Growing Cannabis with hydroponics can be extremely rewarding once you have got it up and running. A hydroponics system has the potential to produce massive yields, using a minimal amount of grow medium. Below is Paradise Seeds 9 top tips to help you on the road to perfecting hydroponic Cannabis plants.
What’s the best vegetation time for Hydroponics
The amount of time that you keep your Cannabis plants in the vegetative state will play a huge role in the final size of the mature plants. Unlike growing Cannabis using organic methods, when growing with hydroponics keeping the plants in the growing phase (18/6) for as little time as possible is best advised. Our top tip here is to range from 7-10 days maximum especially when using DWC or Aeroponics.
How often do you feed cannabis plants with hydroponics?
Just because you normally feed your plants once a day with organics, does not necessarily mean you need to do the same when growing Cannabis using hydroponic systems. In fact, it is actually better when using dripper systems to feed 2-3 times each day during 18/6 (hour cycle) and as much as 3-5 times during 12/12. Our top tip here is to feed little and often and to pay attention to dry back periods.
What is the recommended water temperature for a hydroponics system?
The temperature of your nutrient solution is crucial when growing with hydroponics. The reason being to allow the different salts to dissolve and become fully accessible to the Cannabis plants, preventing a cloudy solution in the water and a nutrient lock out. It is advised to keep your nutrient solution between 18-21 degrees Celsius, so our top tip here is to buy a small aquarium heater that can be set to turn on or off according to the set-base temperature you prefer.
How do you control pH in a cannabis hydroponics system?
Not only is the right temperature important when it comes to the nutrient solution, pH is also a vital component in how Cannabis plants are able to utilize the available nutrients in a hydroponics system. Potential Hydrogen (pH) indicates the amount of oxygen that is present in the reservoir / water tank. Our top tip here is to use a digital pH pen that will allow you to monitor the pH of your solution, and aim to keep between 5.5-6 on the pH scale .
What growing mediums are used with cannabis hydroponics systems
The beauty about growing with a soiless medium means you can use different substrate, for different hydroponic systems. Hydroton, perlite, rockwool, and coco are all used with dripper systems, deep water culture, and aeroponics. Our tip here is to try using different mediums to see which work best for you and the weed strains being grown. Attempt to use drippers with rockwool cubes next to a mixture of 50% coco and 50% perlite, and see the advantages and disadvantages of both.
What are the best dripper systems to feed hydroponics cannabis plants?
Growing weed strains using dripper systems can help take a lot of the hard work out of feeding and can allow your plants to receive a consistent feeding program at the same time every day. Our tip here is to use dripper rings instead of the basic dripper stake, as this will give a much better coverage and keep the entire growing medium fully saturated. This technique works incredibly well using hydroton set up that is left on 24/7.
Boost hydroponics cannabis yields with extra oxygen!
The roots of a Cannabis plant absolutely love oxygen, and especially when it is in the form of dissolved oxygen in the water. One of the reasons why deep water culture hydroponic systems are so effective at producing monster yields is due to the fact they have access to high amounts of dissolved oxygen permanently. Our top tip here is to add an air stone into the reservoir of your dripper systems or NFT systems . Passive hydroponic systems that use gravity to refill the reservoir should also benefit from the added oxygen created by an air pump, as these can often sit stagnant over time.
What is a dry-back period?
One of the most important things about growing Cannabis using hydroponics is to make sure the root zone is kept well saturated and allowed to dry out. These drying periods are known as ‘dry backs’ and can make a big difference to final yields. Keeping the growing medium totally wet when using a dripper system will still produce good yields however try to master the point of saturation to dry with a little and often style feeding program. Our top tip here is to be vigilant and to check how dry your growing medium (coco/rockwool) has become before feeding.
Hydroponics tips – always have a back-up pump!
There is nothing worse than when your pump for your system stops working. Depending on how fast you react it can become a crop killer. Finding out the dripper system has not kicked in, your NFT table is silent, or deep water culture pumps are off can be a terrifying moment, so our top tip here is to always have a back-up pump and air pump. If you are growing with DWC, dripper systems or NFT tables, then spare pumps will be a real life saver.
The 3 Best Paradise Seeds strains to grow in Hydroponics
- White Berry is fast flowering and stays medium height.
- Durga Mata grows short and stocky, perfect for S.O.G hydroponics.
- California Gold is very productive and perfect for hydro.