# learned something new more confusion



## blondlebanese (Jan 6, 2015)

I grow in soil.  I thought that made my grow a organic grow.  now I find out the nutes I use are synthetic.  so do I have to flush the plants between vegg and flowering?  should I flush the soil between grows?  can I use the soil over again?  does flushing remove nutes that are naturaly in soil?  if so why then bother using soil instead of a synthetic medium.   what about organic nutes, are they better?   is there information specific to this subject?


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## The Hemp Goddess (Jan 7, 2015)

What is "better" is in the eye of the user.  Some people like soil, some people like hydro.  Some people like synthetic nutes, some people like organic.

Growing in soil is just that growing in soil--whether you grow organic or not is up to you as you can do both in soil.  Your grow is only organic if EVERYTHING is organic.  In the US organic products are certified and carry an OMRI certification. 

Some soils are organic, some are not.  Not sure what you mean by synthetic medium?  Yes, the purpose of flushing is to remove nutrients from the soil.  Some people do this periodically to prevent a build-up of nutes.  Some people do it between veg and flower, some people never flush their plants, unless they have a nutrient overload.  You do not flush organic grows and that is the reason.  

Organic and synthetic grows differ in how the plant uptakes the nutrients.  In the simplest terms, with organic, the soil feeds the plants and with synthetic, the nutrient solution feeds the plants.  You should be able to find a lot of info on the difference between the 2 types of growing with a Google search. 

When I grow in soil, I grow organic.  I personally find it easier and I like that I can make growing medium and nutrients out of garbage or have red worms turn garbage into great things.  Also you do not have to keep an eye on your pH like you do with synthetic grows.  I reuse my soil.


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## Hushpuppy (Jan 7, 2015)

While THG answered the bigger question, I will try to elaborate a little and answer one specific question you have, which is what do you do now. 

First, "organics" is ALL about microorganisms in the soil. We say "microbes", "microherd", "beneficials", or "beneficial microbes". When someone says the soil feeds the plants, what they mean is that there are millions off microbes in the soil that break down the raw elements and then literally take the "chelated" nutrients that they (the microbes) have made to the roots off the plants and trade them for carbohydrates that the plants produce. 
You can use organic soil, which is soil that has lots of raw materials and loads of microbes to grow your plants, and only give them water, and the microbes will feed the plants until they either, are no longer able to keep up with the needs of the plant, run out of raw materials to break down to give to the plants, or something happens that harms the microbe herd and prevents them ffrom feeding the plants. At that point you can either add more raw materials and/or microbes, or you can feed with nutrient tea, which is an organic, liquefied fform of both raw and chelated materials that can be used by the microbes to feed the plants, or you can switch to using synthetic nutrients and allow the microbe herd to die off.

Some people here with start with organic soil and allow that to feed their plants until its nutrient store is exhausted, then they will switch over to using synthetic nutrients ffor the rest of the grow. With total organic grows, many people will try to use or make "super soils" or amended organic soils. These are organic soils that have extra raw materials added to their mix and then have beneficial microbes added or water with "microbe tea". The microbes then have much more available materials to pull from for making food for the plants.

Now you can use unamended organic soil for growing in but never incorporate the use of microbes. Instead you would begin feeding right away with synthetic nutrients, which will kill off the microbes over time. How quickly the microbes die off depends on the synthetic nutes, the amount used and the pH that the soil is kept at.

Now to confuse you a bit more; you can use synthetic medium to grow in and still use organic nutrients to feed with as long as the medium that you use will support the microbes that are important to the "chelation" process. For example, you would have little problem using coco coir as you grow medium and then either add some raw material amendments to that, and/or feed with organic nutrient teas. This is because the microbes would be able to stay and survive within the coco coir. 
However, as another example; you wouldn't have a lot of luck using "hydroton", or other very coarse aggregates for a grow medium with organics, either in hydro or in soilless.

Now to your main question of what should you do now. For those people who grow with synthetic nutrients, I personally recommend that you flush about halfway through the grow just to prevent buildup. Yes, flushing, if done right will strip out nearly every bit of nutrients and chemicals within the medium/soil. That doesn't hurt a single thing (unless you are using organics. Never flush organics unless there is a majorly serious problem). When growing with synthetic nutrients, you can flush and strip out every bit of nutrients in the medium, and then turn around the next day(or 3 days later) and go right back to feeding, and they will not miss a beat.
Even though you are growing in organic medium, since you have been using synthetic nutrients, you have most likely wiped out the microbes in the soil, so you are officially growing synthetic. You can just continue going like you have been, and just remember that *you *are doing the feeding of the plants (not the soil). 

Whether to flush or not is entirely up to you. If you have been using Fox Farm nutrients from the beginning, I would highly recommend that you flush them one time so that you don't run into toxic buildup when you get to the 7th week of flower (when it is so difficult to bring them back from the damage). To me it is worth the one time flush mid way to keep that from happening. being in organic soil, flushing is going to be a bit messy as it is going to produce a significant amount of mud drain. If that is going to be a problem for you to do that at this point then you can go on without flushing and hopefully not get toxicity. As I said, the choice is yours. I hope this all makes sense and helps


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## blondlebanese (Jan 9, 2015)

great information guys.  so helpfull.  i'm told that my camera won't work with computers.  it's a kodak 100 yellow works under water, nice camera.  have had it 35 years.  guess i need to update.  but, i like dinasour tek.


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## Hushpuppy (Jan 9, 2015)

Do you have a cell phone that has a camera on it and a removable SD card? you can take pics with that then remove the SD card and put it in a card reader and plug into the computer


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## blondlebanese (Jan 9, 2015)

old phone.  no card.  I thought that my adding nutes only added to the to the chelated stuff so I've always used only 1/3 to 1/2 of the recommended amount every other watering.  and so starving the plant.  no wonder why my plants are yellow.  they are out of gas.  this late (wk 9 flowering) in to the grow i'll just add water and see what happens.  the trichoms are 50/50 clear and milky.  I hope with so many yellow leaves trichom development continues.


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## Dman1234 (Jan 9, 2015)

Use synthetic nutes and never flush if you want, not halfway through a grow, and not at the end of flower, with the exception of a major issue you can go the entire grow without flushing and after a proper cure no one will be able to tell.


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## The Hemp Goddess (Jan 10, 2015)

I do like Dman.  I do not flush my plants unless I have some kind of problem that requires flushing.

Yes, you have been starving your plants.  What kind of soil did you use that made you believe that you did not have to feed your plants the recommended amount?


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## blondlebanese (Jan 12, 2015)

i caused nute burn early in the grow now i'm nute shy.  it wasn't the soil.  i just didn't know that the micro organisms died off when feeding synthetic nutrients.  so you agree that starvation could turn the leaves yellow?  at a normall harvest what percentage of the fan leaves turn yellow?  do you think i should add nutes at this stage of the flowering cycle ( 60 days)?  i havent fed nutes in a week because i read that nutes should be stopped two weeks before harvest.  the trichoms are turnning milky so i stopped feeding nutes.  which brings me to another question.  how much time does it take for trichoms to turn amber once they go milky.  seems like forever.  i sing and dance and read stories of encouragement to them.  maybe thay can't hear me  or they don't understand english/spanish/german/polish/french/russian/dutch/swedish/vietnames/or sign(if they can see.


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## Hushpuppy (Jan 12, 2015)

All they understand is nutrients, light energy, temperature, and water. You shouldn't stop feeding them. I am one who does cut off the nutes about a week out from harvest but I have it well calculated so that the plants have enough to carry them to when they are harvested.


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