiful buds.

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Not sure what you are saying there. The AN nutes are all the same on the bases. Full strength is 4ml per liter. I always just rounded it off to 1 liter = 1 quart…close enough. Which is for the bloom A+B would be 32 ml per gal of the bases A and B. What is heavy 16 grow? Is this your first grow since a year ago?

Marty

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It’s not salt in the coco from not being processed correctly…it’s fertilizer salts, compounds that are not soluable in the medium for the plants to absorb. It is caused by buildup, in other words you add the nutes the plant doesn’t use everything you give them, then you add more and finally it gets to a toxic level. And YES I probably maybe use more that is necessary, but you can’t hurt the grow medium with inocculants. And everyone has their own experiences, but Recharge is the ONLY inocculant that I have used that actually works to end lockout. I flush every other watering with only water or water and organic compounds like Fulvic acid, and or seaweed extract and inocculants. It is two different things, much of the coco out there is processed next to the ocean, and instead of using more expensive fresh water to flush out the coco …they use salt water which puts literally table salt in the coco coir. Fertilizer salts are totally different from table salt. HTH

Marty

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Well, I has found that letting the plants dry out too much between feedings’ watering was my major problem. I haven’t had any plants show signs of salt build up since I started this new routine and my last harvest is smoking phenomenally well. I veg the plants until they almost need to be fed/watered daily, then feed one day, water the next. It’s working very very well.

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Yep, that is what I do as well, but I also put the Recharge in there just for safety. I do it at about 1/2 strength just to give them a little help every other day. What it really comes down to is whatever works for your grow, as long as they are healthy and come out great, that is all that matters.

Marty

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very well said, my friend. This harvest, I took tester buds and quick dried them. They smoked like they’d been cure for 2 weeks. Very smooth, not harsh at all and very flavorful. I’m doing my happy dance.

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