[Kanga]

On this grow, I have been using potassium silicate: https://www.growthtechnology.com.au/product-list/gt-silica/ and as seen in the photo below, it has substantially added girth and strength to the plant.

The recommended dose is 5 mL per litre, which I followed by adding 150 mL to my 30-litre reservoir every two weeks. Potassium silicate is the first nutrient I add to the fresh water, and I make sure it is well mixed before adding NPK. I found this to be super useful as I haven’t had any pests, unlike when I was doing soil.

I have heard of mono-silicic and have already purchased this https://greengenius.com.au/products/grow-genius-mono-silicic-silica-booster. It seems expensive, but because of the small amounts required (0.3 mL per 10 liters), it works out to be far cheaper than potassium silicate. Not only that, potassium silicate has lots of potassium, which can take up unnecessary ppm.

That’s interesting about the silica fallout. What I have done in the past is, if I wanted to add silica to my reservoir, I would add the silica to a 2L bottle of fresh water, let it sit for 10 or so minutes, and then pour it over my reservoir to prevent a nutrient lockout. So far, I haven’t seen any white cloudiness while using this method. In terms of pH, I pH the water once everything has been added.

I have read that different mediums require different pH levels. So far, I have gathered that a pH of 6.5 is optimal for RDWC, DWC, NFT, and Dutch Buckets. At first, I was running a pH of 5.8, as I have heard many people do this; however, the pH uptake scale indicates that a pH of 6.5 allows most nutrients to be bioavailable. I have also read that there can be two different values depending on the stage of growth. I will be researching more into this as each stage requires higher amounts of different nutrients.

I use a mixture of organic and inorganic nutrients. I add a soil inoculant every 2 weeks along with mycorrhizal. But I must say I need to run an A/B to see how effective this is.

[Kanga]

Thank you, CamZ! The information you provided is extremely helpful and will take me some time to fully understand it.

I was wondering how to determine the amount of silica absorbed by my plants. For example, if I added 200ppm of silica to 2 plants, how much would each plant absorb in a week? This would be beneficial to know the weekly requirements per plant to avoid wasting nutrients and or causing toxicity.

I already follow points 1-6 that you mentioned, but I am not familiar with the premade solutions in buckets that you mentioned.

I have noticed tipburn when my EC levels are a bit high, so I will make sure to follow your recommendations in the future.

Thank you again for your help.

[Kanga]

<p style=”text-align: left;”>Ok, that’s interesting. The yellowing was mainly from the top to mid-section of the plant. The bottom leaves were unaffected.</p>

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